McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Your Pet Urban Fantasy Cliche Peeves
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: arianne on May 04, 2013, 07:04:30 AM ---Fae who are seductively gorgeous, can predict the future, can fly etc etc...all end up sounding like imitations of vampires, even when they're not (if that makes any sense).
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Which looks to me like the trend for Romantic Vampires basically stealing stuff from older depictions of Faerie in the first place.
arianne:
--- Quote from: the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh on May 06, 2013, 02:06:10 PM ---Which looks to me like the trend for Romantic Vampires basically stealing stuff from older depictions of Faerie in the first place.
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I know; it feels like even when you're writing about something that is really truly seriously NOT a vampire, someone can point to one or two traits and say, "That's kind of vampire-y" even if it is nothing of the sort.
Really, if one were to tally up all the traits displayed by vampires in modern (romantic or not) fiction, pretty much ANYTHING goes.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: o_O on May 04, 2013, 09:52:30 AM ---^this. Mythos mining leaves me stone cold. More mythos mining at this stage simply weakens the source mythoi to the status of cultural baggage. Ripped, with broken handles and torn lining, stinking of the dump they're left on.
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I am in agreement with you on the vast majority of contemporary examples, but I'd not be without the exceptional minority.
--- Quote ---I am also sick to death of worlds and cultures that are just like ours except for the tiny little change of "oh and magic works".
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Oh, strongly agreed. Have I recommended DD Barent's Bloodhound Files in this context before ? (Series in which smart tough FBI profiler is, at the start of the first book, summoned into an alternate world where magic works, which has vampires, werewolves, and golems; billions of them, with humans a tiny minority ethnic group.)
--- Quote ---Put another way, if the world is just like ours except for magic working then you will have immense trouble convincing me that anything magic-related in your books is possibly going to have an effect on the world as it moves past the events of your books.
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Exactly; nor am i overly fond of settings that attempt to get around this by coming up with convoluted explanations for how it's the impact of the magic that has caused our world to be like it is.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: Ziggelly on May 04, 2013, 04:01:58 PM ---... Also, what's up with there being no heroes in the world who have good families? In any genre? If there's a hero, their family is either dead or seriously messed up. Why?
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Loners are a lot easier to write without having to figure out complex real backstories, and messed-up families are a cheap and easy way to get trauma and angst.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: Quantus on May 05, 2013, 06:00:10 PM ---I dont mind using existing mythos, but I am starting to get a little tired of the Norse tie-in.
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Maybe I'm not reading in the same space as you are, because I've not seen too much of that, but I really wince at versions that seem totally not to Get It. (I'm looking at you, American Gods.) I can think of a couple of good counterexamples, but not many.
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