Jonas--The Giver Quartet

I was wavering between The Doctor and Flynn Ryder for my next character post, but, Lord willing, my sisters, and friend, and I are going to see the movie of The Giver tomorrow, so I decided Jonas would go next. However, if you have not read The Giver, PLEASE do not read this post. I love spoilers, but the full effect of The Giver is dependent on it being unspoiled. Go read the book...really, do...and then come back. Due to that, I will give ample warning of spoilers from the sequels.

Jonas is just like any other boy in the Community. He goes to school, volunteers around the Community, and looks forward to the Ceremony of Twelve where he will be assigned a role in the Community. But yet, Jonas is not like everyone else. He has the ability to See Beyond, first manifesting itself as an ability to see color in a colorless world. And this ability to See Beyond is what enables him to become the next Receiver of Memory.

As he receives memories of Elsewhere and before the Sameness, and knowledge of true emotions, Jonas begins to see that the "perfect" Community he grew up in, is really far from perfect. But at first it's the joy. The true joy and love that everyone is missing. Jonas wants to share it with his friends. He wants Asher to see color. He wants his sister Lily to know that there really were animals once. And he wants to be able to make choices.

At this point, Jonas still believed in what he had been taught. That it's dangerous to let people make their own choices. But still, he has inner conflict over it all. He knows the joys that are missing. He wants to be loved by his family. And he realizes that without true pain and sadness, one cannot truly have happiness and love. He tries to justify the Community, but it's just that: justifying. And I know that if a thing has to be justified, it's probably not a good thing.

And then he learned what Release really is. Death of the undesirable. The Old, who have lived their lives. The repeat rule-breakers. The newchildren who fail to thrive properly. It was the Release of the twin newchild that really woke Jonas up to how bad the Community really was. But he didn't want to stand passively by and see it continue to happen. Jonas cared. He and the Giver were the only ones who could care. And he does do something. He rescued Gabriel from Release and let the Memories he held escape.

I'm not sure why Jonas stands out. Some books fade from memory soon after being read. Some books I still remember the story, but the characters fade away. Jonas hasn't done that. Maybe it's because you really experience everything with him. Funny how an author can create that in 3rd person past tense. (Just so you know, I hate present tense narrative.) The Giver is a powerful story. Jonas is the perfect character to experience it through. Because despite believing the lies, he is good. He knows right from wrong, and wrongs really affect him. The horror of war affects him so that he cannot allow the other Twelves to play war, meaningless though it is to them. And he wants love returned to the world. You feel that yearning with him, that horror when you realize his parents don't even know the meaning of the word "love."

Messenger and Son SPOILERS
Jonas's story doesn't end with The Giver. He finds a new home, with people who have love and freedom. Jonas has become the Leader of his new home, because he has the qualities necessary to be a true leader. Not a dictator, but a Leader. And he even gets married and has at least two kids. (I hope he has more, but it doesn't say.) Things aren't always perfect. Matty gives his life to heal the forest. Gabriel has to defeat the Trademaster. And of course, Jonas still suffers the consequences of having lived in the Community as a child. It's impossible for it not to have affected him. But still, Jonas gets a happy ending.
END Messenger and Son SPOILERS
The last three books aren't as good as the first, naturally, and they somewhat spoil the effect of the ending of The Giver, but I got attached to Jonas and wanted to know what else happened to him. Because when you have experienced the disillusionment of this "perfect world" with Jonas, you cannot help feeling that he is a part of your life now.

Resistance Review

Recommended for: Ages 12 to Adult

Rating: PG-13 (for violence, torture and threats of torture, and dangerous situations dealing with persecution)

“Don’t you know? Animals like you have no soul.”

Could God ever love a half-blood all of society looks upon with such fear and disdain? Jace once believed so, but when a tragic loss shatters the only peace he’s ever known, his faith crumbles as the nagging doubts he’s tried to put behind him descend on his grieving heart. With them come the haunting memories of the bloodstained past he longs to forget, but can never escape.

Taken from home at a young age and raised to serve the emperor, Kyrin Altair lives every day under a dangerous pretense of loyalty. After her unique observation skills and perfect memory place her into direct service to the emperor, Kyrin finds herself in further jeopardy as it becomes increasingly difficult to hide her belief in Elôm, the one true God.

