There's so much you can learn about writing good fiction from reading bad fiction

[seriousfic]

So you know how in every sci-fi story ever, the hero doesn't have all the information but there's a wise mentor figure or someone who knows everything? And mentor dude doesn't reveal anything but bits and pieces to generate fake suspense because "there isn't time to explain" or "you're not ready to understand."?

I think it says something about me that in the two stories I'm working on...

1. "You're not ready to understand" translates to "You're not yet onboard with our villainous plan."

2. The protag keys to the fact that the others need him in specific for something, so he says "Listen, D-bags, either you tell me the whole story right now or I'ma gonna go to the authorities or maybe just chillax at Starbucks while you guys suck it." And he gets the background, but the Cliff's Notes version of it, and one told to him by an unreliable narrator so that there's still room for surprises. You know, "Hi, I'm Joe," not "Hi, I'm Joe and I'm sleeping with my best friend's wife and my neighbor is a terrorist." Finding out about his best friend's wife and terror-neighbor comes later.

Instead of "Hi, I'm... YOU ARE NOT READY TO DISCOVER THIS INFORMATION! QUICKLY, WE MUST JOURNEY TO DOOM HILL AND NOT MAKE ANY CONVERSATION ALONG THE WAY!"

Comments

[cissie-king.livejournal.com]

There is one that pisses me off too. The villains that lose a battle and inmediately say "Bwa ha ha! It doesn't matter because I have already won!" or "Yes, everything is going according to plan."

And it never makes sense unless the plan is to have the heroes' foot in his ass all the time, cause that's all he gets!

I hate it. It's obviously used by writers who have no long term plan so the villain has no actual plan.

I hate that one.

[destiny-happens.livejournal.com]

not to sure what ur talking about but, haha!!

[runa27.livejournal.com]

Hee! Yeah, I love playing with tropes too.

For instance, you know how 99% of the time, Aliens are humanoid and speak English and NOBODY COMMENTS ON THIS? Not to mention the idea of aliens watching our TV and listening to our radio, without a way to decode or reconstruct the former? Or deciding immediately to visit us? And automatically having either vastly superior or vastly inferior tech? And being able to reproduce with us and everything???

I have a story where all of the following is true:

*The aliens manage to create radio telescopes, but think that the broadcasts they eventually start to pick up from us are either fake or interference from local stations for MONTHS before they figure out where it's really coming from. And they can't get TV broadcasts because TV breaks apart a lot quicker and besides, is specially encoded - so they don't even get a full picture of what we look like for DECADES, and then it completely blows their minds. ;)

*The aliens DO NOT immediately decide to land on Earth, and in fact keep the discovery of us under wraps from the general public on their world for decades.

*They don't ONLY speak English. They also speak Spanish, French, German, Chinese, Russian, and Japanese, just to name a few. Because they only speak any Earth languages at all because they spent decades making their most brilliant linguists try to decipher the "most common/popular" languages. When they land, they go through a couple different languages before they hit English, and even then, their English is considerably "old-fashioned" and "quirky" by then-current standards.

*The sheer fact that on two planets light-years apart, the dominant species ended up being bipedal, with mammary glands on the chest, opposable thumbs, eyes facing forward, relatively similar scent organs, and a remarkably similar set of vocal chords, in ADDITION to developing verbal language, culture, art, music, computers, radio, television and advanced astronomical equipment... is at first met with disdain and disbelief. And then when it ends up being true after all, it inspires the creation of multiple cults. Meanwhile, evolutionary biologists are both dumbfounded and ecstatic.

*...and the aliens still have trouble interacting with humans because among other things, they have twitchy tentacles on their head, color-changing skin (like certain squid and octopi do) and can make and percieve of tiny sounds outside our normal hearing frequency, all of which combine into a subtle body of non-verbal communication and communicative nuances that's utterly foreign to us... and of course, we "bear our teeth" in a supposedly friendly gesture. (Seriously, I have only seen ONE SF story that I can recall at all that ever addressed this fact! And for that alone, I remember it: it's a novel called "The Ark")

*The aliens are actually about as advanced as we are at the start of the story (did I mention it's from the alien planet's POV mostly?). When it finally comes out that we exist, a considerable amount of debate occurs as to why it even matters, since they can't exactly get to us or vice versa, hmm? Eventually, when they decide that, weeeeell OK it's worth checking out, the very knowledge that we do exist causes a leap in technology... or in other words, a Space Race, and that's the only reason they're able to make it here at all.

*...and even then, it takes them quite a few years, and even then, they almost kill themselves trying to park and basically crash-land on top of Space Mountain. It's at least 3 hours before the news media decides it isn't a hoax.

*After they've figured out what language they should be using, their first words are pretty much: "We Come In Peace! Um... and pieces. Um, sorry?".

*No interbreeding is possible, by the way, because though both species curiously managed to develop milk glands and (relatively) similar outward physical appearances, the aliens are hermaphroditic with copper-based blood, on top of which, their mating method involves organs, senses and glands we don't even have.

I keep meaning to get back to work on that story. :\