What with Baby Smith's cold and his corresponding rejection of anything sleep-related, I haven't got a great deal of writing done recently; but I have, at least, managed a little bit of editing. 

Here's the scene from Dawn Rising where Oriana is about to be married to the man who killed her mother. My difficulty with Oriana is that I'm always afraid people will read her as weak or passive. She isn't: she's badly hurt, out of options and being controlled by someone with far more power and cruelty than she possesses. Sometimes, strength can be as simple as refusing to let our tears fall. (Sometimes it can be as simple as letting them fall, but that's another story.) Anyway, I'd welcome your comments and/or criticism.

Welcome to the party, everyone! Yes, it's true: Reflections of Reality is turning two this week. In honour of my most loyal audience member**, all the cake this year is made out of dog food. I hope that's OK with y'all.

So here we are: a whole year older, but by no means wiser. On my first blog birthday I attempted to pull together what I'd learned from the twelve months that had just passed, so to continue the tradition, here's what this year has taught me.

1. If you want to be a writer, don't have a baby.

2. Er ...

Seriously, though, I have learned a lot this year, but almost none of it is about writing or blogging or anything else that's remotely connected to the purpose of this website. I've learned how exciting it can be to watch a tiny person go from barely being able to support his own head to running all over the house. I've learned how to go to work when I've barely had any sleep at all and still remain professional. I'm still learning how to balance my new family's needs against my own; how to keep my temper when Baby Smith is crying and throwing things and all I want to do is cry and throw things back; how to be a mother and a wife and an employee and a writer without going completely mad***. 

In a way I'm quite proud of myself, because I have been all those things this year. My son is happy and healthy and I haven't accidentally left him in Ikea. My husband is stressed and trying to fit too many things into the day, just like me, but at least we're talking about it. My job is ... well, still there, which is the main thing. And though I may not have done as much writing as I would have liked, guess what? I never did. At least now I have a reason for it. And at least I did some. When I look back over the year, it feels kind of amazing that I did any.

Which leads me to a little bit of exciting news. You may be aware that my blog is not the only person, er, entity celebrating a birthday - the very lovely Kristell Ink turned one recently. In honour of the occasion they ran a flash fiction competition with a feline theme, and guess who won first prize? 

... No. 

... No. 

... No, certainly not. OK, fine, I'll tell you: it was me. Woo hoo! If you'd like to read my 500-word cat story then you can find it here.

Hmm. Maybe I can be a writer and have a baby after all. Which contradicts my sole point above and means I haven't learned anything this year at all. Oh well.



*If you get that reference then I'm officially ashamed of you.

** That dog has listened to me ramble every week without fail for two years. I really must find out his name.

*** This point is up for debate.

Earlier I was humming 'Mother Knows Best' from the Disney animated film Tangled (er, as you do) when it occurred to me that Rapunzel is pretty unique among Disney characters for having not one but two mothers. OK, so one of them is actually a passive-aggressive manipulator who stole Rapunzel to keep herself young, but it can't be said that Rapunzel lacks a mother figure in her life. Yet in general, being the mother of a Disney hero/heroine reduces your chances of actually being alive at the start of the movie to almost zero. Stepmother? You're safe, particularly if you can summon up an evil laugh. But mother? You'd be better off living in Midsomer.*

This got me thinking about my own characters - and yes, once again, they're a fairly motherless lot. Dawn Rising? The mothers of all five protagonists are either dead or unwillingly separated from their offspring. Darkhaven? Two dead mothers, one who abandoned her children, and the rest ... absent. Even in my YA project Arcana, the narrator's mother is dead and she has a stepmother (affectionately known as E.S., short for ... I'm sure you can figure it out). Yet fathers are much more prominent. True, some of them are dead, too, but many are present in their children's lives, influencing them for better or for worse.

And, of course, it's not just me. Look at some of the most popular books of the past decade or so. Harry Potter? The death of Harry's parents, but particularly his mother (who died for his sake), shapes the entire narrative. Twilight? The story starts with Bella leaving her mother to live with her father. The Hunger Games? Katniss has had to take on the role of mother to Prim because their own mother can no longer cope. The Da Vinci Code? Arguably the entire book is about a mother who has supposedly been excised from history ... yeah, I'm probably taking it a step too far with that one. Be that as it may, in the rest of the novels I've just mentioned, the mother's main influence comes from not being there any more.

So where have all the mothers gone? Why is the missing mother such an engrained fantasy trope?

Well, let me say straight away that there are exceptions. Pixar's film Brave was interesting because, at heart, it was the story of a mother and daughter mending their relationship. And A Song of Ice and Fire is notable for featuring several alive** and actively participating mothers; the maternal instinct is shown to be a strong and potentially dangerous force that has wide-reaching consequences. But the point is, these are exceptions. People comment on them, which means they're unusual. They only throw into sharper relief that gaping void where all the other mothers should be.

