wetranscripts | Entries tagged with sequel

Writing Excuses 21.05: The Same, But Different

From https://writingexcuses.com/21-05-the-same-but-different

Key Points: How do you write something that feels original, but still meets readers' expectations? Genre or sequel? Sequels, structure or cast? Change one. Don't change too many things, one difference can be enough. Grounding questions may carry over. Window dressing genre or elemental genre? Keep the window dressing the same, but play with the elemental genre elements. Aesthetic driven or structure driven genres? What are the questions underlying your stories? Writing as hospitality. How do you avoid repeating your tropes? Do it consciously. Honor the fact that you are not the same person. Ask what if about your writing!

[Season 21, Episode 05]

[Mary Robinette] This episode...

[unknown] Kimi no game system... [advertisement in Japanese] [Singing Lenovo, Lenovo]

[Mary Robinette] ... of Writing Excuses has been brought to you by our listeners, patrons, and friends. If you would like to learn how to support this podcast, visit www.patreon.com/writingexcuses.

[Season 21, Episode 05]

[Mary Robinette] This is Writing Excuses.

[DongWon] The same, but different.

[Erin] Tools, not rules.

[Mary Robinette] For writers, by writers.

[Mary Robinette] I'm Mary Robinette.

[DongWon] I'm DongWon.

[Erin] I'm Erin.

[DongWon] And this week we're going to talk about one of... A topic that I'm deeply fascinated by, and, I think, one of the trickier things to figure out when you're talking about genre writing, when you're talking about series writing in particular. But I think it's really true of the entire publishing process. Right? And that is how do you write something that feels original, but still accomplishes meeting the reader's expectations? And that can be down to meeting the same genre expectations, that can be down to writing a sequel, that feels in conversation with the original but is its own thing and is unique. Right? I mean, again, we are creatures of pattern recognition. Right? We want certain beats, we want a certain feeling from our romance or fantasy or science fiction or mystery or thrillers. Right? Like, there's this idea of fiction being trope-y or formulaic. But those tropes and formulas are the building blocks of genre storytelling. So, how do you look at differentiating the story that you're writing from the things that came before it?

[Mary Robinette] So, I think that there's two ways to think about this. One is with sequels and one is with genre. I'm going to start with sequels first.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] So, when I wrote Shades of Milk and Honey, it's basically Jane Austen with magic, it is more or less a straight up Regency romance. In romance, the structure is that you write the first book, and there's a very specific romantic structure. And then when you write the second book, the structure is the same, but the difference comes from a different cast. So it's the sister of the heroine and the boyfriend's BFF. Now follow form. I didn't want to do that. So what I did for my same but different was I changed my structure, but I kept my cast. And what I see when I see people moving into sequels is that a lot of times they are keeping the same ca... The sequels that feel flat is that a lot of times it's the same cast and they are facing the same kind of problem. So it's the same and the same. And they aren't bringing anything new to it. So I think one of the things that you can think about when you are moving into a sequel is keeping the same as this is the heart and the core of this story. Those are the things that you keep the same. Because I also see that the other problem which is that someone moves into a sequel and then go the different and the different.

[DongWon] Yep.

[Mary Robinette] And it's so far away from the original that people... People go back to that sequel because they want a specific thing. And so if you remove that piece of the same, and you then... Then there's no reason for them to go back to it. So I think looking at kind of what is your intention, keep those things the same. And then, what are the places you want to kind of surprise or bring something new?

[Erin] I was thinking about, because I haven't written novel sequels, like, where I've encountered this. And I kept thinking about my time when I was writing for Zombies Run. It's interesting, because it's the same cast of people, and it's the same action. There are zombies and you are running from them. Every single time.

[DongWon] You've got one verb.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[Erin] It is a game with one action. Run. And so, something that we would find is early on the instinct would be to throw a lot of new things, to try to make each thing different. Like, there's more zombies, and they're on fire. And you're in space. No, not really. But, like, and they're all happening. And it turns out that a lot of times one difference makes a huge difference because people are like, oh, I understood how they got through everything, like, they really figured out how to run from the zombies. But now the zombies are on fire. Which is bad. And so, like, this one difference accelerates the tension, in part because you're like, they can't repeat what has already happened, so how are they going to get out of this situation this time? And so, you don't have to change everything, and, like, throw all the toys into the bin, you can just have this one thing that they can focus on, and that actually adds a lot.

[DongWon] Yeah, I mean, going to sort of MICE quotient, right, you have all these different components that make up a story, from milieu to the characters. And I think choosing one or two of these, I mean, you can do a thing where you're keeping most of these the same, and if you're doing, like, romance, you're really keeping a lot of things very similar. Or if you're doing, like, procedural mystery, then a lot of it is staying using the very popular phrase these days, standalone mysteries with series potential, you're going to want to be able to carry things through. But if you wrote the first book as a true standalone, now it's like, okay, how do I do book two? Right? And so figuring out what you want to carry over from book one, whether that is purely the setting, have new characters or pick up side characters, or you have the same cast and you're putting them in a different situation. I think those are the things that you need to start thinking about, of, like, wait, what are the things that I want to be fixed points as I'm looking forward to telling this new story?

[Mary Robinette] Yeah. Like with the Lady Astronaut books, I've got Elma has anxiety, and so... But we go into space and all of that. And so in book one, we don't fix her anxiety, but she has come to a place where she accepts the choices that she's making and... But in the second book, the thing that I change isn't, oh, now she has a new problem. It's, she still has anxiety, but it's a different trigger this time. Which is often the way that things happen in real life. You're like, ah, now I have a handle on this. Oh, wait, circumstances are different. So a lot of times, just changing the context, whether it's setting your zombies on fire or sending someone to Mars, is enough to shake things for the character.

[Erin] And if you think about... Like, a lot of science fiction that, like, at least I grew up on Star Trek, it's very procedural. Like, it is...

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] The same but different, like, episode after episode after after episode in the series, where it is the same cast and theoretically the same... Like, they're still part of the Federation, they're still trying to, like, seek out new worlds, but it's what's on this world? What does this alien do that we didn't expect? How are our expectations of how we can handle this shifted? And I think we, like, see a lot of that and have experienced a lot of that as watchers, as people who are engaged in science fiction. But then sometimes when it's written, it like freaks people out. It's like, nah, you cannot have... If people really love your characters, like, fanfiction will tell you, if people love your characters, they will watch them open an alternate universe coffee shop together...

[Chuckles]

[Erin] Because they just really want to be in a place with these people.

[DongWon] Well, and sometimes it's important to realize that you can wander pretty far afield.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[DongWon] Right? I mean, I'm thinking about two classic examples of 80's science fiction movies, which is Terminator and Terminator 2. Right? Which is just a complete inversion of the first story. Right? They're the same structure, in a lot of ways. Same beats in a lot of ways. But instead of the Terminator being the villain in one, now he's the hero in two. Right? Instead of Linda Hamilton's character being the victim in the first movie, she becomes this incredible badass action hero in two. So it's like, oh, what if we just flipped everything on its head, but told the same story, How does that change? Right? Which makes it a really fun, easy to grasp thought experiment as you're looking at it and being like, oh, I get what this is right away. Also, this feels like a Terminator movie, has the same tone, and it has the same body. And another example is the jump from Alien to Aliens, which is a complete genre shift. It goes from horror science fiction to action science fiction. Right? The second movie, wildly different tone, wildly different vibe, same aesthetics though. Right? It's using the same visual elements and it's still quite scary. There are still, like, horror elements to it. But the difference between there is one alien and it is picking us off one by one to oh, hey, God, there are thousands of them and... But we have a whole military unit with us. Completely different tone, but, again, same but different.

[Mary Robinette] I think... Talking about the tone also brings up a thing that you can do when you're looking at a sequel, and I'm thinking of the Gideon the 9th and...

[DongWon] Harrow...

[Mary Robinette] Harrow. That there's a big tone shift when you go from one book to the other. Because we shift POV characters...

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] Because of a bunch of other things. But there are also so many grounding questions that are carried over...

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] From the first book that you are still engaged with it, even though there's a lot of difference...

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] In that one. But the big kind of question of sort of who am I and how do I define myself...

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] And pushing against systems that want to keep me in a specific place, like, that's very consistent from book to book.

