Exploring Personality: A Reiteration (and a Preface)

Because there seems to be some confusion on this point, let me go back over the basis of the Enneagram again.

As a personality system, the Enneagram deals with primary motivations not behaviors. It is different from other personality profiling systems in that, because virtually every other personality system out there is based off of the Myers-Briggs to some extent, and it is a behavior based system. Yes, behaviors can change, especially over time and with maturity. That means that you may test differently on the Myers-Briggs at 40 than you did at 20. So, although the Enneagram looks at behaviors, it is not looking for behaviors, and that is a huge difference. Your primary internal motivation almost never changes. Seriously. And, no, you can't have more than one primary motivation (which is also why I hate "favorites" lists that have dozens of items on them). With the Enneagram, because it is looking past the behaviors to see what is driving them, people virtually always test the same at 40 as they did at 18. It is very rare (very) that someone's Enneagram type changes, and, if it does, it's usually because they suffered some sort of traumatic event.

Now, this does not mean that you might not get different results on an online test even from week to week, but that's because online tests are generally not very comprehensive. People want to sit down and do the thing in less than 10 minutes, so those things tend to be not very comprehensive. Added to that is the fact that people are often not very honest even with themselves or they might feel differently one day than they did the day before. A cursory 10-minute test is not going to catch those kinds of fluctuations.

However, having worked with the actual tests (the ones that take hours to complete because they have hundreds of questions) and having worked with experts who do this stuff for a living, I can speak for the veracity of the system as a whole. It's possible that personality type is fluid when you're a kid but, by the time you've made it through adolescence, your type is pretty much set. You have a primary motivation that directs the way you interact with the world. It may assert itself in different types of behaviors, mostly based upon your emotional state, but the same motivation is behind it.

And that is why this stuff works so well when developing characters for books. For making your characters believable. If you know what the motivations are for your characters, you can make them behave in believable ways. Nothing kills a book quicker than characters doing things that are, well, out of character. As I said before, "Stupidity is not the same as personality," and having a character make a stupid choice to move the plot along doesn't mean that it's a choice the character would have made. When the audience responds, "He would never have done that!" you know you've done something wrong. When they see the stupid choice coming, though, and fear it, you know you've done it right because, then, the readers are seeing the personality and the motivations of the character.

At any rate, I would suggest that you take the test, not necessarily so that you'll know what type you are, just so that you can see how it works. If you do want to know for yourself, though, be honest with your answers. I left a link to the test back in this post. If you take it, let me know what you are.

Now, on to other things! Other thing, Here's your introduction to the next triad of personality types.

Enneagram types 5, 6, and 7 make up the intellectual triad of the Enneagram. These types are data based. They are information gatherers. They tend to react to situations from a more rational viewpoint, especially when compared to the emotional triad (types 2, 3, and 4). Where other types, when asked why they did something, may say, "I don't know," the intellectuals can almost always tell you exactly why they made the decision they made and hand you the numbers to back it up. Their emotional center is fear; gathering information and making informed decisions is a way of combating that fear. The intellectuals are also attracted to ideas and ideals; relationships are less important and can sometimes be means of achieving other objectives.

Three Years of Indie

Sunday was the third birthday of Lyon's Legacy, which was the first story I self-published. So this weeks marks my third anniversary of going indie. Since then, I've published several short stories, both on my own and as part of Indie Writers Monthly, and a full-length novel. My next novel will come out later this month. I'm not the most prolific of writers, but hopefully as I become more comfortable with indie publishing I can get stories out faster. A lot of it depends on how much time I can devote to writing and publishing.

I knew when I started self-publishing that it would take a while to get established, and that's certainly the case. I've experimented with different ways of promoting my books, but it's hard to find something that works consistently. It's humbling too that there are so many other indie writers out there. But at the same time self-publishing seems to have become more accepted, and the quality of the work I'm reading from other indie authors has increased. I enjoy the camaraderie we indie authors share. Most of them are friendly and helpful. And of course, it's always thrilling to get the proof copy of your latest work or see a promotion make your sales shoot up.

If you haven't read Lyon's Legacy yet, feel free to give it a try; it's permafree. Help me celebrate its third birthday. Here's to many more years of writing and self-publishing. Now if you'll excuse me, I have about a hundred pages to proofread before Saturday, so I'd better get back to Seasons' Beginnings.

When the Tracks Don't Meet (or Travelling At the Speed of Plot)

Have you seen that cartoon of the train tracks being laid? They're coming from two different directions, but there's a problem: The tracks don't meet up in the middle the way they are supposed to. I think there are a bunch of guys standing there scratching their heads. Or something.
Yeah, I would have liked to have posted the image here, but I couldn't find it. You'll just have to pretend.

Usually, where books are concerned, those kinds of things are called "plot holes," but, really, they're not the kinds of things I would call "holes." They're just pieces of... let's call them "discontinuity." I hate them more than the plot holes, I think. Oh, you need me to differentiate?

Okay, let's say your protagonist loses the keys to his car in chapter two but, in chapter five when he's running from the bad guys, he fumbles them out of his pocket: That's a plot hole. And that's not what I'm talking about in this post.

