Writing in a *done* genre

[Moni12]

Polymath,

But what about other Paranormal Romances? There are many others like Twilight that aren't have as popular even though they have many of the same elements. There's the human girl torn between the love of vampires and/or werewolves. She has to make a decision and not to mention that loving either one is dangerous (particularly the vampire). What separates Twilight from these? Like I said, Meyers was accused of plagiarism, so what makes her books better than the ones she was accused of copying?

[Cookie]

I thought it was hilarious too! I wrote a short story about a vampire in love with the sun. The theme was forbidding/unrequited/tragic love. I'm extreme.
Oh, god. I may have to go home and start writing. *Gears turning*
I'm really done with the whole paranormal love triangle. Seriously. I get so mad, because at least one of the potential love interests is usually completely illogical. Or creepy. Or both.

[Moni12]

Cookie,

I love the idea of a vampire in love with the sun. It sounds like a tragic comedy. I feel like I could just laugh and cry over something like that! And yes, in Twilight Edward was kind of a creepy stalker. I think I'd probably get some garlic spray (Iike pepper spray) if a vampire started stalking me. Ha, ha! That would make an awesome element in the satire too! I just might have to write this someday.

[Margo]

I'm really done with the whole paranormal love triangle. Seriously. I get so mad, because at least one of the potential love interests is usually completely illogical. Or creepy. Or both.

We commented on this on Sommer's blog, didn't we?

Love octagon. Just sayin'.

[Cookie]

I'm really done with the whole paranormal love triangle. Seriously. I get so mad, because at least one of the potential love interests is usually completely illogical. Or creepy. Or both.

We commented on this on Sommer's blog, didn't we?

Love octagon. Just sayin'.

We did. I think a love octagon would be awkward and hilarious. Especially if no one could keep each others names straight.

[polymath]

A few intangibles raise Twilight above others. For example, Bella, a meek, self-deprecating young woman from a humble family who's been a wallflower all her short life meets an aristocratic boy vampire who's the most desirable young man in the community. She's a newly emerged young woman struggling with her budding romantic desires complicated by modern societal expectations. She's an attractive and popular young woman whose exotic mystique in a new place propels here to the front and center of her new home. It doesn't hurt that the novel and the saga project mixed messages moral authoritarians disapprove of. Forbidden fruit attracts impressionable young minds for self-identity experimentation. All around, the saga appeals to late young adult, early adult feminine sensibilities.

From a few causes come most of the effects. The Pareto Principle. Other successful vampire genre I've read does the same. Mediocre stuff isn't as fully rounded in execution, mostly from lacking subtext. It's superficial. Superficiality comes into play in Twilight as a subtext motif of the saga. Swan's superficiality causes complications, but also contributes to her personal growth trials and errors. Meyer's execution of subtext is the deciding factor, in my opinion.

By the way, plagiarism is verbatim copying someone else's intellectual property and representing it as one's own. I don't see any plagiarism in Twilight, some copycatting borrowed from across the opus of literature, nor copyright infringement, but that's the nature of the art and the business. I do hear nonsense from artistically jealous critics from time to time though and know it when I see it.

[Falls Apart]

As long as you're doing an original take on it, you should be fine. But if your idea is to illustrate the problems with totalitarianism through the use of animals or make a point about the treatment of women through a patriarchal society dominated by infertile Fundamentalists? Then no, probably not. Uglies is nothing like Hunger games which is noting like 1984 which is nothing like The Diary of Pelly D. One thing to remember while writing dystopia would be that, given the genre, the world is half the point, and you need to make it really interesting. Using Huger Games as an example--a world where the government makes kids compete in a bloodbath would have been a start, but if the author had just run to her laptop and started typing, it wouldn't have gone anywhere. We also see what else is wrong with the society and how the government keeps it up.
Personally, I don't think dystopia will ever be a "done" genre. Each person has his or her individual ideas about the worst fate of the world, and each one can be, when brought to life, an interesting setting ofr a story. And if you listen to too many people at the same time, we're inexplicably heading in about six different directions at once, all of which manage to be exact opposites of each other. Go figure. :)

[sierramcconnell]

This has probably already been said but I'm one of those people that say 'this is getting old, be forwarned'. Because people tend to think 'ooh, this is cool, I can make money off of this'.

No. You have to love an idea. You have to want that idea to be known. Not for the money, but because the story needs to be told, even when it drags you to hell and back.

Not because it's OMG UBER POPULAAA!

No.

Now, granted, if you're writing a story about an 'immortal' and a 'unpopular teen' falling in love, yes, that's been done to death. What makes your story so different?