[DongWon] Or, again, A Memory Called Empire jumping to A Desolation Called Peace. Right? We read A Memory Called Empire a little while ago on this podcast, but the second book takes the same characters or many of the same characters, the ones who make it through the first book, and then they put them on the bridge of a starship trying to figure out how to communicate with some very different aliens. It's a really different problem and setting. I mean, one... In the first one, we are in an epic fantasy succession sort of story, and then in the second one, we're in this Star Trek how to meet the aliens story. But, because of the same characters and the tone and the questions are the same, they are still questions about connection and communication and language in a way that the first one is, it feels of a piece, even though they are radically different from each other. Okay. We're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, I want to talk about some... Zooming out a little bit in sort of a more macro scale, How do I keep this feeling the same, while not just doing a direct sequel.

[DongWon] Okay. DongWon here. I wanted to remind you that in September, our last annual cruise will set sail from Alaska. And on February 15th, ticket prices will increase. The hosts are teaching classes on the business of publishing, world building, conversational storytelling, and game writing. You can sign up and learn more at writingexcuses.com/retreats. Hope to see you there.

[unknown] Lenovo gaming devices, like the Lenovo Legion 7I Gen 10 are engineered for victory. With powerful GPUs, ultra-responsive displays, and advanced cooling that stays chill under pressure. This back to school season, upgrade to a gaming PC that takes you from study mode to game mode in an instant. With exclusive student pricing, 10 times Lenovo reward points, and more through Lenovo's online education store. Join for free at lenovo.com. [singing Lenovo, Lenovo]

[DongWon] Okay. Welcome back. We're going to keep talking about the same but slightly different now.

[Chuckles]

[Mary Robinette] Do we get to talk about genre now?

[DongWon] We get to talk about genre now.

[Mary Robinette] [garbled]

[DongWon] I want to talk about genre now, but I also want to talk about your career planning. How to still feel like you as a writer. But let's talk about genre first. So, in terms of genre, I think a lot... Many, many years ago, Writing Excuses, before I joined the podcast, did a season that I think about all the time, that I find so useful, which is the idea of elemental genres. You sort of have your window dressing genre, which is sort of are there ray guns and spaceships or are there dragons and swords in this? And then you have your elemental genres, which is is this fundamentally a mystery? Is this fundamentally romance? Is this a story about wonder and discovery? Right? And so when I think about the same but different, I think the things that need to feel the same are the window dressing things, kind of carry through, but then the things that you get to play with more are the elemental genre things. Right? You can set a mystery inside your cyberpunk setting. But the cyberpunk setting needs to hit certain aesthetic beats and hit certain elements to feel of the same.

[Mary Robinette] One of the things that I talk about a lot and think about is that there's, I think, aesthetically driven genres and structure driven genres. So aesthetic ones are things like science fiction, fantasy, historical, Western, that there's a look and a feel and a vibe. Set dressing.

[DongWon] Yes.

[Mary Robinette] Costumes. Ray guns. And then structure driven ones are things like romance, mystery, heist, thriller... That there's certain beats that you have to hit in order to do that. And the nice thing is that you can often get your same but different by layering those things.

[Erin] I'm curious though. That all makes sense to me, but how do you know what readers, or should you care what readers are responding to? Let's say you have a cyberpunk mystery that everyone's like, wow, cyberpunks cool, but I was really into this cyberpunk detective and, like, the actual unraveling of the mystery. And therefore if you make your next book cyberpunk romance, this... People might be like, oh, yeah, that was fine, but, like, I was really hoping for more on the mystery side, less on the cyberpunk side.

[DongWon] Well, I think one thing that's really important is we're talking about aesthetic versus structural genres. I do want to flag, though, that even though it is aesthetic and we're talking about it as set dressing, the aesthetic often has a question embedded in it that's really important. Right? So talking about cyberpunk specifically, it is about a certain set of questions and issues, and I think when cyberpunk doesn't feel like cyberpunk, it is just like hackers and flashy stuff. But there's no question about like what is individual... How do we operate within an oppressively capitalistic society? Right? I think, like, one of the primary elements of cyberpunk is the punk part of it. Right? How do we DIY ourselves under corporate oligarchy? Right? I think that's a really important thing. So I think if you carry through that question from one to the other, it'll feel connected. Right? I mean, this is Blade Runner versus Blade Runner 2049. are interested in really different or have incredibly different story structures. One is sort of like... The first one being more of a detective mystery and the second one being more of this, like, more sprawling story about tevolution and inheritance. Right? But they both feel like Blade Runner stories because, not just the aesthetics carry through, the question carries through of what makes a person a person.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah. I think that that is absolutely true. And also, I think that in... You're thinking about the question, but then there's also the thing you're asking is that that may be the thing that the creator is interested in is this question. But the readers may come for something else. And so for me, this goes to a metaphor that I've talked about before, which is the idea of decorating the house. Amal el Mohtar talks about writing is an act of hospitality. So I think that when you're thinking about this same but different, which pieces do you keep, you're thinking about when you move from one house to another, there's some things you keep and there's some things you don't keep. but it's ultimately still your house. So when I did Shades of Milk and Honey, and did the next book, which was secretly a military war novel disguised as a Regency romance, I did lose readers. Because there were readers who wanted... The same that they wanted was the structure. And I lost readers. But that was a ch... And I knew I would. It was a choice I made on purpose because I... As much as I love romance, I didn't want to be trapped in writing Regency romances. So I think that you can do that, but you just have to be conscious of it and decide why you're making the change and who you want to invite into the house. And what house do you want to live in?

[DongWon] Yeah. And I think this goes into sort of the second half of the question I had, which is, as a writer, when you're thinking about your career, when you're planning out what book is next, if you're not writing a series or even necessarily writing in the same genre, how do you make sure your next book still feels like a project from you? Right? What is an Erin Roberts story, and then what also feels like one, when you're thinking about what your next story is? Right? Like, is that something you two think about actively in planning that out?

[Mary Robinette] I think about it with novels.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] I do not think about it with short fiction. With short fiction, that is the place where I am deliberately and joyfully playing all over the map.

[Erin] I think... Yes and no. Like, I think it's just like part of the story is a reflection of who you are. And so, when you think about the same but different, we are ourselves are often...

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[Erin] The same...

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] And always different. And I think one of the struggles when the world is moving at a pace, we'll say, and things are happening is you're changing a lot...

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] And you're trying to figure out who you are and what's going on. That also changes your writing. And I think, for me, feeling beholden to a past version of myself feels like trapping myself in a relationship...

[DongWon] 100%.

[Erin] I didn't want to or locking myself in a house and refusing to move.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] Even though the neighborhood's on fire. and so I think it is... Even though who knows what the consequences of that may be.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] It's better to do something that I feel is a reflection of the thing I'm trying to say and maybe I'm the only one who likes it than writing something that I think other people will want, but I'm not happy with and I feel uncomfortable in the space. I'm not being hospitable to myself.

[DongWon] One thing I look at when considering taking on a client is what is their project. Right? Is the way I think about it. And when I say project, I mean not just what is this book, but what is the big question they're tackling. Right? Are they writing about liberty and authority? Are they writing about family inheritance? Right? Are they writing about morality? There's all... Or are they interrogating capitalism? Right? Like... And I say that in a way that sounds very highfalutin, but sometimes, like, I have this question about Chuck Tingle, too. Right? Chuck Tingle is writing about how to be queer in a world, how to find joy in a world, where things are really difficult. And these are big thematic questions told in a way that is often very light-hearted and accessible. But everyone I think is interrogating a question in their fiction in one way or another. Right? Whether they know it or not, and whether they're aware of it or not. And it's not a question I ask them and that I need them to answer, but this is a question for me of can I see it and can I figure out how to support that question. Right? And... So I think to some extent that connectivity is really important from one book to the next book of being able to feel like they're still talking about the same stuff.

[DongWon] But I've also noticed something, and I'm new to doing creative works on my own. Right? I've worked a long time supporting writers, but I've been doing a thing recently in preparation for an upcoming project where I've iterated on a bunch of games really quickly. Original settings, different groups, different themes. But I keep finding myself tripping over... Like, oh, crap, I did the same thing again. Right? Oh, I put doppelgangers in this story again. I put twins in the story again. Or whatever it is. Right? Like, there's a few repeated tropes I have. How do you spot the things and resist the things that are too same-y, same-y from story to story, and keep it feeling fresh? Or do you not worry about it at all?