Following the emperor’s declaration to enforce the worship of false gods under the penalty of death, many lives are endangered. But there are those willing to risk everything to take a stand and offer aid to the persecuted. With their lives traveling paths they never could have imagined, Jace and Kyrin must fight to overcome their own fears and conflicts with society as they become part of the resistance.

I have been a fan of Molly Evangeline/Jaye L. Knight's books since I first read The Pirate Daughter's Promise. I absolutely loved that book, and was pleased to see how her writing improved in later books. In fact, when I first started reading Resistance, I was blown away by how much better her writing is. I mean, Pirates & Faith and Makilien are awesome, loved, and highly recommended, but Ilyon Chronicles is above and beyond those two series put together. So excuse me if I rave a bit. Resistance is amazing. And, if you follow my blog, especially earlier this year, you probably already know that I think that. You should get used to it. I'll probably be saying it again.

When I first received it, I was riveted to my kindle, even reading it in the car in the middle of door to door campaigning. Backing up, I probably made my sisters sick of hearing how excited I was to read it when I finally got the timetable on getting it. As a disclaimer, I did beta read the book, but I loved it tremendously then, and love it even more now that I've read the final version. I'm no more biased toward it than I am towards C. S. Lewis, or Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time.

Writing: 5/5

Pretty obviously, I think the writing in Resistance is fantastic. The character point of view is well done and adds a whole new dimension to the storytelling, the settings are well described, it made me feel the emotions...The writing really pulled me into the story and kept me there, making Ilyon and it's inhabitants a permanent part of my imagination. The book was also extremely well formatted, which pleased me much.

Setting: 5/5

Even before I read Resistance, I got the impression from Jaye's Pinterest boards that the Ilyon worldbuilding was intricate and well developed. It really is. Ilyon is a magic-free fantasy world, but it takes more from Ancient Rome than from medieval times and has a somewhat dystopian feel to it. It is a harsh world, where people are in danger for believing in the one true God rather than in idols. And, I don't know, it just feels very real. You can tell Jaye put a lot of effort into developing the different races and cultures, and it definitely paid off.

Plot: 5/5

The plot of Resistance isn't exactly what one would expect from a fantasy story. It's not a quest, nor is it a battle to free a land from an evil king. It really deals more with things one would expect from historical fiction and futuristic stories: Christians trying to survive in a pagan world, and what happens when they can no longer stay undercover. It really follows two stories which come together towards the end. It has many ups and downs and dangerous situations and a few moments to relax before things just get worse. Resistance has a lot of action. It is clean, but it can get pretty intense at times, which is why I probably wouldn't recommend it for anyone under twelve.

Character Development: 5/5

I'll take the main characters in turn. First, Kyrin. Kyrin Altair is the main girl. She has a perfect memory and a lot of insecurities. She really leans a lot on her twin brother Kaden, and it's hard for her to be without him. It was interesting to see how having a perfect memory might affect someone. I related to her best of all the characters. While my memory is really rather opposite of hers, in almost every other way, I'm like her. Her personality, her shyness around strangers, her timidity about sharing her faith, even her headaches! Seriously, when it described her headaches, I would think, "I know exactly how that feels!"

Kaden. Kaden really really made me wish I had a brother. He has always been there for Kyrin. He wants to protect her and take care of her, and she really needs him, just as he needs her. He's really close to his twin sister, and, to be honest, made me jealous of the close sibling relationship they have. I know, they're fictional characters, but there's a good reason why my favorite character I made up based on me has two triplet brothers.

Jace. The general consensus seems to be that Jace needs a hug, and I agree. Thankfully, he eventually gets a few. He grew up as a slave where people constantly told him that since he was half ryrik he was a soulless animal. It's terrible to see how much this hurts him. He's tortured with doubts, and has a really difficult time not condemning himself as a dangerous animal. He's not, not by a long shot. He's a really great guy, if only he would see it. I only wish I didn't have to wait until book 3 for Jace and Kyrin to fall in love. Yes, that will be book 3. No, I never miss a series Facebook post.

