​When it comes to weighing morality in fiction, different types of characters seem to be measured on very different scales.

Some character types can get away with things that others can't, while others can be subjected to far more violence with less moral outrage from the audience and other characters.

1. Sparing the top villain is more important than sparing the underlings.
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The heroes have done it. They've cut, burned, shot and bludgeoned their way through the enemy horde, and they've finally reached the person behind it all. The one who's been sending all the minor enemies into battle.

The one person whose death would make the biggest difference toward ending the conflict for good.

But... "No, you can't! Killing is wrong! If you kill him, you'll be just like him! You're the good guy - you're supposed to be a role model of mercy for all the impressionable children watching this!"

The fact that they just killed dozens, if not hundreds, of underlings in order to get to this guy might not even be mentioned. Those guys are generic and disposable. (Yes, I'm looking at you, movie adaptation of Prince Caspian.)

But Heaven forbid that the heroes kill a NAMED villain with a personality. That would be un-heroic! They should stick to slaughtering the nameless, preferably masked or helmet-wearing underlings who are more easily dehumanized - that's just fine.

And if a few hundred or thousand more civilians have to die, because the important villain was allowed to continue their villainy a bit longer?

That's just the price of family-friendly villain handling.

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2. One protagonist is worth more than ALL the 'bad guys'.

When a protagonist dies or gets hurt, there's drama. There's sadness. There are images of loved ones mourning or worrying, woeful music, and unhappy feelings in the audience.

But when an entire enemy base gets blown up, it's awesome. The light show is great, the music sings of heroism, and the corpses and bereaved loved ones are probably not shown.

If this destruction was critical to preventing the enemy from launching a campaign of violence, the reaction makes sense. But what if most of the people on that base were just living their lives and doing their jobs, with no malicious intent...

And what if the people who were killed outnumber the people who were saved?

It's only natural to care more about the characters you've spent time with and bonded with. But if the lives of minor enemies were treated with the same value as the lives of protagonists, a lot of stories would have a very different tone.

3. Revenge is only OK for (some) protagonists.

Whether or not revenge is endorsed depends heavily on the writer, but if the person taking revenge is an antagonist, you can probably count on it being portrayed as tragic at best, or evil at worst.

​On the other side of the coin, there are times when minor characters are created and killed specifically to give the protagonist a reason to seek revenge.

In the case of a heroic avenger, sometimes it will be pointed out that revenge won't revive the dead or give the vengeful party closure. But the odds of revenge being painted as a worthy and heroic goal are a whole lot better if you're the protagonist.


4. Fighting dirty vs teamwork.
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Sometimes, a hero being drowned in a zerg rush of minor enemies is just a chance for them to show how badass they are. Sometimes, it's a portrayal of how the enemy is willing to fight dirty by ganging up on a lone victim.

But how often do you see a villainous team-up being portrayed as the Power of Friendship and Teamwork in action?

Granted, the fact that they're villains makes them less likely than a hero to be motivated by camaraderie.

But I don't think I've ever seen a collaboration of antagonists being celebrated in-story the way a heroic loner is when they finally swallow their pride and allow their friends to help out.

Have you noticed any other double standards when it comes to fictional violence?

I look forward to reading your comments.

While editing the first part of Catgirl Roommate, I've run into an interesting question:

How many bad things can happen to a character before it stops being funny?

In the case of the hapless furball above, most of his pain is self-inflicted, so we're free to laugh at his fur-scorching, face-flattening antics without guilt.

But what about cases like straight-arrow college student Sam, whose suffering is caused by his innocently misbehaved catgirl roommate?

In many of the scenes I recently edited, Sam's pain was limited to exasperation and frustration, but there were a few instances when he actually got hurt. Not few enough, I soon concluded, which led me to alter several scenes to remove or soften the physical consequences of Nyla's shenanigans.