[Mary Robinette] I don't worry about it often when I'm drafting. And there's some things like... There's some things I do on purpose. Like, with my books, one of the things that you know is that you're going to get committed family people. Whether it's a couple or friends, that there's a strong relationship that's not threatened. You will usually know that you're going to get some pretty costumes. The thing that I notice is that I have a... And I think this is a... I have a really strong tendency to injure my characters' hands and arms.

[Chuckles]

[Mary Robinette] And I suspect that that is because as a puppeteer, that is the thing I'm most afraid of. And so that's the part of the body that I'm most likely to damage. And so I will catch myself doing that sometimes and pull it back. And other times, I'm just like, no, that's actually the appropriate part of their body to injure...

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] And we're just going to...

[DongWon] We're just going to do that.

[Mary Robinette] We're just going to do it.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] So, like, it's when I look at it, I think, okay, why do I need to change this, and do I need to change it? Like, the number of times that someone actually is going to binge all of my material back to back and then write a thesis going, ah, she has broken five arms... It's unlikely to happen.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] A lot of times, the patterns that we see in our own work are because we are living with our own work, not because other people see it. And then other people will see patterns that we have no idea are there.

[DongWon] Right.

[Mary Robinette] Like, someone just pointed out that I've got three different books, one of which isn't out yet, that are essentially about... That have this through line of the cost of celebrity.

[DongWon] Interesting.

[Mary Robinette] And I'm like, oh, yeah. Elma doesn't want it, has it forced on her. Tesla in Spare Man, that was a conscious theme of that book. And then the new one, I'm like, oh, yeah. No, look, I've done that again accidentally. Huh.

[Erin] Something that I think is really exciting to do is to use the way you write as a way to push yourself. So, something that I find in... At some point, I actually did have two stories where I was like, wow, these stories are very different, different settings, but I was like seems like I'm writing a lot of stories about a person who realizes their place in the world is worse than they thought it was and lashes out as a result. Against something or someone or in some way, and so I was like, well, that's cool. But what happens after you lash out? Like, what happens, like... It's a short story, so, like it ends there, and there's, like, a lot of implication about what that might mean. But I'm like what happens after an act of, like, violence or anger? Like, what does the community... What are we left with and how do we deal with the aftermath? And a lot of the work that I'm working on now is about what do we give to each other and what do we do as... In the aftermath of, like, an act that is not a good one, but is still one that you have to live with? And I'm like, who knows? Maybe at some point I'll get sick of those and be like then what happens, like, when you want to do restorative justice?

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[Erin] [garbled] Like and so it actually becomes, like, this larger story of, like, how do we deal with life? As I have different things that I am interested in. And part of the reason that I push myself was, I was like, oh, I'm sick of writing the same story, but also, it was partly like maybe I do need to interrogate a little bit a harder thing for me to write. But it's something that I'm still interested in writing.

[Mary Robinette] I think that's exactly the key to writing the same but different, is to honor the fact that you are not the same person.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] And to always be like, well, what is it... I mean, science fiction and fantasy in particular is really the story about, like, what if.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] That's one of the main things that drives us. So I think doing that with your own work... It's like, well, what if I try something different? What if I push this? Even if it's not a theme or a question... What if I push this area of craft? Like, all of these things are ways to have the same but different. Because you are the same person writing it.

[DongWon] Yeah. Exactly. Okay. I think we're going to leave it there. Thank you guys so much for talking this through with me. I have a little bit of homework for the audience. This one is less of a writing exercise and more of a critical one.

[DongWon] What I would love you to do is to take two works from the same franchise, either a direct sequel or just two things in a series. Could be a TV show, could be a movie, could be a book. And then I want you to take note of did you like the ways in which they handled the sequelness? Did it feel the same but different? And then I want you to do a detailed analysis of that. Really write down, component by component, what carried over, what didn't carry over? Did it feel good to you that this thing changed, did it feel good to you that this thing stayed? Did it feel really static, did it feel dynamic, did it ask new questions? And take note of that and think about it as you plan out your next work.

[Mary Robinette] This has been Writing Excuses. You're out of excuses. Now go write.

mbarker

Writing Excuses 19.41: A Close Reading on Structure: An Overview and Why Fifth Season

From https://writingexcuses.com/19-41-a-close-reading-on-structure-an-overview-and-why-fifth-season

Key Points: Structure and The Fifth Season. Spoilers galore! Structurally audacious. Structure. Start with divisions, what are the parts? POVs. Inversion. Parallelism. Sequence or order. Perspective. Tradition and innovation. Structure is usually pacing, order of information, scene and sequel. POV character is the one in the most pain. POV character is the one who can best tell the joke. Second person. Structure as tension, voice, who's narrating. Character as structure. "And you would not exist." Surprising, yet inevitable. Table of contents and chapter titles.

[Season 19, Episode 41]

[Mary Robinette] Hi, friends. I want to tell you about this very cool special edition of one of our close read books for this season. It's the Orbit Gold Edition of The Broken Earth trilogy by N. K. Jemison. This is so beautiful. The set includes, get this, an exclusive box illustrated by Justin Cherry nephelomancer, a signed copy of The Fifth Season, fabric bound hardcover editions of the trilogy, gilded silver edges, color endpaper art, oh, my God. Brand-new foil stamped covers, a ribbon bookmark, and an exclusive bonus scene from The Fifth Season. The bonus scene… I wants it. Just preorder before November nineteenth to get 20 percent off and you can lock in your signed copy, again, I say, your signed copy of The Fifth Season. Visit orbitgoldeditions.com to order.

[Mary Robinette] This episode of Writing Excuses has been brought to you by our listeners, patrons, and friends. If you would like to learn how to support this podcast, visit www.patreon.com/writingexcuses.

[Season 19, Episode 41]

[Mary Robinette] This is Writing Excuses.

[DongWon] A Close Reading on Structure: An Overview and Why Fifth Season.

[Erin] 15 minutes long, because you're in a hurry.

[Howard] And we're not that smart.

[Mary Robinette] I'm Mary Robinette.

[DongWon] I'm DongWon.

[Erin] I'm Erin.

[Howard] And I'm Howard.

[Mary Robinette] We are going to be reading and talking about The Fifth Season. I need to let you know that we are going to be spoiling this up and down and sideways. You need to have read this book before you go into it, unless you're okay with spoilers, in which case, fair game. Have fun. But this is your warning. All of the spoilers, all of the time, as we go through.

[DongWon] Yeah. Because it's structure, we really can't talk about this book without getting into a lot of the nitty-gritty of how things unfold.

[Howard] To be quite honest, to be quite frank about this, if you haven't read this book, the discussions that we are having about structure are not going to be as meaningful for you, and you are not going to learn the things that we believe you, as a writer, really want to learn.

[Mary Robinette] But, having said that, we also know that sometimes you can't wait to listen to something without having read the book. Hopefully, you'll still be able to get stuff from the larger conversation. But if you have plans on reading the book, just do it before you continue listening.

[DongWon] I will also encourage you to look up content warnings for this book. Because there is some pretty intense and dark stuff in there.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah. So, why did we pick this book? One of the reasons is that it is structurally audacious. When I finished reading this… I'm friends with the author, N. K. Jemison, and the first time I saw Nora after seeing this, I walked up and I said, "Nora. Just finished Fifth Season. So good. F U."

[Laughter]

[Mary Robinette] "You have some nerve. Because now the rest of us have to live with this book being out in the world." So we wanted to talk about it, because it is breaking so many of the conventions, and it is structurally so solid, but it's not using an existing recipe.

[DongWon] Exactly. On top of that, it really is one of my favorite fantasies I've read in decades. I think, as an epic fantasy novel, it does such a good job of fulfilling so many things that we look for when we go to epic fantasy, in terms of big worlds, politics, multi perspectives, and exciting magic systems. Right? It's sort of really checks a lot of those boxes, but does something that feels very fresh and innovative with it to me.