Other honorable mentions. Emperor Daican was a very well done villain. He really was made to be human rather than evil incarnate. That being said, he's still the villain of the story. His son Daniel was a particularly interesting character, and my sister's favorite. I was glad to interview him during the blog tour. Rayad was great as a mentor, Holden made an interesting minor antagonist, and I loved what we get to see of Kyrin and Kaden's family.

Wow, this is probably the longest book review I've ever written. Resistance deserves it, after all, the book is about 500 pages long. If you haven't picked up on it already, which I'm sure you have, I highly recommend Resistance, Ilyon Chronicles book 1. It's exciting to know there are still 5 more books in the series, all bound to be better than the last.

Edmund Pevensie--The Chronicles of Narnia

"Even a traitor may mend. I have known one that did."

Edmund is my favorite Pevensie. I like the others, but there's something about Edmund that makes me like him best.

When The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe begins, Edmund is a jerk and a bully, particularly towards Lucy. When she finds Narnia, he has to torment her about it, and when he discovers it is real, he is worse, lying about the fact that he had been there too. Yet he gets worse. Once all the Pevensies are in Narnia, he goes to the White Witch and tells her where his siblings are, betraying them to the very person who wants to kill them.

Why, you may ask, is this Edmund one of my favorite characters? Because the story doesn't end there. As Edmund travels with the Witch, he begins to see her for who she really is, and repents of his traitorous deeds. He wants to get back to his family, but being rescued and brought to Aslan's camp still isn't enough. Aslan had a talk with Edmund which no one else heard, which truly changed him. But to complete it all, because of Edmund's treachery, the Deep Magic from the dawn of time required blood as atonement. Aslan sacrificed himself for Edmund, and came back to life due to the Deeper Magic from before the dawn of time. Edmund was truly changed after this whole experience, so much so that when he was a king of Narnia, after he helped to stop Rabadash's attack at Anvard and they were discussing what to do with him, he said, "But even a traitor may mend. I have known one that did." Even though Rabadash's grand scheme was to kidnap his sister, Susan, and force her to become his wife, Edmund was still willing to show him mercy, for the mercy showed him by Aslan.

Edmund obviously felt bad for the way he treated Lucy. In Prince Caspian, when the children disputed whether to go where Lucy had seen Aslan, or follow their own path, Edmund sided with Lucy. He even says it is because of what had happened the last time, and that Lucy had been right then. Later, he's the second one of the party to see Aslan, before Peter, even.

The movies leave much to be desired, but one thing they get right is Edmund. (Prince Caspian gets Peter all wrong, and it's aggravating, but he's not the subject of this post.) He is a repentant traitor, who mends his relationship with his sister so well that they become very close. Indeed, the relationship between Anne and Edmund Rubin was influenced by Edmund and Lucy. He isn't perfect, he sometimes gets cranky and he isn't as patient as Lucy, but once his positive character arc is complete, he doesn't reset. He never goes back to being a traitor. He isn't free from temptation, Deathwater Island shows that, but he can overcome it.

I think I like Edmund because he's easy to identify with. I never was a traitor, but I was a brat. People who have only known me as a teenager have a hard time believing that, but it's true. I was bad, and I did have to reform. I'm not perfect now, but I'm working at it. Edmund shows that a traitor may indeed mend, with Aslan's help, and that's something we all can benefit from.

eBooks and Future Blog Plans

I was excited the other day to search my name on Barnes & Noble and find my books. They are there as eBooks only, but that means that if you have a Nook rather than a Kindle, you can buy them now. They can also be purchased for Sony eReaders. I don't know yet whether this is more worth it than Kindle Select, but, for the time being, you can buy both Across the Stars and The Experiment for whatever eReader you have. Here are the links.

Across the Stars eBook-$2.99 Kindle Nook Kobo Smashwords

The Experiment eBook-$2.99 Kindle Nook Kobo Smashwords

For future blog plans . . . I have a hard time thinking of things to blog about. A seriously hard time. So I decided last night to write up posts on my favorite fictional characters to post when I can't think of anything better to write about. It won't just be raving on and on about my favorites. I'll try to keep it writing oriented and talk about the character development and try to learn from it.

