Joe Vasicek

Familiar vs. original vs. WTF?

In writing, you’ve always got to strike a balance between things that the readers find familiar and things that might be original or new to them. Every genre has its own standard set of tropes, plot twists, character archetypes, and other such story elements, and even if the readers can’t explain them all to you, they know them well enough to tell when something is off.

Different genres strike different balances between the original and the familiar. Romance tends to lean more toward the familiar, with happily-ever-after (or happy-for-now) endings a fairly ironclad rule. Fantasy tends to have a little more originality, depending on the subgenre, but there’s still a host of familiar tropes and world-building elements that you can usually expect to find. Anime tends to go pretty crazy with the original elements, but even in a wacky show like Hetalia there are still a bunch of anime-specific tropes that ground the story in a degree of familiarity.

A great way to introduce originality is to pull a common trope or story element from a different genre and adapt it to a genre in which the readers are much less familiar with it. This is what Suzanne Collins did with The Hunger Games: she borrowed elements from suspense and thriller, and combined them in a novel that was solidly grounded in YA. As much as I hated the book, I have to admit she did a very good job blending those elements into another genre.

So combining familiar elements in unfamiliar ways is one way to create originality. But another way–and potentially a much more risky way–is to throw in something that the reader has probably never seen before.

I don’t know why, but as a writer I seem to be drawn to these stories–much more so than I’m drawn to them as a reader. As an example, when I wrote Star Wanderers, this weird polygamy element got woven in, with the best friend of the female protagonist trying to convince her to share her husband. I have never read a story where anything like that happened, but that was where the story wanted to take me, so I followed it as best as I could.

The danger in throwing in something that is so far outside the realm of familiarity is that the readers will go “WTF?” and get thrown right out of the story. With Star Wanderers, I tried to do my best to develop the characters and convey their motivations in order for it all to make sense, but it was still really hard to write because I didn’t know if the polygamy thing was something that they’d swallow. And when you’re worried how the readers are going to respond to you story, it can be very hard to write it.

I suppose I should give more credit to my readers, though. Their experience is probably a lot broader than I think it is, and their hunger for strange new experiences may actually be stronger than I can ever fulfill. With Star Wanderers, I got a handful of reviews saying that I should have taken the polygamy thing further, or that I should have paired up characters in ways that I’d never even considered. I’m sure there were others who were disgusted by the whole thing, but the books are still selling, so it’s clear that I didn’t alienate everyone.

Right now, I’m writing Strangers in Flight (Brothers in Exile: Book III), and I’ve got another element in there that you don’t really see very often in any genre–at least, not in the way I’ve chosen to play it. It flirts with the taboo a bit and I’m sure it will make some people uncomfortable, though probably not as uncomfortable as it will make me to know that people are actually reading it.

For that reason, writing this book has put me in a weird mental headspace that’s making it very difficult to finish the thing, no matter how many deadlines I give myself. I’m still going to write it, and unless an unforeseen disaster happens I’ll finish it in time to publish it before the end of the summer, but it won’t be easy.

That said, this is a really fun story. Aside from all my fears about how readers are going to respond to it, I’m having a blast writing it. So maybe I should just put that other stuff out of my mind and focus on what I enjoy about the story. Because if I enjoy the story, then you probably will too.

“It was too short.”

This, by far, is the number one criticism I seem to get in my negative book reviews. I never quite know what to think of it. On the one hand, a reader wouldn’t say something like that unless they thought it was good, since if they hated the book completely they would say something like “it was blessedly short” (and yes, I have gotten reviews like that). On the other hand, some of them really get worked up about it, to the point where I doubt they’ll ever read anything I write ever again.

Just to be clear, I’m not opposed to negative reviews, and I’m not responding to any of my reviews in particular. As a matter of principle, I believe that reviews are for readers and not for writers. I don’t generally respond to reader reviews except in very rare cases, and never to tell the reviewer that they’re wrong.

With that out of the way, what does “too short” actually mean? I can’t speak for all readers, but for me, when a book is too short it usually means that something in the story itself felt unsatisfying. In other words, something felt undeveloped, or rushed, or cut short without ever coming to a conclusion (or, in the case of cliffhangers, at least to a natural stopping point). In other words, “too short” isn’t a function of words or of pages, but of the story itself.

I’ve read short books that felt like they fit their length perfectly. A Short Stay in Hell comes immediately to mind. That book is a thin novella, barely more than a hundred pages in print, and yet it comes together so masterfully that I honestly don’t know what else could be added to make it longer. I would love to have more time to explore that particular world, but as it is, the story comes together perfectly within its own length.