After all, we're supposed to be laughing at his minor misfortunes like the crowd of softcore sadists that we are, not cringing at his actual physical pain.

While contemplating the line between funny farces and the laughter-crushingly cringeworthy, I thought I'd get your opinion on the matter:

Where do you draw the line between hilarious misadventures, and stuff that's too painful to be funny?

Does it largely depend on the degree of the damage, whether it was self-inflicted and/or deserved, or some other factor I haven't mentioned?

I look forward to reading your comments.

I didn't know what information the scientist had that was so sought after, or how it tied into the larger picture.

I didn't know how her hunter intended to use it; I just knew that he wanted it, and it was important to him.

I didn't know much about the spaceborne story world I was creating; I just knew a bit about the bodyguard's superhuman abilities, and her rival's tragic origins.

I had a few key scenes that I wanted to include, like dots in a connect-the-dots puzzle, but I had no idea what lay between them.

Basically, I had an awesome relationship floating around in a shapeless soup of disconnected plot points and premise elements, with no real structure tying it all together.

​What's a girl to do?

For example, I had one really awesome character who was badly in need of being included in a story, but I'd had pretty much nothing for her story except for the character herself, her backstory, and her relationships with her evil rival and sole surviving family member.

Then she offered herself and her backstory to my skeleton of a novel, and suddenly I had one of my primary antagonists, a much-needed source of interspecies conflict, and a badass wildcard character.

The novel is still a work in progress, and has thus far taken a backseat to Catgirl Roommate in terms of receiving a share of my writing time. But it's coming together beautifully, and I'm glad that I decided to give it a shot.

I guess it just goes to show that when you don't have much to work with, but you know that what you have is worth pursuing, it pays to start with what you have, from where you are, and work your way up from there.

Do you have some story fragments in your head that you absolutely love?

Did this blog post encourage you to start turning them into a story?

If so, I'd love to hear about it in the comments!

Sometimes, it's fun to imagine what a character would be like if they were drunk. Even if they're the type who would NEVER willingly compromise themselves like that.

ESPECIALLY if they're the type who would never willingly compromise themselves like that.

Today, I'm going to explore what the characters in my books would be like if they were completely, horribly, falling-down drunk. After that, I'd love for you to share your thoughts on how your favorite characters would behave if they'd had a few too many.

Here goes...

The Beachwalker

After having three drinks too many, she suddenly turns on a nearby soldier and starts shouting that she doesn't know why they're in her country, what they're fighting over, or whose side she should be on.

Furthermore, she doesn't care, because she's far too busy cleaning up after their firefights and organizing apples to take time to study politics.

She then stumbles for the door, muttering about how the oranges aren't sorted properly, and musing on the possible medicinal applications of abandoned towels and vodka.

The Fugitive

If he weren't bedridden, his advanced combat skills would make him a serious hazard to everyone in the vicinity. As it is, the Beachwalker's attempt to numb his pain with alcohol results in him valiantly saving her from his unfortunate pillow.

After clumsily vanquishing his feather-stuffed foe, he grabs her arm, hugs it tightly enough to make her nervous, and repeatedly thanks her for rescuing him. Unfortunately, in the midst of his drunk, ranting delirium, he's forgotten that he's mute.

The Shopkeeper

Following the Fugitive's socially oblivious example, he hugs the Beachwalker hard enough to worry her, then begins to cry and tell her how she's like the daughter he never had.

This level of closeness quickly overwhelms her low capacity for intimacy, but because he seems to need it, she lets him keep hugging her. When he realizes she's quit breathing, his drunk brain concludes that the best way to apologize is to give her everything in the shop, without regard for the fact that she can't carry all of it, and doesn't have a house of her own to store it in.

The Doctor

The stroke of midnight finds his comrades dragging him away from a hole he was digging in a random dead person's garden. He insists that he needs to apologize to someone face-to-face, and apparently digging up the garden is the best way to do it.

