The Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff Interview, Part 4

Maya's had a lot of experience, even collaborating with Emmy-winning writer, Michael Reaves. But, how does that affect the writer's work? What changes? What's more difficult? And how is it to write about Batman? Find out in the continuation of Maya's interview. And, if you haven't yet, there's still parts one, two, and three!

JS: The Meri and Batman: Fear Itself are easily contrasted and very different. Which story did you find more challenging to tell?

MKB: The Meri was my first novel, so it was a big challenge. I'd written other novel-length works, but they weren't ready for prime time, so this was the first one I'd written after I'd had some success with short fiction and half knew what I was doing.

The challenge for me was that I hadn't read that much fantasy (just Tolkien, really) and I was only writing the story because I'd dreamed it. I intentionally didn't go out and read a bunch of fantasy because I really didn't want to even be tempted to model on someone else's work. As I said, I had to make up the world, so it was tremendously challenging. I had never built an alternate world civilization from the ground up and I wanted it to be complete and realistic. In books Two and Three in the series I used the bulk of that research in the real world; in The Meri the challenge was building the magical system and religion. I've studied religion and religious history avidly, but magic wasn't something I'd dealt with before.

In Batman: Fear Itself, the challenge was in telling the story we wanted to tell without violating the publisher's sensibilities about the character. There were a number of "thou shalt nots" that I had to keep in mind as I worked. And I had to research the Batman universe. I think the best training for meeting that challenge is being an avid reader. If you can immerse yourself in someone else's universe then turn around and write in it as if it were your own, media tie-ins and shared worlds can be lots of fun.

JS: How did you prepare to write Batman: Fear Itself? Was there a lot of pressure on you to write a compelling story featuring such a famous protagonist?

MKB: Fortunately with Batman, my collaborator, Michael (Reaves), had a good first draft of an outline and has written so much in the Batman Universe (he has an Emmy for the animated series) that he's an expert. He also had written a prologue and some material for a first chapter. So my job was to learn the "language" of Batman, familiarize myself with the characters and "the story so far", and to absorb Michael's writing style.

The last one was a piece of cake—I'd already done one collaboration with him—but I did notice that there was a different ambience to the writing and I knew I'd have to adjust my style to fit it. I read a wonderful book on the forensics techniques used in Batman stories, which was of immense help, and did some additional science research on things like mass spectrometers and ballistics and neurotoxins. The next step was to nail down the outline. We brainstormed it and I committed it to paper, and then parsed the outline to get an idea of how the chapters would lay out and where key plot developments would occur.

I felt less pressure than I would have if I hadn't tried this before, but I had the benefit of having written a Riddick novel that will never see the light of day since the Chronicles of Riddick tanked. I learned a lot about working with an iconic character and discovered sneaky ways to develop new facets to a character that seemed to be set in stone.

JS: Fans have become very familiar with Batman. They’ve seen him in movies, on TV, and in the original comic books. Does that change the way you approach the writing?

MKB: Of course. As I said, you have to respect that. BUT—here's the cool thing—most people are familiar with Batman from a visual media. This means they're looking at him from the outside. Also cartoons and comics and movies are "short hand." That means I can flesh out what's behind the façade and in between the frames of cartoon or movie. I can write what the audience can't see—the thoughts inside Batman's head. So, I'll make sure he still looks the same on the outside, but inside his head I have some latitude. The fans seem to accept a certain amount of diversity of view and I think to some extent they realize that Batman and Bruce Wayne can't be on the inside what they present to the world. That would be boring. It's a challenge: How do you develop a character without seeming to change him?

There are just a couple more posts focused on Maya's interview. In the next few we'll see what inspires her, what she's working on, and where you can find her current works (and just in case you want to go buy them right now, they're on Amazon!). Don't forget to add the RSS feed for this blog!

The Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff Interview, Part 3

In part three of our interview, Maya talks about her craft, something she's very passionate about. I love her advice on metaphors. If you haven't yet, please check out parts one and two!

JS: You’ve mentioned that you’re quite a “craft monkey.” When reading The Meri, I immediately noticed your exceptional choice and use of metaphor. Many writers (including myself) struggle with appropriate use of metaphor. How did you develop a talent for it?