That said, there are other books that I felt were too short even though they did fit their own length. That Leviathan Whom Thou Hast Made is an example of an award-winning book–clearly well written, clearly well constructed–that left me unsatisfied because it felt too short. Here, though, it was less a problem with the story itself and more just that I wanted more time to explore the alien culture of the swales. I would love to read a full-length novel set in the same universe, if for nothing else than for the fascinating world-building.

This makes me wonder: are there certain forms of fiction that tend to get more ire from readers just because of the constraints of the form? Do some readers hate novelettes just because they’re novelettes, or serials just because they’re serials? Judging from my own reviews, that seems to be the case. Even if I wrote the best novelette in the world, they would hate it because it’s not a novel.

So what am I supposed to do when readers tell me that my books are too short? Should I set a minimum word count and not publish anything unless it goes over that word count? I really don’t think so, because that sounds a lot like padding. Instead, the only solution that I can see is to focus on telling the best story and to not even worry about the length until it’s finished (and even then, only to know whether to label it a novel or a novella).

In the case of series, sometimes it can be difficult to tell whether to bring a certain thread to a conclusion or to leave it unresolved as part of the overall series arc. Certainly, each individual story needs to have an arc of its own, even if it ends on a cliffhanger. I’m still learning as I go, especially when it comes to writing series. But it’s certainly a lot of fun for me, and I hope it’s fun for you too as a reader.

In short, there’s not much I can do other than keep telling stories as best as I know how, and learn what I can from each story in order to tell better ones in the future. If “too short” means that something was unsatisfying, I’ll do my best to learn from it. But I’m not going to pad my novellas into novels just to hit a certain page count. The story itself should determine its own length.

Looking ahead

Sorry not to post anything new in a while. This past week has been rather busy/disorganized for me, which isn’t helped by the fact that I had my last wisdom tooth pulled today. I’ve swallowed so much blood that my mouth tastes like I’ve been sucking on an anvil, and I can also feel a piece of exposed bone with my tongue. Awesome.

So I’m in the middle of Strangers in Flight (Sons of the Starfarers: Book III), and it looks like I’ll have to do a fairly substantial revision. That’s going to throw off the publication schedule a bit, but hopefully not more than a couple of weeks. Comrades in Hope (Sons of the Starfarers: Book II) will be out by the end of June, and Strangers in Flight will be out sometime in August. After that, I’ll take a break to work on some other projects and write the next three Sons of the Starfarers books.

I really enjoy writing in series of novella-length books. I know that a lot of readers complain when writers chop their stories into parts rather than packing them all into one full-length novel, but novellas come a lot more natural to me than novels. I probably won’t go any shorter than Star Wanderers: Outworlder (Part I), which technically is a novelette–novelettes lean more toward short stories in terms of structure, whereas novellas have a lot more room to play with (but not so much that you get lost in it).

What I’m thinking about doing from now on is writing novellas to start off with, and if a series does well (like Star Wanderers), to write a couple of full-length novels with the same characters. I can put out novellas a lot faster than I can put out novels, and putting them in series is a great way to build traction across a whole lot of books. And if the series is successful enough, then I know that a novel with the same characters will do fairly well too.

It’s kind of like Star Trek, in a way: it started as a TV series, then spun off a bunch of movies with the same characters. Which makes me wonder, why didn’t Voyager ever get a movie? Voyager was my favorite Star Trek series, and I totally think it deserved a movie or two.

In any case, I definitely want to write a Star Wanderers novel bringing back some of the main characters from that series. I’ll probably work on that after finishing Strangers in Flight, though with how long it takes me to write a novel, it may be a year before it’s ready for public consumption. It’s definitely on the list of books to write, though.

In the meantime, Sons of the Starfarers is going to consume all of my attention for the next month or so. I’d better get some sleep so I can work on it tomorrow. So much to do, so much to write … but I think you guys are really going to like it when it’s done!

Brothers in Exile — excerpt 11

“What do you think?” said Aaron, breaking the silence that had inadvertently fallen between them.

“The design for the cryotank is crude. I don’t think we can thaw her with any of the equipment here.”

“We’ve got to take her with us, then, and find someone who can.”

Isaac frowned. Something about that idea made his stomach turn.

“We’ve already gone further here than we ever should have,” he said. “Besides, for all we know, she’s already dead.”

