Well, my fantasy sort of applies. It’s short - 65k at last count for one thing - happens only over a week, has no character list, map, made up quotations/prophecies, prologues, demons, bad guys without motivation, characters with apostrophes in, hero with destinies.
On the other hand, there is a powerful magical device, but in my defence I’ll call it analogous to a big gun rather than the point of the stuff. I also completely lose out on the medieval Europe rule, well, nearly. It’s an AU Roman / British Empire, story which is sort of before and after. It’s great, 'cause it meant I didn’t have to make up any stupid names and could just use normal ones.
(Oh, and I admit there was also a dragon, which if there isn’t a rule against, there should be. It was only in a dream, but still there, so maybe cheating).
let’s see, the fantasy novel I have been trying to write for the past 15 years (over half my life), has so far violated 13 of these rules (if you include all “lists” as separate rules). Thats not including the ones I have violated but plan on correcting later (for instance, names, I am HORRIBLE at names so use extremely simple ones).
But some of these I plan on intentionally violating. For instance,
LIFE doesnt have a beginning or an end, at least not that is usually tellable in novel-length form. Why should fantasy novels?
Theres a self publishing site somewhere on the net that seemed pretty good (I forgot the name). It only cost $100 to start, they only print the books that are bought, they offer online reading and DLing of the books (after a buyer pays for it). It seemed like a pretty good deal. A cheap way to make some money at least while you wait for a publisher. Then you can yank the rightss from the site and sell them to the real publisher.
I have to disagree with this one in specifics, although not in principle. All the things mentioned are entirely possible without having developed either gunpowder or steam engines; in fact they were all around before steam engines. However, one should probably not have horse-drawn atomic-powered levitating wagons, unless there’s a reasonable explanation.
38: If you want to invent a language, you must invent a language (i.e. grammar) and not a convenient list of 50 common nouns, suitable for inserting in a 2 page long index.
Also, yay for my fantasy novel only breaking two rules, 4 and kind of half way 15C. And the map is mainly for my own purposes.
14B: Neither the name of the primary villain nor the name of any secondary villain will contain any of the following syllables: “arch”, “baal”, “dark”, “deth”, “mort”, “nass”, “sar”/“saur”.
39: At no point will any villain spend any non-trivial amount of time describing what they will do to any good character after they have captured that character.
True, life does not have a beginning, middle, or an end. That’s what’s wrong with life, and is why stories were invented in the first place: to provide the closure real life lacks. Realism has never been the primary aim of fiction (and certainly not fantasy fiction.)
There are several of these rip-offs on the web. If you have money to burn, send it to me; you’ll get just as much for your cash.
Sales on these sites in in the low double figures, and are even less for fiction. Your novel will be mixed among the worst, most godawful crap imaginable, so readers aren’t going to bother. It does not count as a professional publishing credit.
And you won’t be making any money. It’s unlikely in the extreme you’ll come even close to the fees you are charged. Further, the prices tend toward “bait and switch”: sure you can get it cheap with that ugly two-color cover taken from the dozen designs they let you have. But if you want an attractive book, that’s more. If you want copies to send out reviewers, you’ve got to pay for them (not that the reviewers will read them – anything from these presses are either recycled or read aloud to amuse people about how bad they are). If you want to hand out copies to bookstores, you pay extra for those, too. If you need copyediting (and all books do if they want to look professional), you pay for that.
These sites are there to rip off authors. They do just fine if they don’t sell a single one of your books, so they don’t try. (The most important factor in the success of a new book is promotion, and these scammers don’t give you it.)
Think about this: how many books have you ever bought from one of these sites? Further, the books are usually vastly overpriced (a paperback costs almost as much as a hardcover printed the old fashioned way), which means people won’t want to take a chance.
Don’t do it. Send it to a publisher who’s going to give you cash up front. Remember Yog’s ironclad rule: money flows toward the writer. Anyone who says otherwise is looking to rip you off.
Drat you, Lamia, I wanted to post about that book.
I have seriously thought about looking at random pages in that book, noting the entries, and concocting a story from that. The resulting book would probably be a best-seller.
I’d go further and say the hero shouldn’t be the heir to anything. In the LoTR Frodo didn’t have to be the one to take the ring, anybody could have done it, but he chose to. Bring back the everyman as a hero.
In the back of David Brin’s ‘Glory Road’ he makesa wonderful observation of why are so many fantasy novels set in a medival setting with content and docile peasants when historically many bloody uprisings and wars occoured to otherthrow the fuedal structure.
I confess I’ve been tempted to do the same thing. It’s practically can’t miss! You’ve got your characters, your plot, your locations, your conflicts, and even your stock phrases all laid out right there, all you need to do is string 'em together and stick it all in some horrible garish cover with a big gold title.
