BJ’s This or That | Writing Challenge
This or That Challenge: Fantasy Edition
Fantasy Fiction This or That Challenge…
Apparently lots of people, particularly the ToT queen herself Brett Jenae Tomlin, have been tagging me in This or That challenges and I haven’t been noticing because my Medium settings had mentions turned off. I’m very sorry for anyone whose challenge I neglected, and if there have been any responses I seemed to ignore. That problem should be fixed now, so please do keep tagging me and I’ll respond as much as I can (you can be absolutely sure of at least an enthusiastic read and applause, so if it seems like there’s no response at all, just give me a poke and I’ll come running over).
Last week I stumbled upon Jacinta Palmer’s challenge by luck, and it’s all about our fantasy This or That thoughts. She’s a wonderful writer when it comes to fantasy adventures and bringing folklore to life in the modern world and I hope you’ll give her a read, both her latest adventure series, Beyond Belief, and the article that gave us this prompt…
And now onto Jacinta’s fantasy questions!
Dystopian or Enchanted
It seems like a lazy answer to say “both,” but I honestly do prefer certain elements of both! The reason ties a great deal into the very last This or That on the list, so some of the answer will wait, but I like a connection to the modern world and its troubles, but with a glimmer of hope that things can change and get better. A hopeless dystopia is just an exercise in despair (and my despair muscles are quite fit already, thank you) while an enchanted story is a dream of escape rather than redemption. So I prefer stories where the world isn’t perfect, but it isn’t yet doomed.
Vampire or Dragon
This is a tricky one, because vampires can be done badly, dragons can be done well, and there are more badly-done vampires out there in the fantasy genre than badly-done dragons. But, generally speaking, I’m much more interested in stories about people, and vampires offer a stronger metaphor for the human condition than dragons, who are so non-anthropomorphic that they can’t usually be related to as characters. That isn’t always the case in practice — again, there are at least as many well-written dragon characters as vampires, if not more — but I think vampires give a fantasy writer more metaphorical material to work with than dragons.
Sword or Bolt of Fire from your Fingers
Oh, this is an easy one! Bolt of fire from the fingers! I’ve actually had a bit of practice with a sword: a very, very cool cousin of mine (like, she’s an anime heroine come to life — she rides a motorcycle, owns a katana, mountain climbs for fun, and runs a dojo) spent one summer teaching me kendo and staff fighting. It was very fun, and I did turn out to sort of have a knack for it, but there just isn’t much demand in today’s world for someone who’s handy with a bokken. So I’ll leave that to the experts…
But that’s enough of that trip down memory lane. I’m all about human stories and fantasy as a metaphor, and the power within a person says much more about their nature than the weapon they carry. Swords also have too many physical considerations to take into account, questions like how well a certain blade can cut through a certain material at a certain angle and how long can it keep doing that without being sharpened and how many times can it realistically be sharpened… and so on, and so on. Magic lets us say, in the most literal way possible, “a wizard did it.”
Mind Reading or Crystal Ball
Okay, so in my last ToT about horror stories, the answers kept referring to a sense of dark wonder. And in this one, it seems, the theme of the day is “metaphor for the human condition.” With that in mind, I’ll say mind reading because it’s, um… a metaphor for the human condition.
Yes, I know… sorry!
Fantasy powers, for me, are all about what’s inside the person, their nature, what gives them their strength and sets them apart from others. So the fewer trappings involved, like weapons and artifacts, the better. That isn’t to say such things are bad (they can be especially useful if the power itself is something that people are fighting over), or even that I’ve never used them (in Ghost Country, Isabel has her shotgun and David has his silver knife), but the most meaningful abilities for a character are the ones that come from within. So I’ll generally prefer a character who reads minds and has to figure out how to manage that fact over one using a crystal ball.
Broomstick or Winged Creature
Well, I do prefer traditional witches over things like griffons and wyverns, but if we’re including winged people or flying without using anything at all, they’ll tilt the answer toward their side. It’s really the same logic as the last few questions, that the power within a person is more meaningful than the power they gain from an object. But witches on brooms is a time-honored tradition and they get a special exemption for awesomeness…
Runes or Tarot Cards
Ooh, that’s a tricky one. But Tarot cards, because the imagery and symbolism of the major arcana are very evocative and we can have lots of fun with them, whether it’s through a reading that connects them to a character’s fate or through characters that mirror them.
Under an Oath or Stolen Memories
Hmm, stolen memories, because they dig deeper into issues of identity and how we define ourselves. An oath is either mystically binding, in which case it’s more of a curse, or just an appeal to authority, which I have little patience for anyhow. If something is wrong, adding “but I swore to do it” doesn’t change the moral equation whatsoever in my book.
Rainbow or Waterfall
Oh, that’s a tough one! Both are beautiful, and waterfalls can hide secret passages into everything from a cave to a hidden valley to another world, and rainbows can be bridges to other worlds in the sky, so… I don’t think I can choose! Okay, rainbows, because they can appear anywhere while waterfalls have to stick to rivers, but it’s a very narrow victory. Both are still a breathtaking sight to behold, and they often go together, so…
Enchanted Object or Cursed Object
Probably cursed object. Enchantments come back to the power within vs power without symbolism, and I much prefer exploring the power within, while cursed objects can be a fun source of plot-driving peril.