[Erin] This is a great book.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] [garbled] [laughter] We were like, let's figure it out. Because I think it's… One of the things that I really love about having conversations on this podcast and teaching in general is that sometimes you do want to figure out why did something work.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] The best way to do that is to dig into it. Because it's easy to put it away and be like, oh, that was so much fun. But, like, having a really good meal that you want to be able to replicate in some way, we want to figure out, what's the salt, fat, acid, heat, of this book.

[DongWon] Yeah. Exactly.

[Mary Robinette] So, along those lines, that's a great segue. I was going to ask you, when you think about structure, what are the things that you think about? Like, what are some of the things that we are going to be thinking about as we're talking about this book?

[Howard] I start with divisions, really. Where are the… What are the three parts? Or what are the five parts? That is… When I'm creating a thing, that's where I begin. Because that informs all of the decisions I make about the things that will be building those parts. This… For me, this book felt like it was built out of points of view. But, structurally, you could argue it's built out of time. Or it is built out of punctuated catastrophes. Or… There's any number of ways to think about carving it up.

[DongWon] Yeah. I… As a reader, and as an editor, I don't actually think about structure that often. It's a little bit of a thing that… I just don't pay that much attention to it. It's not something I'm particularly interested in poking at. Obviously, we do structural edits and move things around, but when I'm doing that, it's more about character arc, it's more about tension, it's more about all the other things we've talked about so far. So, I think Fifth Season really jumps out at me because it is one of the times when I'm actively thinking about structure, because it is not being applied in a passive way. It is being applied as an active engagement with the reader of how structure works in this book. The three different POVs, the reveal around what is going on with those POVs, the inversion from the beginning to the end, all the narrative rhyming and parallelism that happens throughout the book. We're going to dig into all these topics in detail. But, for me, it's hard for me not to think about Fifth Season and think about the structure of the work almost as its own character. Almost as… It is the device through which we are understanding this world in a way that feels so radical compared to what we see in most fiction of A to B to C to D.

[Howard] You might think that you don't think about structure when you read or when you watch or whatever else. But I always come back to that moment when my 10-year-old and I were watching a movie, I think it was ParaNorman. I turned to him and said, "Do you think this plan's going to work?" He looked at me, he rolled his eyes, and looked at me. "Dad, if it works, we don't have a whole movie."

[Laughter]

[Howard] 10 years old.

[DongWon] Yep.

[Howard] Already understood the meta. I think we all have that happening subconsciously.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] For me, and this is not some… This has nothing to do with this book. But to answer your question. I actually think that games and working on games has started to, like, really rewire the way that I think about story and structure as being sort of very divided from each other. Because the way that a lot of games work, you don't have as much control as you do in a book about the way that people take in story information. So you always have to be thinking, like, how do all of these different pieces of information, how do all of these different pieces of narrative, actually create forward motion. Even if people pick them up at different times, and in different ways. It's started to affect the way that I write stories, where I'm like, I want to write stories where you can read things out of order. That is where it does come back to this book, which is, I think a really great way of saying, you can play around with structure.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] You can play around with order, and you can be really upfront with it. I think you said audacious, someone said audacious earlier. I think there's something really great about that. Because it gets you to challenge the way that we have been told that stories have to exist. In a world where… It's not just me, gaming and movies and television impact a lot of the way that we take in narrative. It's nice to see books playing with that as well. Just because it's in print, doesn't mean we can't have fun with the form.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah. I think one of the things you said about the… Being able to… Writing in things that you were reading out of sequence. That that's one of the things that's interesting about Fifth Season, is that the timeline is not sequential. Structurally, the things that she's using that for… That controlling that order of information, that control of time, to play with things that we'll be talking about later with parallelism and inversion, but even on a very, hello, I'm an early career writer, thinking about the order of information that you portray to the reader, that is one of the basic elements of story structure that she plays with all the way through this.

[DongWon] It's interesting because time is one of the first clues of what's happening in the meta-narrative.

[Mary Robinette] Yes.

[DongWon] The timeline is one of the first… Howard, you and I were talking about this off mic, but realizing that the world is not ending in these other storylines, that humans still exist in these other storylines, is the thing that starts to clue us into, wait, something else exciting is happening here.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah. Yeah. Speaking of timelines, I believe that it is time for us to take a small break.

[DongWon] This episode of Writing Excuses is sponsored in part by Acorn. Money can be a difficult topic for writers and creative professionals. It's not like earning a regular paycheck that comes in at reliable intervals. It requires more careful planning to make sure that that advance covers you not just this year, but set you up for the future as well. Learning to invest and be smart with your money takes time and research, and it's easy to put that off in favor of short-term goals. I encourage all the writers I work with to read up on the options out there and do their homework to figure out what makes sense for them. Acorn makes it easy to start automatically saving and investing in your future. You don't need a lot of money or expertise to invest with Acorn. In fact, you can get started with just your spare change. Acorn recommends an expert-built portfolio that fits you and your money goals. Then automatically invests your money for you. Head to acorn.com/wx or download the Acorn app to start saving and investing in your future today. [Lots garbled]

[Dan] This week, our thing of the week is a role-playing game called Rest in Pieces, which is a short game about being roommates with the Grim Reaper. It uses, instead of dice, a Jengo tower which you'll see in other games like Dread, but in this case, half of the blocks are painted black and half of them are painted white. So, as you go through the game, you have to do something, you will pull a block, and if the tower falls, something terrible happens. But in this case, whether you're going to act in a selfish way or a selfish way determines what color block you have to pull. That is a very compelling dynamic that changes the way that you play the game, the decisions that you make. It's a really wonderful idea. The game is a lot of fun, and has a lot of cute art in it as well. Once again, that game is called Rest in Pieces.

[Mary Robinette] So, as we come back into this, one of the other things that I am interested in hearing you all talk about is some of… To foreshadow, some of the things that we'll be talking about later. We're going to be touching on things like… Topics that we'll be hitting are whose perspective is it anyway, parallelism and inversion, and tradition and innovation. So, I just want to give our readers a prologue…

[Chuckles]

[Mary Robinette] Of why we think it's important to talk about these things. Because these are not structural elements that most people talk about.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] Most of the time, when people talk about structure, they're talking about pacing. They're talking about the order of information that I brought up before. They're talking about scene and sequel. We're not going to be talking about any of that. So why is it important to be thinking about the things that we're going to be talking about with structure? What can… Like, give us a little [garbled taste]

[Howard] You want teasers?

[Mary Robinette] I want teasers.

[DongWon] I think, for me… I mean, this connects to what Erin was saying earlier, and the idea that the structure of this book is audacious. This might just come from my perspective of reading so many books and seeing so many things at various stages of their drafting, but any time… I want people to be more playful with structure. But I would love these people to understand that you can play with time, you can play with perspective, you can play with the sequencing of things to get across your core thematic elements more than you are getting across your plot beats. Right?

[Mary Robinette] Right.

[DongWon] So much of structure as it's currently taught, whether that's like Save the Cat or something like that, is… Or Hero's Journey, is so much about how do you get across clearly the A to B to C to D. To me, that can sometimes feel very flat or not in service of the actual goal of your story. Right? So if you step back a moment and think about what story am I trying to tell here, and what the best way is to tell that, because this is what I'm writing about, this is why this story's important to me. We're going to be talking to N. K. Jemison at the end of this cycle, and one of the things I'm so excited to hear from her is that she write this out of order or did she write this in order and reassemble it into the form that we see now. I suspect she wrote it out of order, but I'm kind of curious at what point in the process it occurred to her to use this structure.

[Erin] Also, for perspective, I think it's a little bit about challenging some of the assumptions of structure. So I think a lot of times, we think of perspective, POV, as like a decision that you make at the beginning, and you go, okay, I'm going to do this POV, and now I'm going to write the story, and, like, it's a thing that, like, it cannot change. But, like, you made the decision. It's like… I'm like I must stay in this perspective because I told myself I have to. Or because that's the way I think books are written, or it's the way that the books that I've read have been. What I like about this is it shows that even the things we think of as assumptions or as early decisions can be tools that we decide to wield intentionally…

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Erin] In the story in ways that are not the ways that necessarily the books we're used to have wielded them. Plus, I feel like this it is, to be honest, a story where if you don't speak about perspective on some level…

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[Erin] You're doing a disservice to, like, one of the major tools that is used within the book.