Hey, that should be a FRODMA '03 rule right there – no covers with big metallic letters. It’s just tacky.
In principle, yes. However, the reason I originally posted this was because too many fantasy novels want to retain a pre-industrial setting, and yet keep the conveniences (both to the characters and the plot) that we 21st century folks can scarcely imagine going without. This is why “mage lights” have become so ubiquitous it’s a joke.
Many things are possible in principle given 20/20 hindsight but which realisticly would never have been invented at the time. This is why novels about characters going back in time are so popular- the idea that even given the limitations of what could be crafted, a modern would know about things that people in the past would never think to try. (Was it By His Bootstraps that had fun shooting that concept down? A modern goes back in time to pagan Iceland, and discovers that his modern knowledge is useless, inapplicable, or at odds with society.)
For the penultimate example, I give you: the Hang Glider. What could be simpler? A suitably shaped lightweight cloth, spars, and some cables. The friggin’ Ewoks could build them. But in reality people who tried to build wings usually tried feathers, or bat-winged looking things, and made sure that they were in two sections so the person could flap them with their arms. The Rogello(sp) Wing was the product of 20th century aeronautical engineering, exactly the sort of thing that you say “so simple only a genius could have invented it”.
That said, I think it would be interesting if you had a fantasy novel in which there were guns; the only catch would be that gunpowder was magic, and only wizards or alchemists could get it to work- if some nobody tried to mix it, all they’d get would be soot.
Also, a hang glider is only “simple” if you have access to aluminum, synthetic fabrics, screws, etc. If you don’t have access those modern materials, you tend to end up with something that’s either too fragile or too heavy.
Another example where the materials made all the difference: steam power. The Romans knew enough about steam power to made some fairly elaborate toys based on the principle. So why didn’t they develop steam engines? Because they didn’t have metal alloys that could withstand the pressures found in a useful steam engine.
Same thing with gunpowder: the real story there is not in gunpowder itself, but in the metallurgical advances required to cast a cannon that could fire without cracking or exploding.
To drag this back to the subject at hand: Any FRODMA author who wishes all the conveniences of modern technology for the purposes of storytelling shall correspondingly set their story in a world with modern technology. Any FRODMA author wishing some modern conveniences in a pre-modern setting shall limit himself to no more than three (3) miracle technolgies (for example, light without fire, instant communications, and antibiotics.) These miracle technologies shall be expensive and/or difficult to obtain.
You’re preaching to the choir but thanks. Hey, one agent I just had a rejection slip from at least made a note in MS to say my specimen chapters were “well written, promising stuff” so I’m not wholly disheartened.
I quite agree. Publishers and their agents usually have a feel for what will sell - it’s how they make their living, even if there are one or two about the place who lie awake at night fretting about how they gave J K Rowling the thumbs-down :smack: - and vanity publishing is only for the desperate or gullible. I’ll carry on hoping that someone will pay me for the privilege of printing my work… you never know, as long as you keep getting up every time you get knocked back, you’re in with a chance.
Sorry, Lumpy, I misunderstood the point you were making. What you said reminded me of the SCA (the Society for Creative Anachronism, with which you’re probably familiar). We get together on weekends, camp in medieval-looking tents and pretend to be medieval warriors, but I wear contact lenses and have a battery powered fan in the tent…
[qoute](Was it By His Bootstraps that had fun shooting that concept down? A modern goes back in time to pagan Iceland, and discovers that his modern knowledge is useless, inapplicable, or at odds with society.)
[/quote]
That sounds like The Incompleat Enchanter, by L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt. Unless it’s something else.
Just to forestall somebody else making a separate post about it: “penultimate” means “next to last”.
It’s too bad nobody invented the hang glider earlier, although the Chinese did apparently have man-carrying kites, used for military reconnaissance, in the 13th century (if you believe Marco Polo). And the hot-air balloon could have been invented centuries earlier than 1783. (Cyrano de Bergerac, writing in the 17th century, imagined hanging from a great silk bag filled with smoke. Too bad he didn’t try it. Of course, it’s the heated air, not the smoke that provides the lift, but people made the same error of perception with early balloons.)
So you could very plausibly have a medieval setting with hot-air balloons. However, if you bring in useable steam engines, there’d better be a real industrial revolution, with all the good and bad that brings.
This has been one of the most enjoyable threads in a long time! Makes me want to get started writing a fantasy novel.
but thanks. Hey, one agent I just had a rejection slip from at least made a note in MS to say my specimen chapters were “well written, promising stuff” so I’m not wholly disheartened.