“Dead? What are you talking about, man? If there’s even a chance that she’s alive, we should do all we can to save her.”

He’s right, Isaac thought to himself. Still, something held him back: a sense of foreboding that screamed at him to go back to the Medea and forget that they’d ever come to this place.

“Someone else will come eventually. If she’s still alive, she’s frozen in stasis, so it won’t matter how long it takes for someone else to find her.”

“And what if those people are slavers?” Aaron asked. “You really want to take that chance—to have that on your conscience?”

“No,” Isaac admitted.

“Then let’s bring her out. There’s a freight airlock not too far from here—it won’t be difficult to load her up with the rest of the cargo.”

“Do we have the space, though? Our hold is still full from Nova Minitak.”

“If we don’t, we’ll just dump enough to make room. It won’t be much, and saving this girl is a lot more important than our next trade anyway. Besides, we’ve built up enough credit in this sector that the loss shouldn’t be a problem.”

Isaac nodded slowly and took a deep breath. “Right. I’ll get a maglift from the maintenance room, then.”

“No need—she’s already loaded up on one. All we’ve got to do is take her out.”

Right again, he thought, checking the underside of the cryotank. They really did want someone to take her. It was as if the girl was the last hope of a long-forgotten people, a precious artifact lost across space and time. How long had she lain here, waiting to be brought back to the realm of the living? He traced the intricate henna patterns with his eyes and wondered why she’d had them done. Perhaps someday he’d be able to ask her.

This is the final excerpt for Brothers in Exile (Sons of the Starfarers: Book I). It’s also the last weekend in which it will be available for $.99. To pick up a copy, visit the links in the sidebar.

I hope you’ve enjoyed these excerpts–posting them has been something of an experiment for me. Now that they’re complete, I’ll get back to blogging like I normally do.

As always, thanks for reading!

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Brothers in Exile — excerpt 10

A mostly decayed body lay curled up beside a small cylindrical storage tank in the middle of the floor. The body itself wasn’t much different from any of the others, but the tank was something else entirely. It was built like a coffin, with the upward-facing part made almost entirely of glass. And inside of that glass was the perfectly preserved body of a beautiful young woman.

Chills ran down the back of Isaac’s neck as he stared at her. In this mausoleum, she stood out like a brilliant young star in the midst of a dense, obscuring cloud of gas and dust. She was a little shorter than Aaron and probably not much older, with long black hair and dark olive skin. Her face was round, with dark eyebrows, a flat nose, and full lips. As with anyone under cryo, she was naked, though she had a full-body henna tattoo that almost made her look otherwise. It ran from her wrists and arms across her chest and down past her navel, which was obviously the center of the design. The dark brown ink seemed to form a set of intricate parallel fractals, reflected across an axis that ran down the center of her body. The fine attention to detail was almost religious in its precision.

“She’s gorgeous,” said Aaron. “Have you ever seen anything like her?”

“No,” Isaac admitted. He ran his gloved fingers over the glass as if to reach out to her. The henna designs accentuated the natural curves of her body, emphasizing every feature while imbuing her with a sense of poise and dignity. Instead of feeling like a voyeur for staring at her, Isaac felt as if he stood before a shrine.

Brothers in Exile (Sons of the Starfarers: Book I) is available until Sunday as a $.99 ebook. Check out the links in the sidebar to pick up a copy! After Sunday, the price will go up to $2.99. Thanks for reading!

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Brothers in Exile — excerpt 9

“I’m turning a corner,” said Aaron, his voice as clear as if he were standing just a few feet away. “If this is like Megiddo, then—yep, the corridor continues on the other side of this maintenance room. Following the blue arrows. Passing one door, two doors …”

The display screen flickered, then showed a new menu with dozens of option sets. Most of them had labels like SECURITY DECK 2A and brought up a password field when Isaac tried to select them. At the top, though, he found an icon labeled PUBLIC ACCESS. He selected it, and a new menu opened up, this one not unlike the main screen on the Medea.

“… four doors. Arrows end here. It looks like someone left it open. Stepping inside …”

Isaac scrolled down to where the ship’s log would usually be. Of course, there wasn’t one for the station, but there was a document file labeled TO WHOEVER COMES. He selected it.

“… It’s the station master’s office, all right. There’s an official looking desk with its own terminal and dual displays. There’s a wallscreen, too, but it’s dead, with a crack down the center.”

