I was writing a vampire novel and it WAS going to follow along the usual lines, BUT I have since had a break through and have since decided to introduce witches to the world of vampires and mortals. Yet, I am stumped. I would like for the mortal in my story, Madalyn, to suffer from a tragic event, the loss of her family somehow and she is placed in a foster home. Her foster home turns out to be a coven of witches (how many I am not sure). They have difficulty trying to transform her into one of them because she unknowingly is amune to special forces (somewhat of a sheild or mind blocking power). Madalyn neets Samael (vampire) somewhere, other than the overused place of high school, and falls in love with him. But she is held back by her sister, Fatin, who deems him unsuitable for her. Madalyn is determined to find out why and it almost winds her in a terrible situation with a war between two powers. But my problem is I am facing writers block as to the smaller details. What happens to Madalyn's family that causes her to be replaced? Tragic incident or terrible family? Where, other than high school, would people meet? I am hoping that everything will fall into place if I can just get those questions clarified. My end goal is to make this novel as twisted and as enthralling as possible. What are some aspects that would make this so? I am trying to stay away from anything in the Twilight area. Here are some ideas
Pic, "Mary Sue" is shorthand for a character that is boringly perfect and stupendous. Said character, from fresh eyes, seems to be an "author's pet". Mallory, I think, is simply suggesting that you make sure to give emotional depth to the character and be willing to make things difficult for her. Now, to your questions: "What happens to Madalyn's family...? Tragic incident or terrible family?" Maybe both? She views it as a tragedy, but later finds that the family was not so good after all. "Where, other than high school, would people meet." How about a comic-con? Never been to one, but could be interesting. Hey - *snicker* how about they meet at a Twilight event of some sort? You could tweak the franchise and get smiles from the anti-Twilight crowd, and so long as you're not mean about it would also get a thumbs up from the fangirls. then take your story down a non-Twilight path. Hope this helps. -Frank
In addition to what Frank said, a Mary Sue is someone who is "too special." To the point of being (as Frank said) too perfect, but also someone who constantly has special exceptions and breaks the rules of the universe in a way that's simply too convenient. And when I mean rules, I don't mean "breaking the rules" as in the character does something that might get him/her in trouble -- I mean along the lines of, for example, being immune to something that would kill anyone else...the rules set for your universe as far as magical physics and what not are broken for the character so to speak. Hope I helped!
What are Madalyn's hobbies? Maybe have her at a particular store or place where she meets Sam thus sparking her interest since he would be involved in the same hobby etc so it's not just a looks/smell thing, like Twilight.
Picillo, First, if you want to write a non-traditional novel of witches/vampires then your character names (Samael/Fatin etc) seem to be the kind of names you would find in a standard vampire/witch novel. It's hard to make it a 'current day' setting if the characters are walking in to work at Burger King with names that sound like fantasy overlords. I would possibly have them all meeting in rehab. They all have this 'weight' that they carry (witch/vampire) that makes them, by their own perception', abnormal in this hyper-aware world that we live in. So, they all turned to chemicals to cope. This allows the characters to have flaws. The closed quarters also makes it so that they can't just 'be themselves' lest they give away who/what they are. It's a little bit different than a coven of witches but still gets to that same idea.
Ergh, just the high school setting and budding romance initiates 'Twilight' in my head, but I'll suggest some ideas. For explaining vampires I suggest either A) Stick to original lore of vampires and expand from there or B) make them something entirely different with only few common traits involved. Preferably I enjoy vampires who are ruthless, cunning, savage and the like but I understand that others don't like this which is fine. Just try to keep this dark anathema theme to it but not straying too far and making them bipolar, alienated, antisocial where it becomes cliche. Cliches are only good if you can make them good.
sorry but i think this is how twlight got invented so my advice is don't mess up vampires please there is such awesome lore that many don't even know about sturdy the REAL vampire legends don't learn form all the tv\books now days i don't want vampires to be throwout of as "twlight" nothing wrong with being original But for the love of god don't make them sparkle
It's already been said but stick as close as you can to the original vampire legends. If you change too much they aren't really vampires anymore.