Alexandra

Normally, Alexandra is the one writing the paper. The day after her drinking binge, she ends up being featured in it, because she repeatedly drunk dialed every news company in town to inform them of her theories about the resident alien superhero and his abduction-happy nemesis.

Ironically, even though the story focused on the drunk reporter's embarrassing antics, her theories turn out to be right. She occasionally rubs this in by joyriding across town in a borrowed spaceship.

Kadian

As soon as his cells absorb the alcohol, the shapeshifter realizes that he's made a horrible mistake. He loses all motor skills, followed swiftly by the capacity to maintain a solid form, and dissolves into a helpless puddle of shapeshifter goo.

He spends the next few minutes sloshing around in delirious distress while Zorei attempts to mop him into a bucket.

Zorei

Alexandra's drunk-dialing spree is interrupted when Zorei drunk-dials her. She's the third person he's called that night, because it took him several tries to get the right number, and when she asks about the unfamiliar caller ID he doesn't remember whose cell phone he's using. He does, however, have a suspiciously cell phone-sized bruise on his head.

He informs her that he's abducted Kadian, and she needs to come over and rescue him. Even for an alien supervillain, the natural order of the superhero world is hard to remember when you're drunk.

Alexandra comes over, and they soon realize that they have no idea how to solidify Kadian, nor does Zorei really want to. In an attempt to restore him to a not-liquid form, Alexandra puts Kadian in the freezer, then she and Zorei end up playing video games and forgetting him altogether until Alexa shows up.

Alexa

Alexa complains at Zorei for drunk-dialing her after his betrayal, and at Alexandra about fraternizing with her abductor and forgetting about her rescuer. Unfortunately, her train of thought is no clearer than her friend's, and her attempts to repair Kadian don't accomplish anything besides smearing half-frozen shapeshifter goo all over herself.

Alexandra starts to jokingly offer baby names for the happy couple, and Alexa starts a frantic monologue about the medical implications of a human-Marei hybrid. Zorei, meanwhile, takes advantage of the distraction to shoot Alexandra's plane out of the video game's sky.

Dan

Having decided that legal channels are taking too long, Drunken Dan attempts to hunt Zorei down personally. Unfortunately, the gun he would be carrying if he was sober is, instead, a beer bottle. He tries to arrest Zorei anyway, and Zorei responds by dumping Kadian over his head.

Sam

Upon realizing that he's become inebriated, Sam's first reaction is to drunk-dial his mother to apologize for being drunk. When she asks what he's doing, he explains that he's sitting in his house trying not to do anything until he's sober.

What he does not tell her is that his catgirl roommate is wandering the house naked, and he's locked himself in his room to avoid giving her kittens.

Nyla

As it turns out, eating houseplants is hard when you're drunk. So is unrolling toilet paper, splashing water out of your bowl, spreading the remains of the neighbour's hamster around the house, and invading closed bedrooms. You can give it your best effort, but the resulting mess just isn't as satisfying.

Puking on the carpet is easy, though. So that's what she does.

Jack

In a breach of his normally professional conduct, the policeman shows up at Sam's house to see if he can get him even drunker, and to find out what Nyla would be like if she was completely plastered.

Together, they discover that teaching cats tricks is more fun when you're drunk. But it's also harder when the cat is drunk. In the end, it's funnier just to lead her around with a laser pointer and watch her fall on her face. So that's what he does.

Anton

Anton thinks Nyla is hot even when he's sober. And now, he's drunk enough to forget what happens when you try to rub a cat's chest while it's feeling playful.

Unfortunately for him, she still has enough motor skills to remind him.

The encounter ends with Jack clumsily trying to bandage Anton's thoroughly clawed arm, while Anton drunkenly rambles about how crazy women are when they're drunk. A loud "I told you so!" emanates from Sam's still-locked bedroom, and in the living room, Jack resumes laughing.


Now it's your turn. What would your favorite character be like if they were drunk?