To whoever comes, the document read. I am write this station master Nova Alnilam. Datestamp 1.8.1192, New Pleiades reckoning. We are very tsavadet, food medical supplies are tvilo adamansvi since two year, no can we contact outside star …

“Looks like there’s a side room. Door is open, just like the main one. There’s a lot more dust here for some reason, not sure why. Stepping inside right now, and—holy shit!”

Isaac’s blood ran cold.

“Aaron? Aaron, what do you see?”

“You’ve got to come see this, Isaac. You’ve got to come right now.”

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Brothers in Exile (Sons of the Starfarers: Book I) is now out–check out the links on the sidebar to pick up a copy! It’s $.99 right now, but after Sunday the price will rise to $2.99.

One or two more excerpts, and I’ll be finished. Thanks for reading!

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Brothers in Exile — Excerpt 8

They set off down the windowless corridor, their helmet lights illuminating the way. Little flecks of dust lit up like tiny stars as they walked by, suspended peacefully in the air until the wind from the brothers’ passing wrenched them back into the darkness. With the closeness of the walls, though, Isaac felt a little more at ease.

Aaron was right—this place was designed a lot like their home station back in Delta Oriana. He almost expected to see icons on the lintels of the doors they passed, or catch the smell of incense wafting from one of the local deck churches. Megiddo Station hadn’t been much bigger than Alnilam Station, and it was only a few light-years closer to the Coreward Stars. The Oriana Star Cluster was still squarely in the Outworlds, but it was settled thickly enough that none of the systems was completely isolated from the others.

Not that that had saved any of the ones who had stayed behind.

“I wonder if these arrows on the ceiling mean anything,” Aaron mused. “The green ones go back to the stairs, but the blue ones seem to lead somewhere else.”

Isaac shrugged. “So long as we don’t get lost.” Since the station was small enough that they could walk the whole length of the rimside corridor in less than an hour, there wasn’t much danger of that. Probably.

The corridor came to an end at a maintenance closet. The door was open, giving them a view of the equipment lockers and control panels for the stationwide systems. Surprisingly, the computer terminal seemed to be in pretty good shape.

“I wonder if we can access the station records from here,” Isaac mused.

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Brothers in Exile (Sons of the Starfarers: Book I) is available for $.99 from Amazon, Amazon UK, Smashwords, Barnes & Noble, and now Kobo. The price will rise to $2.99 by the end of the week, though, so be sure to get it now if you want it for less.

I’ll post a couple more excerpts between now and then before resuming my normal blogging schedule (inasmuch as “schedule” describes anything that goes on around here …). In the meantime, thanks for reading!

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Brothers in Exile — excerpt 7

Isaac sighed heavily and shook his head. “Haven’t we seen enough already? Everyone is dead—that much is abundantly clear. We can refuel the ship from the external tanks, so there’s no need to investigate any further.”

“Yeah, but don’t you want to find out what happened to these people? Maybe if we go up, we’ll find some sort of—”

“No.”

Even through the copper-tinted faceplate, Isaac could see his brother’s scowl.

“Come on! Why are you always the one who decides these things?”

“Because I’m the oldest.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

Isaac didn’t answer. Now was not the time to get into another argument about who was in charge and whether Aaron could take care of himself. Stars knew they had far too many of those arguments already.

Aaron took a deep, raspy-sounding breath. “Well, fine. You do what you want down here. I’m going to go check out the upper levels.”

“What? Hey, stop!”

But Isaac was too late. His brother was already heading toward one of the narrow stairwells leading to the upper decks of the station.

“What the hell are you doing? You come back right now!”

“You’re not my captain. I don’t have to do what you tell me.”

“Dammit, Aaron! We’re supposed to stick together!”

“Then come with me. It’s not so bad. If everyone’s dead already, then what’s there to be afraid of?”

Take a look around, you idiot.

Isaac took a deep breath and clenched his fists. “Aaron, please. Think about what you’re doing. This isn’t the time or the place to throw a fit like this. This station isn’t safe. We should go back to the ship and get ready to leave the system.”

“You’re not going to stop me, Isaac. I’m going.”

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Brothers in Exile (Sons of the Starfarers: Book I) is now out on Amazon, Amazon UK, Smashwords, and Barnes & Noble. In a couple of weeks or so, it should be out everywhere else. Right now, it’s available for $.99, but the price will go up to $2.99 at the end of the week.

I really hope you guys enjoy reading this book as much as I enjoyed writing it. 😀 If you do, please writing a review so that someone else can enjoy it as well!

Here are the links to the other excerpts I’ve posted on the blog so far. As always, thanks for reading!