[Howard] Way back in Writing Excuses Season One, I figured out… And just so we're clear, Writing Excuses Season One is the story of Howard figuring out what it is he's actually doing…

[Snort laughter]

[Howard] Up until that time, I did not know what POV meant. I did not… Yeah, I did not know that I was writing social sat… I did not know anything. I was so much more not that smart than I am now. The point though is that I did know that the story was being told based on a principle that is sometimes articulated as your POV character should be the one who is in the most pain. Mine was the POV character or the camera angle should be who is in the best position to tell a joke about what's going on right now. Okay. That principle right there, that POV principle right there, for me, dictated mountains of structure. Because I had to move things around in order for it to make sense of the camera to be pointed at this person so I can tell… So I can deliver this joke. So when we talk about perspective as a structural tool, it's absolutely a structural tool because if the perspective is important, it is going to be dictating all of the structural elements that go into justifying it.

[Mary Robinette] One of the things that… Beginning our spoilers now. One of the things that happens in this, is that Nora breaks one of the rules, which is that second person is not the done thing. As you get through the story, you realize that it's not actually second person we're getting. That's a very structural decision about when to… Why to use that and when to use it. For me, one of the things that is interesting about it, and why I like using this book to talk about structure, is that the reason to not use second person is that it can be distancing. That is exactly what that character is going through is that distancing. There's also a transformation that happens through the book. So there are all of these different small structural tools that she's kind of taking and blowing up.

[DongWon] Yeah. We could have used this book to teach any of the segments…

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[DongWon] That we've done this year. Right? What I found fascinating is that she somehow turns each of those elements into structure. The structure of the book is where the tension lies, the voice is tied to structure, in the ways that you're talking about, about the switches to second person, who's narrating it. Character is structure, because the parallels of the three versions of the same character across this book. It's just endlessly fascinating to me to see the ways in which structure is such the centerpiece that holds up all the other parts of this book in a way that is more visible and more active than we see in other fiction.

[Mary Robinette] I think that's one of the things that you as a listener can think about with your own book, if you been thinking about, oh, I have to use the Save the Cat structure. Why? That particular one. I often think about story structure as a recipe. That you can have a recipe, and you can make a really good recipe. But if you say, okay, according to this, every recipe needs to have leavening, which is great if you're doing a cake…

[Laughter]

[Mary Robinette] But not so good for soup. And it's irrelevant for soup. Leavening is completely irrelevant. So what's fun for me with this one is that I feel like I'm watching an improvisational cook go into the kitchen. Or, I feel like I'm watching someone doing molecular gastronomy, where there like, okay, this looks like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, but actually…

[DongWon] It is ham and cheese. [Garbled]

[Howard] I… There is a line in… I think it's the prologue, I'm going to go ahead and read this real quick.

"The woman I mentioned, the one whose son is dead. She was not in Yumenes, thankfully, or this would be a very short tale. And you would not exist."

[Howard] That last bit, and you would not exist. Wait. Me, the reader? In my tied into this? Then we get to those chapters where the point of view is second person and you… Oh. Oh, that means… And then the you point of view would not exist, because… I still haven't decoded at this point in my reading, I still have not decoded what this means, but that is not a throwaway line. That is a hook upon which a whole bunch of structure is going to hang, and I love it.

[Mary Robinette] I'm glad you brought that one up, because I… In the reread of this, I hit that line, like, oh!

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] I need to call Nora and yell at her again.

[Laughter]

[Mary Robinette] Because she tells you upfront what she's doing.

[DongWon] Yep.

[Mary Robinette] And I'm like, oh…

[Howard] And you would not exist. Really?

[DongWon] That was my reaction. In my head, so many of the reveals come so late, or, like… In my head, like, the second person was used so sparingly, and it's right there, in the prologue.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[DongWon] It's there from the jump. It is all throughout. And it's almost… The reveal is that she wasn't hiding anything from us.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[DongWon] It just took us a long time to understand.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[Howard] It's the surprising yet inevitable. Where you look at it and say, "Well, obviously it was inevitable, but now I'm angry that you surprised me that way."

[Mary Robinette] Yeah. One of the other things that… Just when we're talking about it, one of the other tools that she uses is actually the titles of the chapters. When you look at the table of contents, the prologue, you are here. Chapter 1, you, at the end. Chapter 2, Damaya, in winters past. It's like, I'm telling you straight up front what's happening. Three, you're on your way. It is fascinating to me that this is also, because of the two interludes, arguably a classic three act structure, but it is profoundly not a three act structure.

[DongWon] Yeah.

[Mary Robinette] Because there are so many moving pieces that are happening simultaneously.

[DongWon] Again, she's using so many classic things like the chapter titles that we don't see anymore. It's a call back, it's a throwback to an older mode of storytelling, and yet it… The end result feels so contemporary and fresh.

[Mary Robinette] So, with that, let's go ahead and give you some homework. I actually want you to look at the table of contents… And for those of you who have read the book, this is specifically for you. Look at the table of contents, and without opening the book again, write down the one important thing you remember from that chapter. Then, through the course of the next several episodes, as we talk through things, refer back to that list and see what you need to add to it that is also important that you missed on the first reading.

[Mary Robinette] This has been Writing Excuses. You're out of excuses. Now go write.

[Howard] Have you ever wanted to ask one of the Writing Excuses hosts for very specific, very you-focused help. There's an offering on the Writing Excuses Patreon that will let you do exactly that. The Private Instruction tier includes everything from the lower tiers plus a quarterly, one-on-one Zoom meeting with a host of your choice. You might choose, for example, to work with me on your humorous prose, engage DongWon's expertise on your worldbuilding, or study with Erin to level up your game writing. Visit patreon.com/writingexcuses for more details.

mbarker

Writing Excuses 18.29: Collaboration And Partnership

From https://writingexcuses.com/18-29-collaboration-and-partnership

Key Points: Partnerships with other people or other IP's or groups. Even sequels and short stories set in established worlds need collaboration. Working in someone else's IP or working with your past self. Fit into the existing continuity or play with it. Collaboration is not the same every time. With some IP work, the canon rules. In IP work, you don't get to pick the audience. Get to know the audience, at least a little. Learn what kind of collaborator you are, and what type of collaborations you enjoy. Know who you are working with, too. Writing for a property you love may still be harder than writing your own thing. What do you do to make a collaboration work? First, accept that writing is egotistical, and collaboration requires you to let go of part of that ego and listen to other people. An effective tool is focusing on fiting your story within this framework. You've been picked for your personal voice, use it! Match their mechanics and aesthetics, but express your personal voice. What is intrinsic to the first part, what does the audience love, and how can I tell a new version of that? Collaborators sometimes see different things. Collaboration challenges you to think about the essence of the story you want to tell because you don't have full control of all aspects. Collaboration can teach you new tools. Two writers working together works best when each one knows what they are bringing to the partnership. Each case is a little bit different. Sometimes you have to put your foot down if the collaboration is going towards something harmful, or a story that doesn't need to be told in that way. This is a delicate process! Know where your line is.

[Season 18, Episode 29]

[Mary Robinette] This is Writing Excuses.

[DongWon] Working in Partnership.

[Erin] 15 minutes long.

[Dan] Because you're in a hurry.

[Howard] And we're not that smart.

[Mary Robinette] I'm Mary Robinette.

[DongWon] I'm DongWon.

[Erin] I'm Erin.

[Dan] I'm Dan.

[Howard] I'm Howard.

[Dan] We are going to talk about working in partnership with other people or with other IP's which can often be an entire group, rather than a single person. Part of this is collaboration. But this is also something that you often will find yourself doing with your own work when it's time to go back and write a sequel to something or a short story set in a world that you or someone else has established. There are rules you have to follow in order to make sure that it stays true to the original thing. So this is something that all of us have done to varying degrees. So let me start by just kind of throwing this out as a general question. Why is it important, or rather, how is it different when you have to work within an established IP versus just creating something whole cloth?

[Mary Robinette] So, there are built-in constraints that you have to work towards. I've done this in a couple of different modes. I've done this in someone else's IP for games. I collaborated with Brandon on the thing for The Original. But the thing that I'm doing right now is, that is, is basically collaborating with my past self. I'm writing the fourth book in the lady astronaut That series, and I have to fit it in between the novels that I have already written in the short stories that are farther down the timeline of this. As I was working on it, I had… Like, I worked out this whole outline, grabbed one of the short stories to reference a character name, and realized that it takes place two years after the end of this novel. So I could not have the ending that I was aiming for because it broke the rest of my canon.