MKB: I have no idea. The little suckers just roll off the tip of my pen. But it may have something to do with the fact that I also write poetry and lyrics, which are metaphor intensive. And my favorite writers are Ray Bradbury and WP Kinsella, who can sling metaphors like nobody's business. I do try to observe some guidelines (rules, whatever) for metaphors:

First, I choose a metaphor that has more than one element that works with my subject. Let's say I want to create a metaphor for an orator's speaking style. It's bombastic. He roars out his words and pounds the podium, growing red in the face. The obvious choice for voice is "roar." But now I get to the pounding the podium part and no leonine images come to mind. Okay, no roaring then. But what if I realize the guy is a windbag? What if I say "He was a storm in full gale—hurricane voice howling above the erratic thunder of his fist striking the podium again, again, again, his sharp, icy words falling like hailstones over the crowd." That's going overboard, but the point is a good metaphor is one that gives you all the parallels you need. What doesn't work is if you grab "roar" and, lacking animal metaphors that work, change partners in mid-dance. Or, to use a mixed metaphor, change partners in mid-stream. Then "He was a lion—voice roaring above the hammer of his fist striking the podium like an anvil, while he sprayed the crowd with word-bullets." Conjures images of a lion packing heat and wearing a combo-holster tool-belt.

Second, I try not to succumb to the temptation to go for something that's different but not apt in an attempt to avoid clichés. If a cliché is best, do something to make it fresh or just don't use a metaphor.

Third, I ration my metaphors and similes. Rather than use one in every descriptive sentence or paragraph, I try to use them when I especially want to create a strong image with emotional overtones—a moment for the characters and reader to inhabit. A lot of "young" writers just load them up—sentence after sentence. Metaphors are like perfume—a little can create a lovely ambience; a lot can overwhelm.

JS: What other elements of the writing craft do you enjoy? What do you struggle with?

MKB: I love writing dialogue. Writing good dialogue is like riding a roller coaster (which I also love). When I'm doing it I feel exhilarated, tuned in, in synch with the universe. That's true of writing in general, but dialogue is especially exciting to me because it's where the characters come to life, where they reveal themselves.

I'm told I write very good action sequences, but that didn't come naturally to me. That was a struggle to learn. I had to think about it. I also struggle with holding a whole novel in my head while I'm trying to work out plot developments. Mostly this is because with my freelance work and all, I'm trying to hold four or five plot lines in my head all at once. I've only got so much room for information in my user-friendly warmware (brain) so I keep lots of notes.

JS: What writers have influenced you? What writers do you respect and enjoy reading? What are you reading now?

MKB: I have probably been most influenced by Ray Bradbury (especially Something Wicked This Way Comes) and WP Kinsella (Shoeless Joe Jackson Comes to Iowa, which became the movie Field of Dreams) and Tim Powers (Declare and a raft of other amazing books). These are writers who do amazing things with words and who have, shall we say, unique ways of looking at things.

I enjoy reading Lois McMaster Bujold—especially her fantasy—Laurie R. King, Elizabeth Peters, and Mary Stewart. I'm a sucker for mysteries and detective novels and really wish that Mary Willis Walker would write something—anything. I also read a lot of non-fiction of all kinds. Mostly history and religion and the history of religions. Science is fun to read about, too.

Right now I'm reading Star Wars novels in preparation for maybe writing one. My last "joy read" was Son of a Witch by Gregory MaGuire. My non-fic reading currently is Jews, God and History by Max Dimont, Hidden Gospels: How the Search for Jesus Lost Its Way by Philip Jenkins and The Secret of Divine Civilization by Abdu'l-Bahá Abbas.

Tomorrow, the interview with Maya continues. I asked her a little bit more about Batman: Fear Itself and what writing a novel about such a famous detective was like. Drop back by tomorrow!

The Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff Interview, Part 2

In part two of Maya's interview we delve a little further into her specific works. If you haven't yet, please read part one, and then jump back into this post!

Interview continued...

JS: In the Mer Cycle trilogy, you created your own fictional world, but for Batman: Fear Itself you wrote in the preconceived environment of Gotham City. How is the writing experience different? How is it more enjoyable? How is it less enjoyable?

MKB: It's very different. I chose what "facts" to put into the Mer Cycle books. I had to keep track of them, keep them consistent and work out every tiny detail from language to magic to religion to monetary units, and I had free rein to do this. The characters, likewise, were mine to move and shape as I wanted (insofar as they allowed it). That's the upside of an original fantasy work—and the downside. You're out there on your own, flying by the seat of your pants and you have to make it all up. You devise the rules of the world and you have to abide by them. There's more, broader research required for a fantasy novel than for just about any other genre.

Did I say that was the downside? Not if you love research as much as I do.

With a media tie-in or any "share-cropping" book, the world and the back story are written in stone. Batman is Batman and there are some things you cannot make Batman do, not because he won't let you, but because the story canon won't. That's the downside ... and yes, it's the upside too. You've got guidelines! You've got material. Your characters are half-built and the rules of the world are in place. But of course, you have to learn them all, and your research is less the fun "ooh, what's this!" kind and more the "What would Batman use to dig a hole" variety. In other words, targeted.

What I love about making it up is the freedom and the sense of accomplishment when the Rube Goldberg machine I'm tinkering with suddenly starts to purr like a well-oiled machine and the characters make me want to kiss them or kill them. What I hate about making it up is the second-guessing: Did I do that right? Should the character be this or that? And having no one to ask if you're doing it right. (Help me, Ray Bradbury!)