Be forewarned, I won't shy away from spoilers. (Ugh, I can't think about that word without River Song coming to mind. It has joined "precious" and all the other words tainted by stories.) I'm not writing reviews, I'm analyzing the development of my favorite characters, sort of, anyway, and I can't do that without talking about the character's storyline. I'll try to give proper warning for major spoilers, but I can't promise you'll come away unspoiled. (Given that I actually follow through on any of this. I have yet to write a single post, though I did write a list of some of my favorite characters.)

And maybe sometimes I'll interrupt with something more spectacular to say.

A Writing Update

For starters, I was interviewed recently on the Stardust and Gravel blog. Hop over there to learn extras about my books and some more things about me, like if I prefer movies, TV shows, or neither, and don't forget to enter for a chance to win a paperback copy of The Experiment.

Now for the writing update. A few weeks ago, I posted on my Facebook page that I had finished with my rewrite of The Crossways, book 2 of Time Captives, at 38,352 words, by far a record for me. The edits I made on my subsequent read through raised that number to 38,509. So now Time Captives is 2/3 complete. Book 3 will be Crannig Castle, but I haven't started it yet. I'm taking a break from Time Captives to write a companion to the trilogy.

This companion is called Espionage. Here is the logline:

In the midst of an alliance controversy, a nobleman's daughter must expose a heinous scheme by her father's political arch-enemy to force him to align with the evil strytes of Calhortz.

It will be a shorter, less complicated book than anything I have written in some time, and so it is a nice relief, in more ways than one. I'm estimating it will be about 24,000 words, and I'm aiming for ten chapters. (I just realized the number of chapters is the number of my favorite Doctor. Weird, and not intentional.) My goal is to finish Espionage by the end of August. I have a schedule that I have amazingly kept on track for a week, so I think this will happen.

Just a little bit more about it, because I like to ramble about my story ideas. The main character is a nine year old girl named Savanna, but called Vannie for short. I'm writing it in 1st person from her point of view. (Past tense, I can't stand present in the narrative of a book.) I haven't successfully written a book in 1st person, so if this works, which it seems to be doing, it will be my first. The only other complete story I wrote in 1st person was my stupidest picture book which will never see the light of day.

Vannie is a fun point of view character, and rather a relief from Adriel and Eleanor, the primary point of view characters in The Crossways. See, Adriel is a sullen and rebellious slave who is deeply hurt, and Eleanor has had her heart broken by her circumstances and been betrayed, and insists on dwelling on it, which can get sort of depressing. They'll both come out of it by the end, but they haven't quite yet. Contrast that to Vannie, who has a secure happy life, and has only the company of a very annoying cousin to complain about. Things do get more serious than that, but she still has a much lighter tone than either Adriel or Eleanor. Besides, it's fun to try to think like a little girl again. And the characters are super easy to develop, as opposed to my struggles with Time Captives who want to shut me out. :) I'm building a story board for Espionage as I write it on Pinterest. There's one for Time Captives as well.

What does this mean for publishing? Well, my plan is to publish Creighton Hill sometime early next year. I'm not sure of anything more exact yet, but I'll announce it once I am. I'm also thinking, not sure this will happen, of trying NaNo this year to write a sequel to Across the Stars about Hanna and Sam. If (and that's a big, major, huge if) I do, I will probably publish it next fall, if it's any good. You never can tell with sequels. Then the plan is to publish The Crossways in early 2016, Espionage in late 2016, and Crannig Castle the following spring. Who knows what will actually happen. After all, God is in control of my life, not me. His plans could be completely different.

Next on my writing plans, after Time Captives is finished, is to finally fully jump into an outer space dystopian trilogy I planned last year. It was sparked by a dream, and combined with ideas sparked by The Giver and my desire to write a space story because of reading Red Rain, The Destiny Trilogy, and Radialloy. I really can't wait to get into it, especially since every time I finish watching a Hunger Games movie I come away going "Must. Write. Dystopian." and start thinking about my story again even though it's completely different other than sharing a basic genre. What can I say? I've always loved evil government stories.

So that's a (not so) brief update on my current writing and publishing plans. (I could have rambled on longer, but I don't know that anyone would read it.) So long, for now!