[Howard] Kevin J. Anderson, who famously has written a number of Star Wars novels, was on the podcast and gave us what I considered the high water metaphor, which is Lando Calrissian and Han Solo in Return of the Jedi, when Lando Calrissian needs to take the Millennium Falcon and Han says, "Don't scratch it." Your job as a tie-in fiction writer, according to Kevin J. Anderson, is you need to take the Millennium Falcon, blow up the Death Star with it, bring it back to Han without scratching it. I love that metaphor so much.

[Mary Robinette] There's a number of different things that I think that you're thinking about with that. It's the fitting into the existing continuity. So there's a couple of different ways you can play with it. One is that you can… You could play that as Lando manages to do all of that without scratching it. The other is you can have this whole side quest of, oh, crap, I have, in fact, scratched it, now I have to clean it up before Han knows. So there's a certain amount of gleeful playfulness that you can do where you're like, "Hum. You told me that I can't do this thing, but let me see if I can…

[Chuckles]

[Mary Robinette] And still be respectful to the IP.

[Howard] The back-and-forth that I got to have with Doug Seacat when I was writing tie-in fiction with Privateer Press. We were talking about coal technology and magic. I told him, "Hey, are you aware of coal tar?" He said, "What's coal tar?" I said, "Well, it's a 19th-century thing that was a byproduct of coal processing. It's a mild acid that got used in medicine all the time." He said, "I didn't even know about that. Well, it's going into the book." So… That level of the partnership for me was so much fun because I got to reach into Doug's head and find out what they'd said and then see if I could add things to the universe. He paid me a very high compliment at the end and said, "I love what you did with the technology inside this war jack. We haven't had anybody actually try to describe how one of these works, and you just went for it." I'm like, "Yeah, I stared at pictures of railroad engines for hours, but this was fun."

[Mary Robinette] The other thing that I want to say is that I think understanding that collaboration is not going to be the same way every time.

[Right]

[Mary Robinette] So, Brandon and I have collaborated on a thing, and Dan and Brandon have collaborated. Both of these are audio… Things that were intended for audio. Our collaboration processes were completely different. With me, Brandon handed me a script… Or, not a script, an outline and a world Bible. I sat down and we had a little bit of back-and-forth, fleshing out the outline where I turned it into scenes that made sense to me. Then I started writing it. In the process of writing it, I would hit these worldbuilding things, which is the thing that Brandon is known for, that made no sense at all…

[Chuckles]

[Mary Robinette] Because what he realized in that process was that so much of his worldbuilding was figuring it out as he was going. So we had to have a lot of back-and-forth about that, and jettisoning those things that had been planned and plotted that didn't actually make sense once we actually got in there. Whereas Dan was given this very blank slate, which we talked about in the first episode in this series.

[Dan] Yeah. The Dark One novel was similar to what you got. He gave me an outline, but actually very little if any worldbuilding of how the secondary world… It's a portal fantasy… How does that actually function. The collaboration for this process was just, "Hey, this would be cool to do this podcast story. Do it. It has to explain how this character in's up in prison." That was the entire thing that I had to work with.

[DongWon] Yeah. I think, I have a number of clients who do a lot of IP work. Right? I have clients who have written for Bioware and Blizzard and Marvel and Star Wars. Right? Some huge brands. It is always fascinating to me seeing how that process works when there is decades sometimes of canon, and canon that's incredibly important to the fan base. Right? So, if you play with the worldbuilding of Dragon Age, you're going to have a lot of conversations around that. Now, the problem is, there's an asymmetry here, because you're dealing with a big corporation who is trying to develop a videogame, make movies, make TV shows, in parallel with what you're doing, so it's also trying to hit a moving target with people who are very busy. So sometimes as the writer, when you're coming into this, you need to find a way to manage your time and sort of protect your time, so that you're not spending… You're not doing revision after revision after revision chasing a moving target of what the current canon and what the current lore is. Working… Doing that kind of work for hire work can be incredibly rewarding, financially, and it can be really fun to write in these universes, but it is a particular skill that's almost a management skill as much as it is a craft skill of finding a way to fit into that world.

[Erin] I think that's so important… Two things that you said that I love. One is that you don't get to pick the audience. That's, I think, the biggest thing in working in intellectual-property work, IP work, is that the audience for this work has been determined for you, and often times has been built up for a long time. So you may be able to play with the world and with what you're doing, but ultimately… When you write a novel, you might think, "Here's the audience that I want for it." But if you're writing for a game, it's these gamers. So you need to know a little bit… I think it's always wise to get to know the audience a bit. You don't necessarily have to pander to them, but it's good to know what the expectations are coming in, what people sort of want from this property or from this world, so that you have a sense that you're playing to the strengths of it as opposed to fighting it, which is never a good thing to do. I would say the second thing is, if you do a lot of collaborative work, is learning the type of collaborator that you are and the type of collaborations that you enjoy. Because not everything is going to be your cup of tea. Sometimes you don't like working with, like, big multinational companies because ultimately they hold a lot more control. You might consider like more of a one-on-one collaboration like Mary Robinette was talking about. I love writers' rooms, where your getting together with a group of people to create something and you're doing a lot of the generative work together. Then going off and writing and coming back to see how it went. Just because it plays to things that I think are really fun. Sometimes you don't know these things until you do it. But if you've collaborated on anything in your life, a school project…

[Chuckles]

[Erin] A grocery list, like, a vacation, you know a bit about yourself when you work with other people. You can then try to use that and build on it when you collaborate in a creative space.

[DongWon] Yeah. I think it's really important to not only know who your audience is, but who you're working with. Right? Because I've seen writers go into collaboration with some of these big IP that have a fan base that may not always be the easiest to work with. Especially if they're fem, especially if they're queer or a writer of color, they can get a lot of pushback in a way that can be very unpleasant. Coming up, I have Mark Ashiro is collaborating with Rick Riordan. One of the things that collaboration was specifically because Rick did not feel like he was in a position to write these queer characters. So he wanted to find a queer writer to take that on. It was a thing that Mark and I looked at very carefully in terms of how is Mark being positioned to the fans and in what way. I mean, we could not have a more wonderful partner than Rick on this. Then he and his team have taken absolute care to make sure that Mark is seen as a full collaborator and is front and center in the fans' eyes. So, knowing that we had that backup going in really changed the calculus for us of, like, is this a thing… Or, like, how do we approach this, what do we need to do to make sure that, like, we're going to navigate this well. Right? The book's coming out soon. Fans are really excited, we're really excited, I think it's going to be a really beautiful partnership.

[Dan] Yeah. This is such an important thing to consider. Especially, remembering back to my days trying to break into this, where I was like, "I will take anything." But also if you let me write for a property that I love, that's even more exciting to me. It is often so much harder than just writing your own thing. I sat down, back when Star Wars kind of ramped up its new slate of novels a few years ago, I sat down with Claudia Gray who's been writing a ton of Star Wars stuff, and said, "Tell me everything, I would love to work in this." By the end of that conversation, I was like, "Absolutely not."

[Chuckles]

[Dan] "This is not for me." I love Star Wars, but this process that you go through that produces very good books and the people who do it enjoy it is definitely something that I would not have enjoyed. So you do need to pay attention to who you're going to be working with, what their process is going to be like, how much do you love the property. Given the same opportunity to write for Star Trek, I would absolutely say yes, because it's more of a personal connection for me. But there a lot of extra considerations when you get into this kind of work. Let's pause now, and when we come back, we want to talk more about how this collaboration works.

[Mary Robinette] I wrote a story with Brandon Sanderson called The Original. This story is about a woman who wakes up and discovers that her husband has been murdered, and, more than that, that she is a clone, and her original murdered him. She's been given a period of time in which to track down her original and bring her to justice. It is science fiction, it's immersive, but it is audio. It is specifically written for audio. It was a lot of fun to write. So, if you're interested in someone who's doing a lot of self reflection out of force, this is something you might want to pick up. It's called The Original. That is by me, Mary Robinette Kowal and Brandon Sanderson.