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The next few months are going to be CRAZY

I knew that back in March, but with Brothers in Exile about to be published, I’m right in the thick of it! Fortunately, it looks like everything is proceeding more or less according to schedule, which is good for my readers because it means a steady stream of books all summer.

First of all, I’m just about ready to publish Brothers in Exile–in fact, if all goes well, I should be able to hit “publish” tomorrow (it still takes about 24 hours for the book to actually go up for sale, but yeah). Yesterday I got the cover art, today I went through all the edits, and tomorrow I’ll write up the author’s note, format the thing and put it up on Amazon, Smashwords, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble.

The second book, Comrades in Hope, is coming along quite well and should be ready in six weeks at the latest. I’ve gotten enough feedback from my first readers to do a quick revision draft, probably in about a week or so, before getting the publishing gears ready to grind. My first readers ate this book up–many of them said they finished it in one sitting. It’s short, but not super short–about the length of a 60s sci-fi novel–so that tells me it’s just about ready to go.

The third book, Strangers in Flight, is going to be a bit more tricky, but I should be able to get it out six weeks after Comrades in Hope. I’m still writing the first draft, and am maybe 1/4 to 1/3 of the way through it, but the story is coming along well and shouldn’t hit any major snags <crosses fingers>. I know exactly how it’s going to end, and I predict a lot of you are going to squeal at the cliffhanger, but don’t worry–I’ll try to throw in at least some resolution, since it might be a few months before book IV.

Right now, I foresee at least nine books in the Sons of the Starfarers series, perhaps as many as twelve. Like Paul Atreides, I can only catch a few fragmentary glimpses of what will happen in the next few books, but the overall direction is very clear. These books are going to be a lot of fun to write–if you guys enjoy reading them as much as I’ve enjoyed writing them, you’re in for a real treat.

The books are fairly short–not as short as the Star Wanderers books, but not too much longer. They straddle the line between novellas and short novels, kind of like the long-form science fiction from the golden and silver ages. Unlike those books, though, these are more character-driven than idea-driven, with the overarching galactic conflict tying all the characters together, rather than the other way around.

Once I’ve finished writing Strangers in Flight, I’ll take a short break to work on some other projects. I’ll come back to Sons of the Starfarers sometime in the fall, though, with the same grueling schedule for the next three books. It’s hectic but fun–I’m definitely not complaining.

So that’s what the next few months are going to look like. With luck, tomorrow will be the day I upload Brothers in Exile–I can hardly wait to get it out to you guys! Definitely look out for it in the next couple of days or so!

Brothers in Exile — excerpt 6

They found the first body a short while later. It had decayed so much, with the skin stretched tight across the dry old bones, that it almost looked like a bag of discarded waste. Only when they came up to it did the human form become apparent.

“Stars of Earth,” Aaron swore, jumping back. “What is that?”

Isaac crouched and gripped one of the curled up arms as gently as he could with his oversized gloves. The suit did not transmit the sensation of touch, but the blackened skin peeled off like dry paper, the bone snapping off at the elbow joint. In the eerie silence of the station, the crack of the broken bone sounded surprisingly distinct through the external mike.

“What are you doing?”

“Investigating,” Isaac said softly as he laid the bone back in place. The body was curled up in a fetal position, with ribs poking out from the stomach and stringy black hair still hanging from the scalp. It was roughly adult-sized, with the gaunt remains of facial muscles pulled back from two rows of worn, flat teeth. Strangely, there was no sign of clothing—perhaps the colonists had preferred organic fibers over synthetics. Either way, the only indication of the body’s sex was in its bone structure, and Isaac didn’t know enough about that to tell whether it had been a man or a woman.

“Sol, Earth, and Luna, Isaac,” Aaron swore. “Step away from that thing.”

It’s not a thing; it used to be a person, Isaac wanted to say. Instead, he stood up slowly and took a step back.

“I can’t tell how long it’s been since he died, but clearly, it’s been a while. Years, at least.”

“At least,” Aaron agreed. “Stars, it gives me the creeps.”

Brothers in Exile (Sons of the Starfarers, Book 1) is coming out this weekend to Amazon, Smashwords, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble. It is a novella about 36,000 words long–about the same length as Star Wanderers: Deliverance (Part VIII), perhaps a bit longer. It will be $.99 the first week, and $2.99 after that.

To be notified when it comes out, be sure to sign up for my new release email list if you haven’t already. Or you can just keep watching this blog.

Thanks for reading!

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