The Ties That Bind Us

As a writer with a psychological bent, I often examine my own interactions with the people around me, probing the boundaries, fingering the threads and knots. I've done this since I was prepubescent, working out who got along well with whom, how to diffuse tense situations, how to tailor my approach to a person when I wanted to ask a favor. I'd like to say the ability comes naturally, but it doesn't.

I'm still the master of social gaffes. I sometimes work against myself.

But there's a beauty in the way people are connected -- some bonds stronger, taut, steady...others thin, wispy, barely sustained. Complicated. There's the mother who would sacrifice anything for her child, yet she hardens her heart with jealousy, eyeing her thriving child, born into privileges she herself was not fortunate enough to have. There's the broken criminal, brusquely keeping the other inmates in line with threats and muscle, but whose thoughts turn to the younger brother he left on the outside, barely a teen and now fending for himself and their younger siblings.

A story can take place anywhere, any time, in any setting. But it's the relationships between the characters that draw me in. So I don't rule out any particular genre. I'll read mysteries, sci-fi, fantasy...anything, if the author catches me with some good relationship tension. So how are your characters connected? Are the ties overt, simple? Or hidden, snarled?

Sure, I love a good relationship. Does that mean I write romance? No. In fact, I find relationships that are barbed with awkwardness, conflicted feelings, and hardships to be the most interesting.

I also love to get deep down into a character's biggest soft spot. His or her true devotion, whatever he or she most wants to protect. Whom does Dek Sundowner most want to protect? The answer may not be so obvious...

Keep loving,
Ren D.

Just Once, Metamorphosis

I think every creative person should be allowed to undergo a metamorphosis at least once without seeming inconsistent and a tad flaky (unless you're The Artist Not Really Known As Madge...then I suppose you've got free license to make yourself over anytime, as many times as you want).

As springtime approaches (in the Northern Hemisphere), it's the perfect time to think about the theme of change and renewal.  Whether it's change in the form of editing and rewriting, or growth and dynamism in your characters, or even your own development and improvement as a writer, change is normal, natural, and virtually always going to happen.  (In your stories, it better happen!  Why else are you telling the story?  To show how nothing changes?)

Often a story will approach a character in a way that shows him or her growing and changing, perhaps breaking free of convention or the bonds of static friends who hold the character back.  It can be just as interesting, I find, for the character to be stuck, repeating the same mistakes, as this can make a point to the reader as well.  (I think we all know people who are like that, don't we?  Stuck, trapped...)  In The Fracture of a Dream, Dek seems to be a spectator as life -- as even nature itself -- lives and thrives around him, while he finds himself stagnant.  The people around him change, but he can't seem to move on himself or alter the path his life is taking.  He may think he has some semblance of agency, to drive his actions, but it doesn't get him far.

Does it make a difference in where Dek ends up?

You'll have to read to find out.

Don't "stay anything," readers!  Be bold and change. :)

Ren D.