[Dan] All right. So, how do we do this? We've talked about a lot of the perils of collaboration, and a lot of the benefits that you can get. Specifically, how is it different? What do you need to do in a collaboration to make it work?

[Howard] I want to start by saying that there is nothing is inherently egotistical as writing a novel that you expect other people to read. That's good. It is an inherently egotistical act, and I accept that. I accept that and I embrace that. It's important to accept and embrace that, because the moment you're collaborating, you have to recognize that at least a little bit of that ego you gotta let go of it. You have to let go of that and learn to listen to other people over the voice of your inner artist who is shouting for the things that you want. This may sound like a 101 level technique, but I'm here to tell you, the world is the place that it is because it ain't a 101 level technique.

[Mary Robinette] So, along those lines, one of the things that I have found to be a very effective tool is to think about, there's your goal. You have to tell a story for someone else in this world, or in your own world. But that you want to bring… You can fit your story, the story that you want to tell, within this framework. There's a reason that they picked you to tell this is opposed to someone else. That is your personal voice. So I'm going to draw… Take a brief sidestep to draw out the distinction in voice. There's three types. There's mechanical, there's aesthetic, and there's personal. If I use puppets as a metaphor, which I'm very fond of doing. When we say mechanical, it's like what kind of puppet is it. When we say mechanics in writing, it's like third person, first person, game, YA, whatever you're doing mechanically. That can be taught, that can be mimicked. Aesthetic, what does that puppet look like, what does it sound like. Those can be taught and mimicked. Personal… If you loan the same puppet to two different puppeteers, it looks like a different character. Which is why everyone freaked out when Kermit's original puppeteer, Jim Henson, died and Steve Whitmire took over, even though it's clearly the same puppet. So it's matching mechanic and aesthetic. So when you are coming in, you want to make sure that you're matching their mechanics and their aesthetics, but recognize that your personal voice is part of why you were hired. So your ideas, your personal experience, those things are going to express themselves in the fiction, and that has value. At the same time, you're also going to have to make decisions about which pieces of your personality you are sharing with them, and which pieces you are retaining, and which pieces you're willing to say, "You know what, we can overwrite that," because it is getting in the way of my paycheck and the things that you want me to do.

[Dan] Another consideration here when you… One of the things that you mentioned was the story you want to tell. I think that that's such a big part of this. One of the things we said at the beginning was even when you write a sequel, you are essentially in collaboration with yourself. It is interesting to me to look at sequels or second seasons of the show and realize, "Oh, this creator misunderstood what the audience loved about the first thing." Right? One of the examples I like to use for this is The Temple of Doom, the second Indiana Jones movie. What Spielberg and Lucas loved about the first one, and what they were trying to do, is not necessarily what the audience took away from that first one. The things that the audience loved were not… About Raiders of the Lost Ark… Kind of weren't present in the second one as much. That was a case of them identifying different things than the audience did in terms of this is what I'm going to continue, this is how I'm going to keep this story going. You can see the same thing with season two of Heroes, people developing superpowers. What the creators thought we all loved about that and therefore what they focused on in season two was people coming together and forming a super team. Whereas the audience was like, "No, we already saw that. We want to see the team do something together now." Because what the audience kind of pulled out of season one was, "Oh, I love these characters, and I want to see them continue to grow along this path." Rather than I want to see them walk the same path over again. So identifying what it is that really makes this click, and how can I give you more of that while being different, is part of not only writing a sequel, but also writing an episode of a TV show, writing a short story set in a larger world. What is intrinsic to this, what does the audience love about it, and how can I tell my own new version of that?

[Erin] I think one of the challenges and excitements of working in collaboration is that you may feel differently about that than a collaborator does. You may believe, like, that the audience is getting character and they may believe, no, the audience is really into the tension of it. So, sometimes you do have to set aside, especially if you're working with a collaborator that has more positional power, like, they're a big company, and ultimately you're not going to convince Marvel that they are wrong about the character. They're going to tell you, "It's this," and you're going to have to work with it. But I think that that's actually some of the most fun of it, and why I enjoy collaborating, is figuring out what are the mechanics and aesthetics that I need to fit my personal voice to, and how can I still make things that are core to me as a storyteller come through in this different format. Sort of like when we were talking about writing in a different format, when you're using someone else's mechanics and aesthetics, it is its own, like, sort of genre of writing. Figuring out how to tweak things and say things differently, but still get the core through, is so important. I remember Mary Robinette several episodes ago, you talked about, I think, essence and form.

[Mary Robinette] Yeah.

[Erin] Which I always say as essence and expression. It's, you change the expression, but the essence is there. I think what it challenges you to do is think about what is the essence of the story that you're trying to tell in a way that you might not when you have full control over all aspects of the storytelling.

[Dan] I understood this principle you're talking about in a completely different way when I took the time to look at my favorite X file episodes and realized they were all by the same writer. There was something that that writer was putting into the stories, that essence, that personality, that intimate connection to what was going on, that I responded to. It's one of my favorite shows, I like most of the episodes. But these four or five in particular spoke to me in a very unique way, because it was that singular author's voice coming through.

[Mary Robinette] This is a thing that we have to do in puppet theater a lot, that… They say it takes 5 to 10 years to establish a company, and during that time, you have to do names, like Pinocchio, Snow Queen. So the goal is to figure out how to do the story that you want to tell while still having the audience feel like they came out of the theater seeing Pinocchio. It comes down to figuring out, okay, what are the markers, what are the things that are important in these stories? Like, I know that in The Calculating Stars, and this is part of what I get from reading the five and four star reviews, when I'm in the right frame of mind, is that people like seeing women in STEM, they like seeing someone who's dealing with anxiety, they like a happily married couple, and they want to be in space. Like, I have to make sure that as much as possible, I give you at least one scene in space.

[Erin] I also think you can get tools from collaboration that are like random things you would never have to have known otherwise.

[Chuckles]

[Erin] A good example of this is, so Zombies Run is based out of the UK, and all of the characters are British. I am… Was, when I was writing, the only non-British writer. So I would write things and they would be like, "This is very American." They'd be like, "You just used this American slang. This is not how things work. Stop saying… Whatever… The floors start at zero." It really made me, like, open my eyes in a way to sort of what are the things that I'm making assumptions about in the way that I tell stories that I wouldn't have thought about if a collaborator hadn't said we tell stories a little differently and you're going to need to adapt to that. I actually think that even though I don't write in Britishisms outside of that, it really helped me think differently about the assumptions I was making as a writer.

[DongWon] Mostly, up until this point, we've been talking about writing for IP or writing for an existing universe in those ways. There's another type of collaboration that is two individual writers working together. I've been fortunate enough to work on a number of co-written projects that were quite successful. Your talk about tools is what made me think of this. I think they've worked the best when I could see each writer knew what they were bringing to the table. So, in the case of James S. A. Corey, that was Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck. Like, Daniel was really bringing this sort of like rich worldbuilding, really thoughtful politics, very expensive sort of systems oriented thinking. Then, Ty was bringing a really strong sense of action and pacing and all of these things. It was one of these things that each of them individually… I mean, Daniel is a truly wonderful novelist in his own work, but I could see how the alchemy of the two of them working together were making something that was so dynamic and so fun, and created this really fantastic science-fiction series. Max Gladstone and Amal El-Mohtar, working on This Is How You Lose the Time War together, that is a collaboration that's really driven by their friendship, and each of the two characters, Red and Blue, are kind of reflections of both their styles and ways of being in the world, and then figuring out a little bit of how their friendship worked through these two characters interacting and talking to each other. You could just sort of see, like, Max's more mechanical thinking, Amal's more like organic thinking… I'm obviously being very reductive here. But, like, these two I think coming together in these two characters in these really symbolic ways and weaving together to make this really beautiful story. So, what I love is each of them knowing what their toolkit was and also understanding there was a way that that would we interact with someone else's toolkit to make something that works better together than individually.

[Dan] Well, let me follow up and ask you some questions about that. Was there a point in either of those processes where you, as the outsider, saw them start to click into what those roles were?

[DongWon] I think with Daniel and Ty a little bit more. Because that was a little bit more not clearly what section was written by which person. They did alternate, and then they would sort of pass and edit together. That was meant to be seamless. With Max and Amal, it really was more… Each… Red sections and Blue sections are meant to sound different. So those were written separately, and then sort of edited to work as a whole, but that was… Also that just showed… They didn't even tell me they were working on this. It just appeared on my desk one day. I was like, "What did you guys do?"

