McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft

A Question for Fantasy Readers and Writers…

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Darkshore:
I'm an orignalist I guess. I truly enjoy the classic stories of human struggles in an epic fantasy setting more than any other substitute. I'm not a big fan of non-human races being the MC's.

OZ:
I think, as mentioned before, that in all but the most experimental fiction,  we enjoy seeing the human traits in a non-human character. Not all of Brust's characters are human but they have human traits. Whether it's love, honor, sorrow, courage, fear, etc. give the readers something to let them relate to the main character and if it's well written they will like it.

I read an interesting short story once about two very advanced aliens from different races that were watching two human settlers, a husband and wife, on a new planet and trying to figure out why they did the things they did. Neither alien came from a bisexual race that had families as we know them so it took them some time to recognise the emotion that we call love. On the other hand the aliens felt curiousity, friendship, and even some form of compassion so although they were definitely alien there was enough for the reader to relate to and enjoy both the similarities and the differences.

Dresdenus Prime:
Everyone, thank you so much for the incredible feedback. Pretty much every single reply has given me a lot to think about and has assisted me in furthering my brainstorming of this project.


--- Quote from: Darkshore on December 02, 2011, 03:04:39 AM ---I'm an orignalist I guess. I truly enjoy the classic stories of human struggles in an epic fantasy setting more than any other substitute. I'm not a big fan of non-human races being the MC's.

--- End quote ---

I think I can help you Darkshore! There will be humans in this story, and they will be the underdogs of the tale. Through some event or disadvantage they were made one of the lowest races of the book, and part of the main plot will be how one of the human characters helps to elevate them back to a higher status.

Again thanks everyone, I think the biggest lesson I've learned from this is that I need to learn how to write from the perspective of the humanoid races. Like someone else said, if I write an elf as a human with pointy ears what's the point? The reader will just take that as laziness on my part.  I've got to come up with a thought process that belongs to them alone, along with habits and lifestyle. Phew. I've got some work to do!

Aminar:
Good Luck and have fun.

Quantus:
The big thing about other races is that that they need to be relatable enough that the reader can identify with them, but different enough so that they arent just funny looking humans.  The most common way Ive seen for that is to take the normal human trait mix, but skew it so that one aspect is heavily exaggerated.  Elves that are all inhumanly graceful and long-lived, or maybe place an exaggerated importance on Nature.  Dwarves that are rough and abrasive.  Vampires that hate themselves.  Werewolves with temper issues.  Of course, that route will take you dangerously close to some of the over-used cliches out there, but if you put your own spin on it and run with it, you can sometimes find yourself with an interestingly new thing.  Those sorts of ideas, for me, usually start with a What-If statement.  A good example (despite later becoming the angst cliche) were the Anne Rice Lestat books, in that it took a human and asked "What if your physiology only had one requirement?"  Well lets see, all the signals and responses your body has to inputs would combine, so lust, hunger, thirst, warmth and breathing would all be one unified urge, and partaking of that would combine the satisfaction of getting all of those things at once.  Then you make it a predatory need that runs counter to the common community/herd based morality, and you have both your relatable similarity, and your exaggerated distinction. 

On the other hand, you can make the differences themselves the exaggerated element, which is probably a bit harder to manage, but can provide a sharper contrast.  I havent read Oz's example, but Ive seen Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human, which sounds like its basically the same idea; its a normal Boy Meets Girl type love story, but its narrated as if an alien anthropologist were studying strange clothed apes in their natural habitat.  The trick with those stories is to use the dramatic differences to raise questions or point out social/cultural oddities that the reader can relate to, rather than relating to the alien character themselves.  In that film, it was mostly assigning ridiculous sounding motivations for various aspects of the modern courtship process, with a heavily satirical tone (The Narrator is voiced by David Hyde Pierce).  Great flick...

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