There was a horror-fantasy television series in the early ’90s called Friday the 13th: The Series, which had nothing to do with the Jason movies despite being part of the franchise. It was instead about a trio of characters who are traveling all over the country trying to recover a set of cursed antiques from their unsuspecting owners. The weekly episodes were hit-or-miss, and it eventually fizzled out without much of a conclusion, but it was an excellent premise, sort of like the Conjuring movies with a greater sense of urgency and an overarching story involving the Devil.
I’m not usually a fan of reboots, but that was a premise with tremendous amounts of untapped potential, and with today’s focus on more serialized, season-long story arcs, it could be turned into a fantastic story.
Seer or Warlock
Hmm, seer for a hero, warlock for a villain. Poor warlocks, I don’t think they’ve had a single hero to their name since Harry Potter pretty much cemented the tradition of referring to every male magic user as a wizard. But “warlock” just sounds like such a nicely villainous word!
Dungeon or Banishment
A dungeon really only has one story — escape from it — while banishment allows a character to stumble into all sorts of adventures as they explore the world. So I’ll say banishment for the storytelling potential.
Soul Sucking or Demon Torment
Hmm, both can be fun! You know, for the writer and audience, not so much for the characters… Anyhow, I’ll say soul sucking, because losing your soul is a fantasy staple that dives headfirst into all sorts of fun questions about what makes people who they are. Supernatural featured plenty of both, along with one exchange that I absolutely loved. To give a bit of context for non-fans, Dean’s brother Sam lost his soul and Castiel is an angel:
Dean: But is he still Sam!?
Castiel: You pose an interesting philosophical question.
And those are precisely the sorts of questions that I enjoy most in fantasy, so soul-sucking (at least temporarily) wins out over demon torment.
Portal or Time Travel
Oh, that’s a good one! I’ll say portal, but only because time travel has gone through just about every narrative permutation imaginable over the years and there don’t seem to be many stories left to tell about it. But there are still plenty of magical realms and other worlds to be explored.
Undiscovered or Forgotten
Both can be used well in a fantasy story, depending on whether it’s something entirely new that the writer can invent whole cloth or a mystery to the characters that the audience understands. I’m a big fan of dramatic irony and the tension of readers realizing the stakes involved before the characters themselves have figured it out, so I’ll say forgotten.
Enchanted to Sleep or Cursed to Ride
Cursed to ride has much more narrative potential, so I’ll have to choose it. But Sleeping Beauty is still my favorite Disney movie! (At least, probably my favorite Disney movie: there’s the sheer awesomeness of Maleficent and the fairy godmother trio, although Frozen does have Elsa…)
Diary or Grimoire
A diary has a more personal, revealing touch, and it can play much the same role as a grimoire depending on the owner. So diary it is.
Kraken or Mermaid
Mermaids certainly have more personality and can make for wonderful characters in their own right. But the ocean terrifies me (it’d probably count as a phobia if the sea played any part of my daily life, but it’s safely hidden over the horizon), and the reason is the deep endless dark beneath the surface. A kraken captures that aspect best, so it wins this one.
Haunted or Re-programmed
Haunted, haunted, haunted! Reprogrammed is a mundane problem that can be fixed by re-reprogramming the offending device, but the interplay of magic and technology, of spirit and matter in a post-modern way, is just all sorts of fascinating. So spooky haunted technology it is!
Historical or Future
I’ll say the future, because where we’re going is more interesting than where we’ve been, and there’s a thrilling, stylish, hyper-kinetic pace to a high-tech urban setting that’s very difficult to convey elsewhere. In the fantasy genre that can mean urban fantasy in the shadows of modern life, or an alternate timeline, steampunk, even post-apocalyptic fantasy.
This World or Another Realm
This world. I did go through a phase of being in love with Lord of the Rings (doesn’t every fantasy fan?), but I think trying to read The Silmarillion cured me of it: the world-building was just endlessly exhausting, and without any fixed story or viewpoint characters to act as a through line, there didn’t seem to be any point to reading a book that, in the end, amounted to just one author’s very elaborate, admirably detailed sandcastle.
Real folklore is enthralling to me because it’s the voice of a whole culture; the common links between those different stories are a testament to our shared humanity. Fictional folklore in the form of a constructed fantasy world comes from a single mind: all it can really tell us is what that one particular writer finds interesting. There are fictional settings that I love, settings that are very immaculately crafted and that I could never match, but the most interesting stories to me are the ones that connect to the world we know, that have something to say about our lives.
I’m rather out of the This-or-That loop these days and not sure who to tag, and most of the first people who came to mind have already been included (sorry Bradan Writes Stories and Rayne Sanning, that’s the only reason you’re not both here on this list!), so we’ll start with JK Mill, Jordan Riley, JD Nealey, and Brett Jenae Tomlin. Anyone else who feels inspired is invited to write one too — please just tag me as well so I can read and clap!
Each week I’ll be posting a chapter from the Dreadful Desire erotica series, a collection of taboo, sometimes forceful — but never degrading — sexual fantasies. You can find links to my Medium stories in this handy compendium…
And now there’s a Dreadful Desires novel! The five-part supernatural romance The Fallen Sky is available in an omnibus edition that contains the complete erotic fantasy adventure. You can find it on Kindle and Smashwords!