This is what I'm talking about in this post:

When I was in high school, I had an after school baby-sitting job, and one of the things I "got" to do virtually every day was sit with the younger of the two boys and watch He-Man. I hated He-Man. I good example of why is related to the picture above. One day on He-Man, he would lift a mountain. He would struggle with the mountain but, eventually, he would pick it up and throw it. The next day, he would pick up a boulder, and would struggle just as much with the boulder as he did with the mountain. Why? Was the boulder made of dwarf star matter? I kind of doubt that. It just served the "story" by making the moment more tense if it was difficult for He-Man to do the job, no matter how easy it should have been for him.

It drove me crazy.

For those of you who follow my own blog, StrangePegs, you'll know that I've been reading and re-reading Madeleine L'Engle's Time series. She does this stuff all the time, stuff where things don't quite connect.

For instance, in A Wind in the Door, there's a section where Meg and her companions go into one of Charles Wallace's mitochondria. L'Engle goes to great lengths to tell us how much faster time moves inside the mitochondria than it does in the outside world. It's a huge difference, something like 10 years in the mitochondria is only one second of real time. After going to all of that explanation, she proceeds to move back and forth between what's going on with Meg in the mitochondria and what's going on with Charles Wallace and his mother in real time. Meg and everyone with her would have been dead of old age based on the real time passage.

Another example is from Many Waters (review forthcoming). At one point, one of the characters is having a baby. At the same time, there's an interaction happening with Sandy and Dennys that happens in one evening. The birth, which happens within the time frame of this one evening, somehow lasts for three or four days. And don't even start me on the fact that Dennys and Sandy, older teenagers (maybe 17?), act like they are about nine when it comes to girls: "Sandy got a funny feeling inside when he looked at her." Her being the naked girl talking to him. A "funny feeling." Or something like that.

However, the thing that inspired this post came from one of today's fantasy giants. Now, I haven't read A Game of Thrones -- and I don't really intend to -- but I do watch the show, mostly because my wife likes it. There's a point (during season two, I think?) when the castle is being attacked by Stannis and there's absolutely no hope that they can defend it. There's no hope because no one is close enough to come to the rescue. However, Tywin shows up anyway and saves the day, even though he was much too far away to get there over night. Then, I read an interview with Martin in which  he said something along the lines of, "I don't bother with distances in my books. If I need someone to be somewhere, I just pick them up and move them there." You know, like a game of chess in which you can move any piece to any location on the board any time you want to.

I call it "traveling at the speed of plot."

And, you know, on the one hand, I get it. It's your thing; you do with it what you want to. However, when you set up rules for your thing, you need to follow your own rules, and Martin does have rules in his world which are pretty much (except for the dragons and zombies) the same as the rules in our world. That means people can't teleport. They can't travel by magical means. And the don't have horses that travel at the speed of sound. It's bad enough that they use birds to deliver messages which are pretty much as fast as telegrams.

Honestly, I don't have patience for this kind of stuff. It's sloppy writing; I don't care how successful it is. Most people either don't care or don't notice, I suppose, but it doesn't make it not so. The thing is, it doesn't have to be that way. All of these things, with a little more effort to bring them into alignment with the rules of the worlds the authors have created could be that much better and not alienate people like me.

Actually, it's one of my biggest rules of writing: Follow your own rules.

And when I say it's "one of my biggest rules," I mean it's one of my biggest rules. One of my rules because, other than just doing the writing, every writer has to figure out his/her own rules. I suppose that makes it one of my biggest rules of reading, too. So be warned! If your book doesn't follow the rules you have set up for it, I'm not going to view it favorably.

An Exploration in Fantasy -- Part Five: The Source

Imagine you're a kid. Your father is a landowner and a knight. Your older brother is obviously being groomed as the heir, which is normal and natural. He is, actually, a knight in his own right. You, however, are not being trained as a second, a backup, which would also be normal and natural. You're being trained to take care of horses and muck stalls and do the upkeep on your brother's gear, but that's about it. Sure, you'll get to be a squire, but you can tell there's some... difference; you're just not sure what it is. Clearly, your father loves you, and it's not a matter of favoritism; your brother is held just as accountable for wrongs as you are. But there is something... something that sets you apart. Or is that just wishful thinking?

This tournament comes up, and your brother is going to take part. He's even one of the favored knights. But something happens. The morning of the tournament, there's a problem with your brother's sword. He's livid. Stomping around. He demands that you find him a new one. And that's where everything changes...

* * *

Raise your hand if you know where this is going.

From what I can tell, the Arthurian Legend is at the root of modern fantasy. All of the elements are there. Let's look at it along with the initial list.

1. Arthur is not an adult. His age varies from child to teen, but it's clear that he's not an adult.

2. Arthur is an orphan. Soon after being taken from his parents by Merlin, they are killed.

3. Arthur is the child of the king, the first High King of Britain, even if short-lived.

4. Arthur is the child of prophecy, the one destined to draw the sword from the stone and become the True High King that will unite the land.

