Villains for Valentine's Day?

I have to write about villains on the most romantic day EVER? (Whine.)  Reviewing the topic as assigned: development of positive traits builds better villains. Hmm. Somewhat tongue in cheek, I offer:

In my novels to date the "villains" have been:

Isis, Queen of the Egyptian Great Ones, who doesn't think a god and a mortal should fall in love...

Nephthys, her sister, who doesn't think humans count for much and doesn't care about two mortals in love...

A Hyksos commander who's been ordered to retrieve a certain Egyptian dancer...

A practitioner of black magic (can't say who or we'll have spoilers happening)...

Various assorted demons...

Or, if you prefer science fiction romance, I've had:

The penny pinching and evil corporation behind the Wreck of the Nebula Dream...plus pirates and very scary aliens...

The person masterminding a planetwide rebellion in Escape From Zulaire...(again, no spoilers)...

And, last but not least, a barbarian warlord who's determined to keep the unwiilling bride sent to him in an arranged marriage....

Well, ok  each of my villains has their reasons for doing what they do, even the demons, who have to report back to their scary master (and who might be hungry as well...). Isis and Nephthys certainly have their attention on the greater good of all Egypt in 1550 BCE, and it's up to the human heroes and heroines in the Gods of Egypt books to figure out a way to survive while still accomplishing the mission....

I just tend to focus more on my protagonists and take the villain at face value. He's got his motivations but he (or she) is the Big Bad and we're in the middle of the story when I start Chapter One and so let's just get ON with it. Can I make a tiny confession? There's a series I used to read (not written by a fellow Word Whore) where I skipped PAGES of internal monologuing from the villain in every book. Ok, don't be shocked! I'm sure it was all very well written but I...just...wasn't...that ...interested. Give me the stuff about the hero and the heroine.

Perhaps it's because I was imprinted young by Ming the Merciless. The one in the 1930's serials actually, because our local TV station ran them every day in the late afternoon. Do we know Ming's back story? Do we know what motivates him, other than a craving to conquer the universe and quite understandable desire to marry Dale Arden? Do we enjoy the adventure and know who to root for? NO! I rest my case.

Now I will say there's one villain I always was fascinated by, and

Richelieu & Milady deWinter

that was Cardinal Richelieu. I did get that - as portrayed in The Three Musketeers -  he was motivated quite a bit by his desire to do the right thing for France, and a little bit by his um 'admiration' for the Queen. So he could be flexible, and not all evil all the time.

Perhaps at some point in my writing life I'll have a villain who compels me to delve deeply into his/her backstory and have sympathetic aspects. I do have a couple of characters in mind, both in ancient Egypt and for my SFR's who might start out as less-than-white-hat people and evolve. We'll see.  

Musketeerly goodness for you:

I Love Research From Chariots to Crocodiles

...but I can get lost in it sometimes! I do the most in depth research for my paranormal novels set in ancient Egypt. It's not that I don't research some specific things for the science fiction, but the Egypt of thousands of years calls to me. I maintain a large library of actual books, most of which I list on the my blog under the topic of overall historical accuracy. At some point I realized I probably owned a lot of the books I’d need if I was pursuing a degree in Egyptology (but facing no tests).

So how do I pursue this research? I don’t write strictly historical novels because I wanted to have the Egyptian gods and goddesses take direct action in the events. Right away this takes me outside the boundaries of what’s acceptable for historically accurate. I don’t want my novels to be “wallpaper historicals” either though, where I just toss in a few cool looking Egyptian words and make reference to the pyramids, pat the Sphinx on the head and I’m done. I want the Reader to be in ancient Egypt, even if it’s my paranormal version. There are some plot conveniences I want, like talking about actual coins (which the actual deben system was not). I do some deliberate anachronisms to serve my stories.

Let’s take my latest novel MAGIC OF THE NILE. Since it’s a sequel to PRIESTESS OF THE NILE, I’d already done the research into the Crocodile God Sobek, hero of the first book and major player in the second. But for the new book, since we spend time at the temple my heroine Tyema runs, I researched how Sobek’s temples were organized 4000 years ago, a lot more details about crocodiles, how processions were conducted, which deities were important in the capital city of Thebes, the hierarchy of an Egyptian temple’s priesthood, what Pharaoh would wear for different activities, what foods would be served on a big feast day…

I needed my hero Sahure to be dashing, so he’s a charioteer, which was about as dashing as you could get in 1500 BCE. That led to research on chariots, including a wonderful NOVA special, called “Building Pharaoh’s Chariot.” (Available on dvd.) Watching a team of British researchers attempt to reconstruct the chariot of ancient times, with the help of Egyptian craftsmen, basically by studying tomb paintings and the few actual surviving chariots, was amazing.  But where does Sahure need to drive in his gleaming, horse-drawn vehicle?

Turns out there was a chain of fortifications along various Egyptian borders, including at the Southern Oasis of Kharga, located on a major caravan route. I’d already researched caravans pretty heavily for a sequence in DANCER OF THE NILE. That’s one nice thing about writing a series – I can build on the tidbits I’ve learned before.  Also, research suggests plot points and vice versa. Since I’m a seat-of-the-pants writer, this approach works for me! Now I know all about Kharga, including the topography and weather.

At one point, Sahure needs to tell Tyema about a battle he’s fought in beside Pharaoh. I drew a suitable tale to adapt from translations of  4000 year old eyewitness accounts of actual warfare and gave my character the right ‘memories’ to share with the heroine. I also needed to be able to talk about his weapons and tactics. Back to researching bows and arrows of the time…

Were the native people of the Southern Oasis descended from the goddess Sekhmet? They apparently thought so, which sent me off to ponder all the cool facets of her powers and background.  In many cases there are alternate versions of the myths surrounding an Egyptian deity so I’m free to choose the aspects that work for my story and to extrapolate other ideas for my plot.  

A lot of the research I do never shows up directly in the novels, so if by now you’ve been thinking that my books must be pretty dry, dusty tomes, possibly akin to the textbooks, let me reassure you. I have to be able to put myself in the headspace of ancient Egypt, so I can create characters who are believable residents of that time and place, even while they’re having these amazing adventures. I don’t have to show off all my research (except maybe in blog posts LOL). If it doesn’t serve the plot, it doesn’t go in the book, but the knowledge might influence the story’s direction.

It’s trickier than you might think though and I know I don’t always succeed. Let me give you an example from the first draft of DANCER OF THE NILE: “The chariot bounced over iron hard ruts…” The problem? The Egyptians didn’t have iron at this point in time! So I changed it to “bronze hard”…but to a modern reader that’s an unfamiliar phrase and it took me completely out of the flow when I read it. Eventually the line became: “The chariot jounced over deep, hard ruts…” 

So there's my example of how researching one thing takes me to the next and so on and so forth...

And below the art is the NOVA special on chariots:

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Three Things About My Writing I Now Know

Well, my writing process is my writing process and we all know I'm quite superstitious about the whole thing. HOWEVER, having said that, I do know three more things about the writing now than I did in January.

No, I won't be switching to Scrivener or keeping spreadsheets LOL.

1. Much as I love my ancient Egyptian paranormal romances and enjoy the heck out of researching and writing them, they are a nice little niche. I have loyal readers who love them - thank you from the bottom of my heart! - and I'll keep writing them BUT the science fiction romances seem to be more of a sweet spot for me, at least for now. I have been alternating between SFR and ancient Egypt but I think in 2015 I'll probably do a run of SFR. I do have my next ancient Egyptian nearly ready to send off to the editor so you'll see GHOST OF THE NILE fairly early in 2015.

2. Whichever scene is the one I'm avoiding writing, that's the one the book probably needs desperately and I might as well just WRITE IT. I call it my "crossing the river" syndrome, because in the first SFR I ever wrote, I had a fairly major chase scene, concluding with a dramatic last stand on the banks of a raging river...and I kind of cheated by saying, "And after they crossed the river...." Uh, no. My beta readers and editor weren't standing for that and they were right of course. In one of my ancient Egyptians, there was a two week river voyage I tried to wiggle out of writing....no dice, So since then, I've learned that whatever scene I'm shying away from tackling is probably an important one and I'd better just dive in (yes, it nearly always seems to involve water! Sex scenes - no problem. Major bodies of water - problem!) And hey, it turns out ok.

3. I used to believe I could never write a series, that my Muse didn't work that way. But this past year I've been taking my own self-directed master class from Nalini Singh and our own Jeffe Kennedy, which consists of reading and rereading and loving their books and taking mental notes of how they've created the ongoing arcs and plot threads....plus asking Jeffe questions, which she's always very generous about answering. (I'm sure Nalini is generous as well but I don't  know her that well LOL. I pepper her with book-related questions for my USAT column from time to time...) I really feel that writing an actual series is my next challenge as a writer and I hope to develop one in 2015. Yes, my existing novels are connected series - the same Pharaoh for the Egyptians and the same Universe for the SFR's, but I want to write a classic series with continuing characters and an arc beyond the events of each books. It's going to require flexing some new writerly muscles and as I'm a total pantster we'll see how that goes, but at least I've reached a place after publishing seven books where I feel I can attempt it.

Happy New Year to one and all!!!

(Here's the book trailer for ESCAPE FROM ZULAIRE, in which I wrote the darn river scene as soon as I knew I needed it!)

Books of 2013 That Linger in My Memory

I'm not necessarily going to attempt to rank these as my Top Five, but they are books that have stayed in my
memory and since I read a LOT (when I'm not writing), I take that as an excellent sign that they deserve to be on a Favorites List.

Archangel's Legion by Nalini Singh - continues the story of Raphael the Archangel and his Guildhunter consort, added some serious new twists to the already complex world building. Plus, angels! I also enjoyed Obsidian by her, which is the latest installment in her Psy Wars series. It was dark and intense, but I was unable to put it down. I admire how she weaves the plot elements together so seamlessly over the many books.

Ruby by Jeffe Kennedy, my fellow Word Whore - I felt as if New Orleans was another key character in this sensuous, intense book and I loved the Cajun chef, Bobby Prejean, and the heroine, Danielle. I wanted a sequel the moment I turned the last page! (Are you listening, Jeffe???)

South of Surrender  by Laura Kaye - terrific idea to have the ancient Greek gods of the wind as modern day heroes. Her worldbuilding was amazing and the romance between the South Wind and a human who is slowly losing her sight was poignant. I read the other two books in the series right after this one and can't wait for the final volume in 2014.

I read quite a few books that are scholarly tomes on ancient Egypt, to enhance my own world building (and Dancing for Hathor, by Carolyn Graves Brown, about the role of women in those faraway days. Ancient Egyptian Jewelry was pure eye candy, a lot of beautiful items other those in the well known King Tut collection, plus discussions of how the jewelry was made...this book was by Carol Andrews.
because like most authors, I love research for research's sake). One I especially enjoyed was

Breeder by Cara Bristol - science fiction romance with terrific worldbuilding on Ms. Bristol's part...I was really pulling for the main character to overcome all the conditioning of his planet and his culture and Find True Love. I'd been reading 8 sentence snippets of this book on the Weekend Warriors Blog Hop prior to its release so I was more than ready to have the entire story in my hands.


I periodically reread my favorite Georgette Heyer Regency novels, which are now on my kindle, and so Talisman Ring, Frederica and Cotillion deserve mention on my list. (I kept my original paperback copies, now very well worn and falling apart, as well as more recent re-releases with beautiful paintings on the covers.)

That's a sampler of my reading year...that's kinda five, plus or minus, right? I can't wait for 2014 and another year of great books from my favorite authors and exciting new authors yet to be discovered. I want to FILL that kindle!

Sometimes the World Is Already Built

I write two different series - a loosely connected set of science fiction romance and adventure  novels set in the far future of a galactic civilization I call the Sectors and another loosely connected set of paranormal romances set in Ancient Egypt. 1550 BCE  Egypt to be pretty exact.

Talk about a rich background in which to to set stories! By then the Egyptians had about 1600 years of history already behind them, the pyramids were built long ago, there were myths and gods, heroes and legends, male and female pharaohs, and a well organized civilization with all of its own rules and intricacies. OK, so I did not create Ancient Egypt. But I don't write pure historicals either...I want, no I need the gods to be personally involved in the events that occur during my novels. So I do research and more research and I never know where the research will lead me, in terms of either new plot ideas or facts to weave into the stories.

It really made my day when Kirkus Reviews said I'd "clearly done my research".  Thanks, guys!

So I invented my own Pharaoh, made him a composite of several real men who sat the on the throne around that time. I gave him a Usurper Pharaoh to fight  and she's very loosely based on Hatshepsut. My ruler and the heroes and heroines of my books constantly battle the Hyksos, who were Egypt's primary enemy at that time, and their gods and demons, which I freely admit to having developed myself, based on research into a great many belief systems of ancient peoples in that part of the world (Sumer, Mesopotamia, Akkadia) and what little we know of the Hyksos.

But it's not as simple as plunking my characters down in hot, sunny ancient Egypt during the Nile inundation and "just"  writing. I want  the people in my novels to inhabit their world believably, even if black magic is going on and the goddess Isis is issuing commands... First of all, while we know a great deal about the civilization, most of the knowledge is from tomb paintings, scraps and fragments of papyrus, broken columns etc. So a lot of what we "know" is theorizing, which leaves me room to maneuver. Secondly, the Egyptian pantheon of deities had origin stories that shifted over time. Not only that, the gods themselves changed during the thousands of years the Egyptian civilization reigned. In some cases three or four previously separate gods eventually morphed into one. And many cities and towns had their own local  god or goddess, or a version of one of the more well known gods.

So like anyone who has built a world from scratch, I have to keep track of which aspects of the mythology and the history I've chosen and be consistent. I have to try to weave daily details into my novels that place my characters in ancient Egypt for you, without either going overboard on how much research I've got at my fingertips or having the dancers, priestesses, warriors and others take too much notice of things that would be routine to them.

I enjoy the challenge. I love the time period, which is part of why I write novels set there...I sometimes create

deliberate anachronisms to make the story flow a bit more easily...I catch myself in other anachronisms that need to be fixed. "The chariot jounced over iron hard ruts..." Umm, no, they didn't have iron at this stage. and saying the chariot jounced over bronze hard ruts is just going to take my Readers out of the story most likely so...time to rewrite that sentence!

So yes, I "moved into" a world that I didn't have to create from thin air, but once I was there, I definitely did some rearranging and expansion to make the background into the place where the stories I want to tell can take place.

Maybe another week I'll tell you about my science fiction world building. Anything can happen at Word Whores!