Why is your immortal different? Is he part of a secret clan of neanderthals that were actually descended from a crossbreed of two separate subtypes of humans, therefore making him a missing link and a seriously not so hot but totally lovable guy?!

Well...he'd be an abusive 'everything is mine' type, but so are most bad boys girls seem to go for... [cough cough]

You see, you have to make the story stand out. Yes, the general is done to death, but the unique has to be special.

[Falls Apart]

Oh, and someday somebody has to write Moni12's book. :) I personally don't like Twilight, but not because of its writing style (which isn't actually that bad) but because of the abusive patterns in Edward and Bella's relationship. A girl waking up after her wedding night with bruises all over her body and then thanking her husband for it is exactly what teenagers today do not need to see. But it's not "copied" any more than anything else. It just ticks off us obnoxious feminists :)

[Moni12]

Oh, and someday somebody has to write Moni12's book. :) I personally don't like Twilight, but not because of its writing style (which isn't actually that bad) but because of the abusive patterns in Edward and Bella's relationship. A girl waking up after her wedding night with bruises all over her body and then thanking her husband for it is exactly what teenagers today do not need to see. But it's not "copied" any more than anything else. It just ticks off us obnoxious feminists :)

Thanks Falls Apart! I give permission to anyone who wants to write it. Here's another stroke of brilliance: the girl tells the werewolf and vampire she only dates vegetarians and they gotta go to rehab! Ha, ha!!! Hey, if I actually write this book I'll dedicate it to all of you!

[Cookie]

Oh, and someday somebody has to write Moni12's book. :) I personally don't like Twilight, but not because of its writing style (which isn't actually that bad) but because of the abusive patterns in Edward and Bella's relationship. A girl waking up after her wedding night with bruises all over her body and then thanking her husband for it is exactly what teenagers today do not need to see. But it's not "copied" any more than anything else. It just ticks off us obnoxious feminists :)

Thanks Falls Apart! I give permission to anyone who wants to write it. Here's another stroke of brilliance: the girl tells the werewolf and vampire she only dates vegetarians and they gotta go to rehab! Ha, ha!!! Hey, if I actually write this book I'll dedicate it to all of you!

Rehab. Hehe.

[polymath]

Let's see. A vampire in love with the sun. Subtext: What does it mean? The very fatal thing that most must be avoided is the thing which is most fascinating. A moth to a candle flame, eh? I have a fatal fascination with life-giving sustenance. Food is killing me by degree. Without it I can't live, with it I die. I am a vampire in love with the sun.

Gannets dive from great heights into the sea to catch their food. The force of striking the water eventually makes them blind from cataracts. They will not live out their natural span.

Locusts are the gregarious phase of otherwise solitary grasshoppers. When food is in short supply, they swarm for new climes. In their swarms they come into close physical contact, transform. Gregarious is a euphemism for abnormal social behavior. They voraciously eat in destructive numbers anywhere they find food. Often they don't. A local locust swarm a few years back descended on the edge of land during a gray and windy storm. Seaside plants are tough, nothing to eat. Nothing to eat in the sea. They died overnight, some from exhaustion, some from hunger, some from drowning. In the morning, a ribbon of dead locusts stretched along the strand as far as the eye could see. Sea birds lined up single file along the ribbon, so fat they couldn't fly from gorging on the feast. What does it mean? Overcrowding has consequences.

Subtext, in general, implied meaning behind the literal meaning.

Say, love interests argue about what to do for dinner. She wants take-out delivered at home. He wants to go out on the town. They fight. She goes into the kitchen and makes a measly potted meat sandwich, eating it crying in the dark. He storms out and goes to a bar, drinking with his buddies. What does it mean? She wants them to be together privately. He wants them to be together publicly. She thinks he doesn't love her anymore. He thinks she's unreasonably clingy. They're both driving wedges in the relationship and blaming the other.

[abc]

Thanks for all the words of wisdom, Peeps. I love the story, so I will write. I have no fantasies of being the next Stephenie Meyer. My only fantasy is to be able to sleep longer, take some trips now and then, and hang out more with my family and my dog.

Polymath, how did you get so smart?

[polymath]

Polymath, how did you get so smart?

I guess from decades of asking questions. What does it mean to me, the number one question. A close second, can we meaningfully share the meaning for our mutual enlightenment.

[Thomas Burchfield]

I know how you feel. I'm writing what I'm calling a "Dracula" and believe I hear those cries "Oh THAT old thing again." But I believe my take and approach are fresh and unique and thoroughly entertaining. Another thing to keep in mind is that these trends come and go and you never know when the wave will rise again.

The point is to *always* be yourself, whether your Vladimir Nabokov or Dan Brown. Stick to what you are whether millions are doing or, or you're the only voice sounding from the forest.

Thomas