advice I wish BL authors would follow

[insaneneko]

I stumbled on the FAQ for "the official archive of the paris/torres collective, which reads more as a simple primer of fanfiction and writing it. I was surprised to find that The Romulan Way by Diane Duane was considered a Mary Sue story by, well, anybody. If it is one, I suppose there are very good Mary Sues out there. But then, Diane Duane is a really good writer. :P Also, Peter David started out as a fanfic writer? Cool. (I own a lot of ST:TOS novels, many of which are very good, or at least extremely entertaining to read.)

But what came to mind reading the advice was how some of it desperately needed to be applied to BL novels.

Cardinal Rule #1: If your characters have to act out of character for your plot to work, then your plot DOES NOT WORK.

BL needs to follow this, desperately. The FAQ is talking about OOC from canon, but in a good number of BL novels they betray the characterization set up in the novels themselves to move the plot. If I can accept the characters enough to keep reading, no matter how much of a pansy or an idiot or such a complete and utter jerk that I can't fathom why anyone would want to be around them let alone be in love with them they may be, I don't want them to suddenly do something OOC so that some stupid plot point (usually the pivotal one) can happen. Also, miraculous and sudden reformations of not so steller characters do not ring true, especially if it seems like it happened just to get a happy ending. -_-

Tip # 1. Angst does not always equal good drama. Do not kill/maim/torture a character just for effect. Writing a tearjerker just because you want to manipulate the emotions of your readers is not a sign of depth or skill. Keeping the scale and intensity of your stories closer to reality than Opera, means that the genuine emotion you provoke in the reader will be all the more powerful for being attained through subtlety and skill rather than cheap theatrics. Readers identify more with a realistic protagonist's plight than they will the Nibelungen.

YES YES YES and YES. I am an angst whore, but I can only get into the angst if the characters seem vaguely like "real people" and not just paper cut-outs acting out the great tragic horror that are the string of "moe points" the author is trying to hit. I am amused at the angst of paper cut-outs, not moved.

Tip #13. Don't rush to finish a story just to have it out by a certain date, or to be the "first" to have a particular type of story out. Give your story the time and attention it needs.

Tips like this and others that talk about finishing stories up before publishing, etc...how I wish professional authors could follow them. I hate reading an ending that is so obviously just a wrap up to finish things up rather than a real conclusion. I know they are under deadline and have to produce, and that the entire industry is a book mill, but still...A girl can wish, right?

Comments

[worldserpent.livejournal.com]

I think this is one of the problems with people writing their kinks. Often they don't know or don't care to make them understandable to others, so the characterizations make no sense, and the angst is just painfully excessive.

[insaneneko.livejournal.com]

I'd think with commercial works they'd want their stories to be more understandable than less, though.

[baka-neko.livejournal.com]

Ahaha, there's some definite parallels to the taiwanese bl I'm reading right now as well. Just finished one of the rare angst novels I picked up, and ended up cheering more for the secondary couple, while I heartily wished the primary couple would just get a clue and stop with the pointless torture.

[modorenai.livejournal.com]

Tip #13. Don't rush to finish a story just to have it out by a certain date, or to be the "first" to have a particular type of story out. Give your story the time and attention it needs.

Although I don't know all that much about the Japanese publishing industry, from what I've heard of it, I suppose that their strict adherence to deadlines and the constant push to make something commercially viable and not necessarily of literary value is often the downfall of a lot of BL novels and manga. While I do acknowledge that this is how the real world works and publishers will never want to publish something that doesn't sell, it saddens me that so often a story is cut short or edited to the point of not being able to live out its full potential.

And I absolutely hate how for some BL works it's just so obvious that the sex scenes were thrown in for the sake of having them so that the product will sell, and has absolutely no impact or relevance to the plot whatsover. Though to be fair, I think this is partially to be blamed on the BL fans - I've come across my fair share of BL fans who mention that they'd rather have "more sex, less plot" and who read BL just for the steamy scenes and nothing much else. I suppose the industry is simply catering to the demand by this majority of BL fans.