My feeling is that the trope is so pervasive because, on a fundamental psychological level, we can't conceive of anything more frightening than losing our mothers. Bad and abusive mothers notwithstanding, some key equation is built into our DNA that tells us Mother = Safety. And as we all know, a safe character is a boring character. Remove someone's mother, and you're removing an emotional comfort blanket. A missing mother - whether dead or simply not there - is fictional shorthand for all kinds of things, from forced self-reliance to a search for identity, but probably the core one is vulnerability. Whether it's as external as not having someone there to advise the character when they're making a stupid decision, or as internal as emotional self-sabotage, No Mother = Danger. Which is why, although I'd love to see some really strong mother-child relationships in fantasy fiction, I suspect there are plenty more motherless characters to come. After all, if you have that strong a relationship with your living, present, available-for-tea-and-sympathy mother then you can cope with anything life throws at you. And where's the fun in that?

Of course, for those of you (like me) who are mothers yourselves, this comes with an additional layer of scary - for two reasons. One, you are someone's safety. You are what stands as protector between your children and the world; you are what has to step aside, in the end, to let them grow up, whilst remaining the ever-present fallback. That's probably the biggest responsibility anyone can have. And two ... two, if you find yourself between the pages of a fantasy novel, chances are the author is going to kill you off to give your children a background of rich emotional trauma. Sorry. Don't say I didn't warn you.



* For those unfamiliar with Midsomer Murders, it's a UK detective series set in a quiet rural county in which every week, almost without fail, someone is murdered. Basically, if you live in Midsomer then, sooner or later, you're going to die a horrible and blackly comical death.

** At least to start with.

1.

Partner: What are you doing?

Me: Writing.

Partner: No, you're not. I've been watching you for the past five minutes and you're just sitting there staring into space.

Me: Staring into space is part of writing.

Partner: Uh-huh. And before that, when you frowned at the screen, typed in a single word, frowned some more, then sighed heavily and deleted it again - that's part of writing too, is it?

Me: Yes.

Partner: And those times when you swear and slam the lid of your laptop shut, before stomping off to the kitchen to eat chocolate - they're also part of writing?

Me (defensively): Yes.

Partner: I see.

(He sits back in his chair and closes his eyes. Ten minutes pass in silence.)

Me: What are you doing?

Partner (without opening his eyes): Unloading the dishwasher.


2.

Casual acquaintance: So, I gather you've written a book.

Me (warily): Yes.

Casual acquaintance: I've often thought I'd like to write a book.

Me: Oh?

Casual acquaintance: Yeah. I mean, how hard can it be? People write books all the time.

Me: Well, yes, but -

Casual acquaintance: It must be nice, getting paid for just sitting there scribbling all day. Like getting paid to daydream.

Me: Well, it's not exactly -

Casual acquaintance: Have you signed up with a publisher yet?

Me: That's not how it -

Casual acquaintance: I'd go for Penguin, myself. I reckon my name would look good on one of those classic book cover mug things. So what's your book about?

Me: Um, it's a fantasy, and -

Casual acquaintance: Like Harry Potter?

Me: No, not really.

Casual acquaintance: Oh. To be honest, I don't read much fantasy. I don't read much fiction, actually. I prefer celebrity biographies, stuff like that. I got Peter Andre's autograph the other day.

Me: Yay.

Casual acquaintance: Still, not reading other people's fiction means I won't be influenced when I come to write my own, right?

Me: Well -

Casual acquaintance: Like I said, how hard can it be?

Me (under my breath): You just wait.*


3.

Me: This scene we wrote yesterday is actually pretty good.

Myself: Er, no, it's not. It's terrible.

Me: But look how witty the dialogue is! How cleverly we built the suspense! How successfully we revealed character through action!

Myself: It's the worst excuse for a piece of writing I've ever read. It sucks in every conceivable way. Based on this heap of garbage, we don't deserve to call ourselves a writer; in fact, I think we should give up and do something else with our lives.**

Me: Yeah, you're right. I don't know what I was thinking.

Myself: Let's go and eat chocolate.

(The following day ...)

Me: I know we said we were going to give up writing, but I just can't help myself.

Myself: I know. Me neither.

Me: So what are we going to do with this scene? Scrap it and start again?

(We read it through.)

Myself: Actually ... it's pretty good.

(Repeat ad infinitum.)



* The sad thing is, this woman probably will end up getting a multi-book deal and a six-figure advance. C'est la vie.

** Like play Gollum in the LOTR movies.