[Chuckles, laughter]

[DongWon] Which turned out to be a beautiful sort of surprise. So it depends a little bit on the project. Right? With Mark working with Rick Riordan, it has been, again, a little bit more deliberate of Mark. Like, okay, how do I fit into this voice, into this style of storytelling, while bringing their own sort of personality and their own perspective to it. Which is what, as Mary Robinette was talking about, they were hired to do. That's why Rick wanted Mark, because they had read Mark's other work and said, "This fits. This is the perspective that these characters need to have. This is Nico." Right? So I think in each of… Each case is a little bit different is one of the things that also is really useful. Not only look to who you're partnering with and what are they bringing to the table. Know what you bring to the table. It's always a little bit of a tap dance, always a little bit of give-and-take.

[Dan] Yeah. The first collaboration I did with Brandon was for a book called Apocalypse Guard, which is not published and might not ever be published. We back burnered that one. But that is a book he wrote for Delacorte and wasn't working. He basically handed it over to me and said, "Is there any way you can fix this?" Which meant that I came into it kind of more with that mindset of, well, what are my strengths here? I had the benefit of looking at an existing thing and realizing, okay, what do I… I know Brandon is better at endings than I am, he is better at worldbuilding than I am. What am I going to bring to this? Character and voice and humor. That really helped us crystallize, this is what I… My specialty, this is what your specialty, we're going to put these together and create something neither of us could have done on our own.

[Erin] This is making me think of one really specific type of collaboration, which is that I also do some cultural consulting, where I come onto projects and collaborate with them to make sure that there thinking about the world beyond the one that they just know from their own cultural background, is the way I'll put it. So, just bringing my own experience to the table. Those tend to work better when it really is a collaboration, versus, like, a we wrote this, please fix it so we don't get canceled, which is a thing that sometimes happens. But when it's truly collaborative, it's really interesting because what happens is you're bringing your understanding and, like, I'm bringing my worldview and saying, like, "how is this worldview a little different than the worldview that you would bring?" Even though you're in sort of more control of this property and what's happening with it, I'm trying to bring something different to the table that I want you to listen to, because it's going to reach a whole new group of people and also, just, I think, be a broader and more interesting story. I would say that one thing that I've really gotten out of doing this is, even in other collaborative projects, I will put my foot down if I feel that the collaboration is going towards something that I think is harmful, or just like a story that I don't think needs to be told in that particular way, because it's not… It's putting things out in the world that I don't agree with and I don't want sort of my name associated with. That can be a really delicate process, which is why I'm bringing it up right here at the end of the episode. But I think it can be very delicate to figure out when can you take power in a collaboration, and when is it important to say, "This is my Hill to die on. I do not want us to tell this type of story." And when do you have to let things go, and really understanding the difference between something you may not like aesthetically or a choice you may not have made as a storyteller, and something that you think is a deeply personal and, like, thing that you don't think should be out in the world in the form that it is in the particular collaboration.

[DongWon] Yeah. I mean, I've seen… We mostly talked about when things go well. I've also seen collaborations not go well, and those projects not make it to publication, which I think, in each of those cases, was for the best. Right? I think that's also something to keep in mind, is that there are failure states of this that are different from the failure states of writing your own solo project. Sometimes it's knowing what's important to you, knowing where your line is and saying I'm not going past this line and holding that ground, which can be very difficult to do, but it's important to have clarity about why you're doing this and what you're bringing to the table.

[Dan] Okay. It is time for some homework. What we would like you to do today as an exercise… This is not going to produce salable fiction, because you are taking words from somebody else. Grab something on your TBR pile, a book that you are intending to read and haven't gotten to yet. Open it up, find a random paragraph, and use that paragraph is the opening of a short story.

[Mary Robinette] In our next episode of Writing Excuses, we learn what all the one star reviews for I Am Not a Serial Killer have in common, and we talk about the two halves of a reader's brain. Until then, you are out of excuses. Now go write.

mbarker

Writing Excuses 12.43: Serialized Storytelling

From http://www.writingexcuses.com/2017/10/22/12-43-serialized-storytelling/

Key Points: Character progression in the long run, or don't bore the reader with arcs? First, beware of breaking relationships or character to make an arc. Try changing character focus to get an interesting character arc in each story. Separate your iconic heroes, who don't have character development, from your epic heroes, who do. Romance often has one character who is the star of the first book, then later books take characters from the side cast of the first book and give them a romance. To keep it fresh, give them different issues, different love triangles and problems, and often, an overarching background struggle. Use the set of characters as a framework or structure for the series. Another approach is to keep the same character or characters, but have different challenges for them to react to in each book. Different sets of characters, who is working together on what, also can keep it fresh. Avoiding power creep? Different problems. Also, consider a design space that provides consistent problems, character growth, powers, etc. across the series. Not "save it for the sequel" but "here is the set of cool things for the series, which ones am I going to do in detail in this book?" Beware the perfect romance. Yes, characters can resolve issues and be strong, but they should still need the relationship and each other.

( Cliffhangers and other cereal dangers? )

[Howard] You need me to do homework, Brandon?
[Brandon] I need you to do homework.
[Howard] okay. I've talked about beat charts before. Where you write down the iconic moments, the character arcs, whatever for your story. Build a beat charts for a series. Identify iconic heroic moments in which the hero does something awesome. Put each one down on an index card. Identify character arcs. Learns to love. Has a descent into madness. Put those down on cards. Identify what the reveals are. Then take this stack of cards, and spread them out into multiple stories. Order yourself a series in which everything gets to happen, but it doesn't all happen at once.
[Brandon] Excellent. This has been Writing Excuses. You're out of excuses. Now go write.

mbarker.livejournal.com

Writing excuses 5.13: How do you write the second book?

From http://www.writingexcuses.com/2010/11/21/writing-excuses-5-13-writing-the-second-book/

Key Points: The second published book may be mechanically easier, but emotionally harder. Your first book may not have an ending, which can teach you to start with a resolution for the second book. Your first book may fail because you are thinking too big, and need to find a story with a cohesive beginning and end. Your first book may teach you that "you can do this." To make the second book easier, learn the terms for what you are doing (e.g. POV, third person limited, character). After finishing book one, trying to write a sequel often is hard because you need a new character arc, something new for the character to learn. Coming up with a compelling new storyline after putting the galaxy in peril can be tough. Bigger doesn't necessarily mean better. "Stories are good because people you care about are doing things you care about." [Brandon]
( Second system syndrome? )
[Brandon] All right. Zombie John Brown. Writing prompt.
[John] Writing prompt. You have developed some strange thing... your character has developed some strange thing on his nose. So you get three different things that you could do. Somebody comes up and says, "I think that's an alien." Or somebody comes up from the occult and says, "I think I know what that is." Or it's a love story. It develops into a love story. Not with the growth. With somebody else.
( the camel's nose )

Current Mood: squiggle

Profile

Writing Excuses Transcripts

February 2026

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
1	2	3	4	5	6	7
8	9	10	11	12	13	14
15	16	17	18	19	20	21
22	23	24	25	26	27	28

Syndicate

Page Summary

mbarker - Writing Excuses 21.05: The Same, But Different
mbarker - Writing Excuses 19.41: A Close Reading on Structure: An Overview and Why Fifth Season
mbarker - Writing Excuses 18.29: Collaboration And Partnership
mbarker - Writing Excuses 12.43: Serialized Storytelling
mbarker.livejournal.com - Writing excuses 5.13: How do you write the second book?

Style Credit

Base style: Patsy by sforzinda
Theme: Clay Deco by timeasmymeasure

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags

Page generated Feb. 8th, 2026 10:33 am

Navigation

Writing Excuses Transcripts

Entries tagged with sequel

Writing Excuses 21.05: The Same, But Different

Writing Excuses 19.41: A Close Reading on Structure: An Overview and Why Fifth Season

Writing Excuses 18.29: Collaboration And Partnership

Writing Excuses 12.43: Serialized Storytelling

Writing excuses 5.13: How do you write the second book?

Profile

February 2026

Syndicate

Most Popular Tags

Page Summary

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags