Last month, I wrote about my favorite literary tropes, and I wanted to follow it up with a look at a few tropes that I’m less fond of. My intention isn’t to complain or cast judgment (for the most part), but to explore what it is about each trope that I dislike. Several of the entries on this list are actually quite good, when executed well. It’s just that I don’t see them done well all that often. As before, these are in no particular order.
Continue reading “6 Tropes I Hate”Once Upon a Start
It’s been said (and sung) that the beginning is a very good place to start. And figuring out how to start is a problem writers and creators have faced since they began creating. A good opening has to catch the audience’s attention, draw them in, and set the tone for the whole story or piece.
Fairy tales have mastered openings. Not only do they set the tone well, they’re immediately recognizable. As soon as you read “Once upon a time,” you know exactly what you’re getting into.
Continue reading “Once Upon a Start”9 Tropes I Love
Readers and writers alike love to throw around the word “trope.” Some people say it with derision, but are tropes always bad? What does trope even mean?
Being someone who lives and breathes books, I thought I’d put together a list of my favorite tropes (and next month, my most hated tropes). These are in no particular order, and while many of them relate to the fantasy genre, it’s not only fantasy tropes. Also, I wanted very badly to keep this list in the single digits, or I’d be tempted to go on forever, but I do include some honorable mentions at the end.
Continue reading “9 Tropes I Love”The Many Legends of Baba Yaga
One of the pillars of fairy tales is their recurring themes and character archetypes. It’s even common to see names used over and over again (Jack, Hans, even Snow-White is used in several unrelated stories). But it’s rare to see the same character appear in multiple fairy and folk tales, like we see in the many appearances of the hag in the woods, Baba Yaga.
Baba Yaga is staple of Slavic lore. She can be found in stories across several countries as a specific character, not just an archetype. What I find most interesting about her is that she is portrayed, almost equally, as a villain and a benefactor.
Continue reading “The Many Legends of Baba Yaga”Faster Than Expected
(This was meant to be a video, uploaded earlier this week. However, I’ve been under the weather and lost my voice, so instead of putting it off any longer, I decided to post the script!)
Heya word nerds, Kate here! Boy, it’s been a crazy month. You may remember that earlier this year, I sent off my novel to a freelance editor. I sent it at the beginning of March, and she planned to send it back by the end of May. I thought it was perfect: I could take March and April to start outlining the next manuscript, as well as research agents, create a list of people I want to query, and start putting together my query material. Then I could spend June and maybe July making revisions, and be ready to start querying toward the end of the summer.
That didn’t happen.
Continue reading “Faster Than Expected”At First Sight?
Dear Fairy Godmother,
A good friend of mine seems to ‘fall in love’ every other week. She always insists that this time she’s found ‘the one.’ I want to be supportive, because I care about her so much, but I just don’t believe it’s ever true. I don’t how to express my concern without sounding like I’m judging her, but some of those past ‘loves’ have turned into pretty severe hurts, and I don’t want her to keep going through this cycle.
I’m just not the kind of person who believes in love at first sight. I’ve always been more of a ‘you-can’t-marry-a-man-you-just-met’ type than a ‘I’ve-found-the-one-wait-what’s-your-name-again?’ type. My friend calls me cynical when I try to rein in her more romantic expectations, but I just don’t believe that love is an immediate reaction.
Continue reading “At First Sight?”How to Write Your Unicorn
I’ll be honest, now that I’m trying to post here with some sort of regularity again, I sometimes have trouble figuring out what to write about. So occasionally I’ll look back through past posts for inspiration. Considering I’ve got about ten years of backlog (wait, what?!), there’s plenty to choose from. (Actually, the ten year anniversary of my first post here is tomorrow, which is CRAZY!)
In 2015, I wrote a pair of posts that I vaguely remember wanting to turn into a series. I couldn’t tell you why I never followed through on that, but here I am almost eight years later finally continuing on. The premise was taking a look at well-known magical and mythical creatures, exploring some of their history, and providing ideas for customizing the creatures for your own use in storytelling. So, welcome back to the How to Write Your . . . series! Today’s topic: unicorns.
Continue reading “How to Write Your Unicorn”Kate Reviews: Echo North
Fairy Tale Facts: East of the Sun and West of the Moon
I was shocked to realize that I haven’t yet covered this story in my Fairy Tale Facts series. After all, it’s one of my favorite stories and partly the inspiration for the novel I’m writing! So let’s get to it!
East of the Sun and West of the Moon is a Norwegian fairy tale, first collected by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe and later included in Andrew Lang’s 1890 The Blue Fairy Book. It has similar themes and plot points to Beauty and the Beast and the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche.
Types of Words: Eggcorns
Here’s the original post where the term was coined! What’s your favorite eggcorn?
You can also check out the video I made about malaprops and mondegreens. What’s your favorite weird type of word?
Until next time, word nerds!
Kate G. Jameson 