What I love about share-cropping is the sheer challenge of working with someone else's tools. It's like that TV show that was all the rage a while ago—Junkyard Wars. You get to be MacGyver. Hm. I have a piece of chewed pink bubble gum and a TV remote control—what can I do with that? Start the clock, I'll think up something...

JS: The Meri (the first book in the Mer Cycle trilogy) is a book about self-discovery, character development, and change. Where did the idea for The Meri come from?

MKB: Literally a dream and a line from a Robert Silverberg novel. I dreamed a vivid, movie-like dream and knew as I was dreaming that I wanted to write it into a story. I wanted to wake up and write it, but when I managed to get one eye open (we'd gigged the night before and I was exhausted) I saw that it was 6 AM and I couldn't make myself reach for the note pad in my head board. I was afraid I'd forget the dream, so in my dream, I magicked myself up a yellow note pad and a nubby little pencil and wrote down what the characters did in a pivotal scene (it has to do with amulets). I made my dream characters perform the same scene over and over until I finally woke up and could wrap my fingers around a real pencil.

The dream sat on its notepad for months before the final two pieces of the puzzle turned up. I knew the main character was a young teen on a quest, but I didn't know what the quest really was. I had two epiphanies. One came as I was rereading my notes and realized the character that had been a boy in my dream needed to be a girl. That gave me the central conflict. I cloned the boy in my dream—he became the main character Mereddyd and her close friend Leal. I started pushing ideas around, but the final piece fell into place as I was reading one of Bob Silverberg's Gilgamesh stories and came across a phrase that made chills race up and down my spine: He was as a man on dry land and as a selkie in the sea. I knew as I read it that this was the final piece. It gave me the nature of the quest and one further plot element that I needed.

I sat down and started to write. I wrote the whole novel longhand in pencil in a series of college theme notebooks and copied the pages on the Xerox at work (with my boss' blessing) every day just in case.

JS: Mereddyd, the protagonist in The Meri, begins the story as a headstrong, often impatient, and sometimes doubtful young woman, but she develops (quite drastically) throughout the story. Do you plan for a character’s development before you begin, or does it work itself into the story as you move along?

MKB: Both. I plan how I want my character to change overall and I plan pivotal points in the story where those changes will either be catalyzed or will be put to use. But then I let the character "find" the pace of change. I try to let the changes grow out of their environment, the things that befall them, and their personalities and beliefs.

A basic element of change for a character is the type of person they are and how they regard change. Mereddyd, for example, is a person who knows she needs to change and knows she should welcome change. She's just not sure what form those changes should take or if she'll have the ability to make them—and thereby hangs the tale. Contrast her to the old Osraed, Ealad-hach, a man so afraid of change that he'll do incredible mental contortions to avoid it. People like Mereddyd bend and adapt; people like Ealad-hach don't bend, they remain staunchly rigid until they break.

JS: Mereddyd changes significantly throughout the story. Batman, on the other hand, doesn’t change much at all (he rarely does even in the comic books). How does that effect the way you approach the storytelling?

MKB: Well, therein lies one of the downsides to episodic writing. The character really can't change. It's a challenge, because in a way it goes against nature. I wrote some obvious growth into Bruce Wayne in my first draft of Batman: Fear Itself and the "powers that be" said "uh-uh". It was mildly frustrating and it caused me not to go as deeply into the character as I might have liked. I couldn't have the character forge deep relationships with other characters—especially the ones Michael [Reaves] and I created—and I had to be careful about what I revealed about him. This can be exacerbated if you're in a situation where the "owners" of the world are saying they'd like the character to grow but aren't sure how much. Also, the character's life exists on a continuum—at first, Lucius Fox doesn't know Bruce is Batman, then he suspects he is, then he knows he is. Where are we in the continuum and are the comic book people happy with the revelations in the most recent movie? The cool thing about Batman in particular though is that you're really writing two characters: Batman and Bruce Wayne. It's the points at which they come together that are tricky.

It boils down to not writing outside of what's considered canon and it does cause me to write more carefully and with less abandon. My one-time agent told me that I wrote my best when I "use the Force." Which for me means that I close my ears and eyes to anything but the internal muse and, knowing my characters as a creator knows her creation, I immerse myself in the world and write. That's not possible to any great degree with a media tie-in. But I still enjoy writing them—as I said, it's a challenge.

That concludes part two of Maya's interview. Please stop by tomorrow for the next section, and if you haven't yet, please check out part one. Thanks!

The Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff Interview, Part 1

As I mentioned yesterday, today's post launches an exciting new segment for Constructing Stories. I'm very pleased to present my writer interview with Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff. I've had the pleasure of reading three of her novels, and I highly recommend each. She's talented, she has worked very hard, and it all shows. Here's part one of her interview. I'll be posting the rest of it throughout the week. Enjoy!

JS: A writer strives to engage readers and stimulate them with setting, characters, and plot. You’ve created fantasy and science fiction worlds and worked with existing comic book worlds. As a writer, what tools do you use to make these worlds come alive to the reader?

MKB: Ooh, a multifaceted question! The most basic tools are the words a writer has in her palette. I love words. I love playing with them, molding them, shaping them into sentences and paragraphs and scenes, and watching stories emerge. Writing is a lot like sculpting in that way—you have these raw materials, words, and you work them until a coherent shape emerges, then add detail upon detail until you have a complete story. It’s very tactile for me and I love the feel of words and the sound of them read aloud.

Naturally, it's important to know the tools as well as you can. A good writer can make worlds come alive by choosing the right words and arranging them so that they paint pictures, evoke emotions, excite, terrify, impassion, soothe...all that. That's where the craft comes in: knowing how to get words to evoke sadness the way the color blue or a D-minor chord evokes sadness, or spark anger or get the blood pounding with a good action sequence.

There's more to it than that, of course. One mainstream writer, whose name I've mercifully forgotten, said that there was nothing at all mystical about writing. He was one of those types that hate writing but love having written. It was just like forging horseshoes, he said. Just the iron of words and the brute strength of craft. Period. I thought about that metaphor for about two seconds before I realized he'd missed one of the most important factors: fire. If you don't have fire—inspiration, passion—AND strength, the inert material will just lie there. So, I think the tools are inspiration, passion, craft, and words. And by inspiration I mean whatever sparks you to write—a cool idea or research you've done about pre-Columbian burial mounds or a neat turn of phrase, a divine epiphany or a dream.

Now, I'm going to turn around and answer the question in a completely different way. In another sense, the tools you have are character, plot, setting, dialogue, action and writing style. These things put together combine to create stories readers want to read. But of course, underneath it all is ... words.

JS: That passion and intentionality is very apparent in your writing. Do the tools you use change based on the type of story or the type of environment with which you’re working?

MKB: Yes and no. I mean, whether I'm writing a crime novel or a fantasy novel, I still need to absorb facts, create characters, put words together in ways that are harmonious (or not) and vivid. But the type of facts I need and where I acquire them differ.

I wrote a crime novel that my agent is currently shopping for which I needed facts gleaned from the real world. I needed to understand how guns worked and what was the right weapon for a 5 foot tall, 98 pound PI. I needed to know a lot about pot hunters (archaeological looters) and Latin American ruins. I needed to know about the magic of the Russian Orthodox Church. For my MERI series, I needed a different set of fact-tools and I had to create a significant number of those tools myself. The magic, the religion, the government, the history all had to be invented.

So, as I'm working in the environment, I look at my toolkit and say, "Well, for this story I need to create a language and know how the priestly hierarchy works. And for that one, I need to know some Russian and how a police department is structured."

Obviously, the words and how I use them will also be different. I use different words trying evoke a sense of placeless wonder for a fantasy novel than I will to depict a gritty urban landscape. The type of characters I'm writing about will also cause me to handle words differently. A shy, village lass and a smart-ass Asian-American detective don't think, speak, or behave the same way. The tools change to adapt.

Having said that, there are constants. Action scenes in any genre require words to be used in a particular way. Dialogue in any genre, likewise, needs to communicate, and descriptive passages need to bring the reader into your world.

That concludes part one, but part two will be posted tomorrow. Be sure and drop back by!

Shared Passion: Writer Interviews

Let’s take a short break from the character discussion and transition into a new segment of Constructing Stories: writer interviews.

Throughout the week I’ll be posting segments of my interview with a fellow Infinite Space, Infinite God author, Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff (A Cruel and Unusual Punishment). Author of six novels under her own byline, several ghostwrites, numerous short stories, and even a few articles about her craft, Maya has achieved a level of success that many authors crave (including me). From her fantasy novels (The Mer Cycle trilogy) to her collaborations with Michael Reaves (Batman: Fear Itself and Mr. Twilight), Maya has developed amazing environments for her readers to explore.

I’m really excited to kick off this new segment, and I want to make sure that you get a chance to discover how Maya approaches her craft. If you haven’t already, I encourage you to utilize an RSS feed to keep up with the posts over the coming week. I’m privileged share some of Maya’s insights with you, and I hope you’ll drop by to read more.

I’ll be posting the first segment of Maya’s interview tomorrow, March 9, 2008. Tell your friends, tell your family, and don’t forget to stop by!

And if you're a writer and would like to be considered for an interview, please submit your request to palidod@yahoo.com. Thanks!