Flawed vs. Perfect Characters Pt. 2

For any readers not on Facebook, my friend Jaye L. Knight interviewed me on her blog last week. There's still a little bit of time to enter to win an eBook copy of Across the Stars!

Last week I talked about perfect characters, and how they can be boring, annoying, or even dangerous. This week I'm going to talk about the other extreme: when character flaws are condoned.

The biggest thing I can think of to illustrate this right now is Pirates of the Caribbean. Will and Elizabeth start out as ordinary colonists, well, Elizabeth is the governor's daughter. They are good. Will is a blacksmith. He hates pirates because they are criminals. Throughout the course of the story, both Will and Elizabeth become pirates. They gradually lose their moral compass, learning to do whatever it takes to accomplish what they want to. True, the British officers aren't really good guys either, but that doesn't mean that it should be okay for the "good guys" to be pirates.

Now, I enjoy Pirates of the Caribbean (not the fourth one, I hated the fourth one), but the lack of a true moral compass by any of the characters annoys me. For instance, in the second movie, Jack Sparrow wants to get out of dying yet again, so he and his crew try to round up one hundred people to unknowingly send to their deaths, so as to trade one hundred souls for Jack's life. Am I supposed to support that? Maybe not, but I don't remember the movie making it clear that it was the wrong choice. SPOILER Elizabeth ended up tethering Jack to the Black Pearl so Davy Jones's beastie would eat him, thus killing him and alleviating the need to kill one hundred souls. So they didn't actually go through with it. Then they went to Davy Jones's Locker to get Jack out, cheating death once again. END SPOILER

Another thing that bothers me is NBC's Revolution, which has now been cancelled. I watched the first half of the first season, and enjoyed how Charlie was a good person in the midst of chaos where everyone, including her uncle Miles, were willing to kill for any reason. I stopped caring about the show when it came back after Christmas because they killed off Charlie's brother Danny, who they were trying to rescue for the first half of the season. Then they started adding in inappropriate material and I really really didn't care to watch. But my parents still watched the show, and so occasionally I caught part of an episode. I was disappointed to see how all the characters had deteriorated into wandering around killing people without much purpose. Sure, maybe Charlie and Aaron were wimps at the beginning and needed to toughen up, but to become killers? Maybe that's part of the reason why it was cancelled.

Yet another is National Treasure. I enjoy it and its sequel, yes, but the characters constantly break the law, nonchalantly, and get away with it. They steal the Declaration of Independence, kidnap the President,  hack into security systems, break into numerous places, and Ben Gates even once remarks, "Maybe one day I'll wear this to a party I'm actually invited to." Somehow they're the good guys, I suppose because they're not going around shooting people. Still, every time they get off scot-free, and are hailed as heroes for the historical finds they made in the process. It's "the end justifies the means" in action, and I don't really think that's a good message to be sending people.

I suppose Star Wars is a different matter, since the prequel trilogy is a story about how Anakin Skywalker became Darth Vader. His behavior isn't condoned. It tears everything apart, his friendships, his marriage, the Jedi Order, the Republic, the entire galaxy. This is a place where a negative character arc is necessary and well done. (Yes, there are tons of flaws in the film-making, but I think the negative character arc was well done.) I still don't see why Padme was stupid enough to marry him, when she knew how bad he could be, but someone had to be Luke and Leia's mother. I don't agree with the idea of marrying someone in hopes of reforming him, but again, someone had to be Luke and Leia's mother.

Something I like about Tangled, one of the many things (yes, I'm now an adult and I love that movie), is that Rapunzel didn't really start falling in love with Flynn until he saw the error of his thieving ways and started trying to be a hero. At the end Flynn says specifically that he gave up thieving and turned his life completely around, then it says that he and Rapunzel got married. See, just as I think it's bad for girls to expect perfection from their future husband, I think it's dangerous to make them think they can marry someone bad and reform him to make him good. The song "Fixer Upper" from Frozen interestingly points this out:

"We're not saying you can change him,
Cause people don't really change.
We're only saying that love's a force
That's powerful and strange.
People make bad choices when they're mad or scared or stressed.
Throw a little love their way,
And you'll bring out their best."