I look forward to reading your hilarious speculations.

You know what really bugs me in movies with large-scale battle scenes?

Protagonists who SHOULD know better than to launch a full frontal charge, and yet, they do it anyway.

I mean seriously, was there any way either of the above images was NOT going to get a lot of people killed, while doing WAY less damage than they could have done with a better strategy?

Just last night, I rewatched James Cameron's Avatar. In most ways, the execution of that movie was brilliant - they really breathed new life into an old story.

But when an army of pa'li riders charged a line of guys with machine guns, I wanted to facepalm. Way to make yourselves easy targets, people.

And in Return of the King, when they reacted to an attack of Oliphaunts by saying "Reform the lines"?!

No. No, no, no. Any decent RPG player knows that when your enemy is using area-of-effect attacks, like a swinging set of spiked tusks, you do NOT bunch your people together so that more of them can get hit at once. You scatter so that each of your enemy's attacks does less damage.

Maybe it isn't fair to ask filmmakers who probably have no military background to make sensible military decisions. But you'd think if you're going to sink millions of dollars into a movie, you'd get some better guidance for your characters' strategies than "zerg rush into a death trap".

(Yes, I know, J.R.R. Tolkien served in the army. But with the way the battlefield was arranged in the movie, I think the sheer numbers of airborne and dead Rohirrim during the Oliphaunt battle speaks for itself.)

Maybe I'm out to lunch. Maybe the frontal charge was a good idea in some way I haven't thought of.

But personally, I can't help but think that it would have been smarter for the Rohirrim to continue fighting among the Orcs, covering each others' backs while shooting at the Oliphaunt riders, and at least force the enemy to dish out some friendly fire instead of giving them a convenient target of nothing but tightly-packed horsemen. Or at LEAST scatter a bit, so that each swing of the trunks took out fewer riders.

And I think the Na'vi could have done more damage, and suffered fewer casualties, if they used stealth attacks on the mecha instead of a highly visible, vulnerable frontal assault.

What do you think? Am I missing something? Or do supposedly battle-savvy leaders need to quit leading their fictional armies into suicidal zerg rushes?

Are you a cat owner who enjoys telling stories about your pets? And would you like a free copy of a comedy novel for cat lovers?

Here's how you can do both:

I'm looking for stories of hilarious cat mischief for my novel, Catgirl Roommate. These stories won't be told verbatim, but they'll be used as material for the antics of my catgirl protagonist.

If you send me a funny, true anecdote about your cats, and I choose to use it in Catgirl Roommate, you will get a free copy of the novel once it's finished.

If you so choose, I'll also include you and your pet in the 'acknowledgements' section of the book, so you get bragging rights among your cat-loving friends.

If you have a tale to contribute, just enter it in the form below and mail it to me. I look forward to hearing your stories!

When I saw the above quote on TheMetaPicture, it grabbed my attention. How many times do we hold back, letting a story or a dream sit in our minds unheeded, because we aren't sure what the results will be if we act on it?

Today's blog post will be short, as it's a pretty busy week, but I wanted to share this quote with you. Because I have stories I want to write, things I want to take risks on, and ways in which I could get hurt... but it will all be worth it to put my novels in writing, to experience life fully, and to reap the rewards of doing things that could be painful, but could also open new doorways to amazing things in my life.

What is in your mind right now, that seems like too much of a risk?

Is there a song you want to sing? A story to write, a project to start, a business or product to create, a relationship to pursue?

And if it's still in your mind, after months or years of hesitating, do you think it's worth the risk?

I look forward to reading your comments.

Have you ever had one of those times when you started to create something that was going to be small, and it decided to grow out of control?

I was going to make a music video for Harvey from Farscape, centering around his perspective on the events of "Infinite Possibilities". I wrote out the outline, chose the music, started adding slides and clips...

...and then realized that what I was creating was turning into something more like a mini-episode.