5. Arthur is mentored by Merlin, the Wizard.

6. "What is your quest?" "The Quest for the Holy Grail!"

7. Arthur's great descent is the affair between Lancelot and Guinevere.

8. Arthur has all of the Knights of the Round Table, many of whom have special skills and talents.

9. The "dark lord" Arthur has to face is his half-sister, Morgan, a sorceress and mother of his child.

10. And, of course, there is no technology.

Not only is fantasy filled with King Arthur stories... Wait, let me list just the ones that I've read, which is nowhere near comprehensive:
1. Le Morte d'Arthur (technically not fantasy, because it's a classic but, if it had been written today, it would be fantasy)
2. The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights (also, technically, not fantasy because it was written by Steinbeck, but if it had been written by anyone else...)
3. The Once and Future King
4. The Pendragon Cycle (possibly the best Arthur series I've ever read)
5. Camulod Chronicles (possibly the second best Arthur series I've ever read and it's done completely from a historical fiction perspective, so it's only fantasy because it's about Arthur)

There may be more, but that's what I know I've read right off the top of my head, and those are just the ones that are actually about Arthur. There's probably no good way of counting up the number of books that make reference to Arthur or Merlin (The House on the Corner for one) or show some kind of direct influence from the Arthurian Mythos (even Lewis' Space Trilogy, and the resemblance of the Sword of Gryffindor to the Sword in the Stone can't be denied). It's possible that the Legend of Arthur is the most pervasive literary influence in Western culture (but it would probably take more study than I've put into it to determine that for certain).

And, yes, even Tolkien has a relationship to Arthur. There's The Fall of Arthur (a poem that Tolkien didn't consider finished so was published posthumously) and his re-telling of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. And probably more but not more that's been published. That I know of.

Even with Tolkien's interest in Arthur, not much of the Arthurian Model finds its way into The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings, as has already been discussed. I think Beowulf was a much greater influence on both works than Arthur ever was.

None of which is to say that Tolkien doesn't deserve the title Father of Modern Fantasy. Certainly, he's the one that "created" the genre, and he gave a lot of window dressing to it. The idea of fantastic races in fantasy comes directly from his influence; however, they're not required. Adding elves and leprechauns is like... well, it's like spicing your food. Some people sprinkle on the elf, some shake on some goblins, some keep it plain.

All of which is to say that, even though we can thank Tolkien for ushering in the age of fantasy literature, it's to Arthur that we owe the stories. One little orphan boy who pulled a sword from a stone.

Tracking Your Reading

Since I recently posted on my own blog about my reading progress for this year, I was wondering if anyone else tracks what they read, either on a social site like Goodreads or by other means. I never bothered listing my books before I joined Goodreads, as it would have been more work to make my own list. The main reason I track my books now is for the annual Goodreads challenge and to look for trends. I'm generally not comfortable reviewing books (I tend to critique them instead of approaching them like a reader), and I haven't had much time to interact in the reader groups, even though my original reason for joining Goodreads was to make myself and my work known. So perhaps it's time to broaden the question: are you active on social reading sites like Goodreads? Why or why not?

P.S. I do include Indie Writers Monthly magazines toward my reading goals; so should you!

Lies Writers Tell... To Other Writers (Part Six -- Here Are the Rules)

Life is full of rules. So many rules. Rules aren't a bad thing, not necessarily. In a lot of ways, rules make us behave like, well, like people. Sort of. At least, they have the ability to make us be better people.

Of course, on the other side of that, rules also have the ability to make us worse people. I'm sure you know one of those people who is always trying to enforce "the rules" and enforce them to the letter. There is no room for individual circumstances. For example, I read a story a while back (no, I'm not going to go try to find a link; it's been years) about a man in a pickup truck who picked up a family on the freeway whose car had broken down. I said "pickup truck," right? Because that's what he was driving, and this was a large family so, of course, he didn't have enough room in the cab of the truck for everyone, so some of them had to sit in the bed of the truck. Hmm... That's illegal on the freeway.

Seeing as how no good deed goes unpunished, the man was stopped by policeman who, if I'm remembering correctly, not just gave the man a ticket but arrested him. It was a lot of people in the back of the truck. The officer refused to listen or give consideration to the circumstances. The case went to trial and the judge immediately dismissed it. Somewhere in there, he used the word "foolish" in reference to the police officer.

Maybe that's an extreme example, but who hasn't run across one of those people?

* * *

And here's the trick:
Normally, I tease this on my own blog (StrangePegs) and have the complete post here but, this time, I'm teasing it here, and you can find the full post in the July issue of Indie Writers Monthly. Don't worry, though, because it's available NOW! And, in it, you can find out ALL OF THE RULES OF WRITING. Seriously. I strenuously researched the topic and sifted all of the available information and have come up with the definitive list of RULES OF WRITING! So, if you want to find out how to become a published author and how to write more gooder, you're going to want to pick up the July issue. Plus, I talk about Munchkin.

Click the link and pick up your copy now! Just $0.99!