Spread Light with Stories that Empower

13 Sunday Nov 2016

Posted by Elizabeth Fais in Inspiration, Story, Writing

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C.S. Lewis, Chronicles of Narnia, diverse books, Elizabeth Fais, empower, J.R.R. Tolkien, Martha Brockenbrough, Meg Cabot, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, Yogi Tea

Literature Lights the Way

I’ve stayed clear of politics on this blog, until now. The results of the recent Presidential election cast our nation into darkness. Many now live in fear for their safety and the safety and well-being of family and friends. This is not OK! Especially not in a nation formed on the ideals of freedom, equality, human and civil rights, “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” for all.

But as bad as it is, I finally realized these aren’t the worst times our country has faced…and survived. We are not in a Civil War.

Not to minimize the difficulties and rough road ahead, just giving it a little perspective.

Serendipity bestowed an emotional pick-me-up the other night that helped me to see things in a new way. The Yogi Tea I drink in the evening comes with wisdom-y quotes. This one was spot on:

Spread the light. Be a lighthouse.

How perfect is that?

We each have special skills to draw from that can help to turn the tide of discrimination and hate to one of acceptance and love. Writers wage the of power influence through their words, with their stories. Meg Cabot tweeted as much the very next day.

empower_mc

Words of Power

Honesty hour. I hit a wall on my current YA project two-thirds of the way through the first draft. Self-doubt and an internal editor, who’s more like a death eater, put the skids on my progress. Until now. The election results were my call to arms—or maybe hands, since I’m a writer. Suddenly, something is way more important than my ego.

Creating stories that infuse young readers with courage, dignity, inclusion, love, and hope is my mission. My new mantra, compliments of an author I admire:

Write that, write that hard. –Martha Brockenbrough

Writers in previous generations used their words to dispel the darkness, when faced with criminal injustice and the atrocities of war.

C.S. Lewis wrote The Chronicles of Narnia after returning from World War I. Likewise, J.R.R. Tolkien penned The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy in the aftermath of World War I.

We don’t have to attain the greatness of Tolkien or C.S. Lewis to make a difference today. We just have to craft well-told stories that empower minds of all ages.

Now to writing that, writing that hard.

Fictional Time Management & Other Relative Topics

06 Sunday Nov 2016

Posted by Elizabeth Fais in Story, Writing

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Albert Einstein, Andie MacDowell, Bill Murray, clockpunk, clocks, Daylight Savings Time, Elizabeth Fais, Fantasy, Fiction, Groundhog Day, Pennsylvania, Punxsutawney, Story, Tara Sim, Theory of Relativity, time, Timekeeper, Writing, YA, Young Adult

Einstein Nailed It

When I was in grade school, my parents went away for an hour and it felt like an entire day. Seriously. Later that same year when we went to Disneyland for the first time, one day felt like a minute.

Not unlike when we set our clocks forward an hour in the spring for Daylight Savings Time, and it feels like we lose four hours of sleep instead of just one. Yet when we set our clocks back an hour in the fall, the same hour feels like it’s cut in half. What’s up with that?

Einstein’s Theory of Relativity in four words: Time is funny stuff.

The Perception of Time is Relative

We often perceive time as expanding or contracting based on our emotions, and our perception creates our reality. Authors have used this to their advantage for quite some time. Telling a story in real-time slows the pace down to focus on a character or story element, or maybe to build suspense. Writers have their ways of accelerating the pace to adjust perception and influence emotion too. Further proof that the pen, and the keyboard, are mightier than the sword. And quantum physics…apparently.

Manipulating fictional time, at its best, keeps readers turning the pages. I wrote a post on Time as a Story Element that discusses these techniques in greater detail, if you’re interested.

Lost Time: Timekeeper

What if time didn’t just expand and contract, but could actually be lost? As in disappear. Vanish. Just freaking gone.

An intriguing predicament that I hadn’t considered, until I picked up Timekeeper by Tara Sim. The first lines of this alternate Victorian era London run by clock towers cut to the chase:

Two o’clock was missing. Danny wanted it to be a joke. Hours didn’t just disappear.

But they can, and did, in a world where clock towers literally control time. When a clock tower breaks, so does time. And when a clock tower is destroyed, time stops completely. This clockpunk fantasy is infused with magic, woven through with myth, and spiced with mayhem. Danny, our hero, is a clock Mechanic charged with ensuring that time flows according to the natural order. The Mechanics inherit the job, because they can actually feel the strands of time and the weave of its fabric. The existential truths layered throughout the story provide satisfying believability and depth.

Time was everywhere and nowhere at once, making the moment last an eternity.

Stuck in Time: Groundhog Day

There is broken time, and then there is being stuck in time on infinite repeat. A post on fictional time and relativity just isn’t complete without a mention of one of my favorite movies: Groundhog Day.

Phil (Bill Murray), an egotistical curmudgeon of a weatherman, gets stuck living Groundhog Day in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania over, and over, and over…until he finally gets it right. Which for him, takes some doing. I could go on and on and on about this movie, but you’ll enjoy watching the following trailer much more. May time forever flow in your favor.