At first, I wasn't sure how to feel about that. If the video gets too long, will people want to watch it?

But then, Harvey never does get an episode of his own. Which is very regrettable, because he's an interesting character in an unusual and rather tragic situation. So much missed potential there.

Sure, what I'm creating won't quite have the production values of a Farscape episode. I don't have a million bucks to throw at it, or Wayne Pygram to voice Harvey's musings. (Though, I know YouTube has someone who's gotten good at vocally impersonating Scorpius; maybe I should recruit him.)

All the same, I think it's turning out pretty well. It's kind of like a cross between a music video and a fanfic, and it pulls on all the right heartstrings. In some ways, creating it has been kind of a saddening experience; it's a deep dive into the mind of a very lonely neuroclone. So if you enjoy sympathetic fanfics about characters whose viewpoints aren't explored much in-series, I think you'll like this.

What do you think? Would you enjoy a fan-made Harvey mini-sode?

Sometimes, when I'm writing a scene, I have specific things I want to get done in it.

Lines have to be spoken, actions have to be taken, and then the characters can move on.

When I write the scene in this way, it's... functional. It gets the job done, and moves the story along. But it just doesn't have the emotion and magic that I want to infuse it with.

Have you ever had that problem? A time when you were writing something, and you knew that all the requisite information was being conveyed, but you just weren't feeling it?

One of the ways I've found to deal with that is to stop and really picture what's happening in the scene. Imagine the details. Lighting. Temperature. Sounds. The things that linger in the air.

What is the POV character feeling at that moment? What do they notice, in their current state? How are their perceptions affected by the way they feel at that moment?

It's the difference between saying "He walked across the crosswalk to greet his girlfriend, who had just gotten home from a year-long study trip", and

"As he reached the edge of the curb, time seemed to slow down. The clouded sky pressed down around him, thickening the air, and he had to remind himself to take a breath before stepping onto the street.

People were moving, crowding around him, a tangible blur of clothing and noise. His eyes seemed to reflexively filter them out, searching for the one crisp, clear face on which they longed to focus.

Would she remember him as vividly as he remembered her? Had she missed him? Or had the year they'd spent apart weakened their bond, maybe even tempted his girlfriend of six months to seek out other company?

A third of the way, halfway, all the way across. For a moment, he stood alone in the crowd, searching the tide of faces... and then, there she was."

I don't know about you, but that second one definitely draws me in more, and makes me more interested in knowing what happens next.

What about you? What methods have you found to infuse interest and emotion into what could have been a dry, merely functional scene? I look forward to reading about them in the comments.

Sometimes, I almost feel bad for liking a character.
 
Sure, the character is cool; they’re smart, suave, competent, complex, and have a style that’s all their own. But in the case of ‘guilty pleasure’ characters, either they’re the villain of the story, or some of their flaws make liking them feel almost like being the girl we’ve all heard about, who keeps on falling for the wrong guys.
 
The thought crosses my mind, and sticks: “Am I just being a dumb fangirl who falls for all the typical traits, while wearing the typical blinders?”

Have you ever felt like that?

Sometimes, it's enough to make me wonder if something's wrong with me.

...And then, lately, I decided that that was enough of that. OK, the character has flaws. And sometimes they're the villain. But they're a really, REALLY interesting character - and, in a few cases, they're also very hot.

If I like them, I like them, and that's just how it is - why make myself wrong for that?

Take the good traits, enjoy them, and maybe ignore the bad traits or downplay them... just a little. After all, it's not like I'm going to marry this collection of ideas, words or pixels.

It's interesting that these musings come at a time when I'm starting to go easier on myself for my own flaws, and on others for their flaws as a result. Hm, who knows - maybe these 'guilty pleasure' characters are just the practice I need for this stage of my personal growth.

What about you? Have you ever read about or watched a fictional character that made you feel a bit uncomfortable about liking them? What do you tend to do about it?