People can change for the better, but it's not a good idea to marry someone in the hopes of changing him. That isn't likely to work out well. It's more likely to deteriorate into a really bad situation. There's a reason the Bible says Christians shouldn't be unequally yoked with non-Christians.

Bryan Davis is actually very good at creating good, but flawed characters. Jason Masters from Dragons of Starlight and Nathan Sheppard from Echoes From the Edge are both gentlemen who care about the people around them and try to do what's right. They have flaws, but they are things they struggle against in order to do right.

I'll finish with Bardon from the Dragon Keeper Chronicles again. He is a good character who is a gentleman and a knight, but he has flaws. Yet his flaws are not condoned. Kale doesn't think it a good thing that he constantly gripes when riding horses instead of dragons, though it does amuse her. Make good guys good. Don't make them perfect, give them flaws that are clearly portrayed as flaws, and make them good. Well rounded characters are the true key to an excellent story.

Flawed vs. Perfect Characters Pt. 1

Characters are an important part of stories. In fact, they are probably the most important part. Without good characters a story is missing something vital. Lately, I've been thinking a lot about character development and I've come to the conclusion that there are two extremes to avoid: perfect characters and characters with flaws that are condoned.

I'll start with perfect characters. I love the Elsie Dinsmore series by Martha Finley, but they have a major flaw: perfect characters. If the character is a good one, he or she rarely, if ever, makes mistakes. Just look at Elsie. She is the standard of what a little girl should be, right? Lulu Raymond was really bad, until she reformed and became a Christian, at which point she was perfect. To be honest, this was pretty typical of child characters of the time. Look at Sara Crewe. She doesn't really have any serious character flaws to struggle against.

J. Grace Pennington had an excellent post about this subject awhile back. See, it's not that I'm against characters being good, not by a long shot, and I'll address that in more detail later. It's the unrealistic goodness that I don't like. It gives a false impression, and makes it impossible to relate to the characters. I never could relate to Elsie. I could relate to Lulu and her struggles with her temper, but it annoyed me when she reformed because she never did anything wrong again. Sure, I conquered my temper and don't really have much of a problem with it anymore, but that doesn't mean I don't struggle with sin in other areas anymore. I think good guys should be good, of course, but not perfect. Perfection in a human character is unrelatable, and makes for a flat, cardboard character.

Another aspect I thought of recently, actually what got me thinking about it again, was the perfect "love interest." A trap many authors fall into is creating a girl character and then making a perfect guy for her to marry. I admit, I did somewhat fall into this trap myself when writing Felix Walker. And my favorite character in The Hunger Games Trilogy is Peeta Mellark, who is pretty near perfect. I mean, he does lie to the Capitol, but overall he's really good. He's really nice, he loves Katniss unconditionally and is blind to her flaws, and he is incredibly selfless. He was willing to let himself get beaten for burning bread in order to give Katniss the bread that saved her life after her father died. Maybe there are people like that, but we can't teach our readers to expect that from real life. Things do change in regards to him in Mockingjay but that would be a major spoiler.

On the other hand, Jace in Ilyon Chronicles is far from perfect. He is constantly depressed because of his ryrik blood and sometimes has difficulty controlling his temper. But he's still a good person, and is always struggling against his nature and trying to protect others, namely Kyrin. The character who got me thinking about this subject again was Bardon in Donita K. Paul's Dragon Keeper Chronicles. He is a gentleman and a chivalrous knight, but he's not perfect. He can be infuriating with his principle quoting. Actually, he kind of reminds me of Ferus Olin from Jedi Quest and Last of the Jedi by Jude Watson, a character who was so focused on being perfectly by the book that he became stuck up. Not that Bardon was all that stuck up, but still.

I think having a perfect character in such a role is a very bad idea. It prepares girls to expect perfection out of their future husband, which of course can never be attained. The key I discovered with Bardon is that he is a character in his own right. Sure, he entered the story to eventually marry Kale, but he still is his own character. He got the first 3/4 of DragonKnight to develop as an independent character, struggling against his nature and personal desires in order to do what is right, and it made the last books better for him to be a character in his own right.

Next week (hopefully), I will explore the opposite extreme: condoned character flaws.