Is There a ‘Dystopian Bandwagon’? by Guest Author Caroline Green

This week we welcome back guest author Caroline Green. In January, Caroline wrote about her edgy YA novel Dark Ride. She returns just as her new dystopian thriller, Cracks hits the shelves.

I’ve come across the expression a fair bit lately. The suggestion is that Young Adult authors are knocking out books set in a grim future because they think Hunger Games-style fame and fortune will surely follow.

I’m noticing more than I might otherwise because my own YA dystopian thriller, Cracks, is launched this week. Cracks is set in a near future where a fear of terrorist attack has led to surveillance at every turn. Holograms that encourage citizens to distrust their neighbours appear on street corners and tiny insect-like drones capture CCTV footage of a cowed, frightened populace. Climate change has brought widespread floods and antibiotic resistance means that everyday bacteria can quickly become deadly.

Yup, it’s grim, alright... 

But am I trying to jump on a bandwagon?

Fame and fortune might be nice, but there’s really only one reason why I chose to write a book like this. And that’s because I love dystopian fiction as a reader.

Like many people I’d read Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World at school but when I came across The Hunger Games about three years back, I was instantly hooked. I couldn’t wait for the next one. I then devoured a range of other dystopian novels (see below for my favourites) in quick succession.

There are many reasons why they appeal to me, purely on a story-telling level. Although my own main character is a boy, many in this genre have strong female protagonists (sorry Bella Swann, but Katniss Everdeen would kick your ass). They have proper baddies. And they have evocative and atmospheric settings. I might not want to go on holiday to a polluted wasteland that has been ravaged by war, but that’s the kind of setting that fires my imagination and make me turn the pages as fast as I can. Who wants to read a book about somewhere pretty where the sun always shines and everything’s lovely? Not me. Or at least, not that often.

I don’t think it is at all surprising that young people have embraced this genre with such passion. The teenage years are a period of intense change, where it can feel as though the sole aim of adults is to prevent you doing the things you really want to do. Authority in general has a far more oppressive feel now than when you are that accepting and malleable creature of younger years.

What’s more, young people probably have very real worries about what the future holds for the planet. They’re bombarded with messages about the environmental consequences created by previous generations, including my own. Those messages sounds an awful lot like, ‘Here’s a big mess. You deal with it now.’

Any of these reasons may be responsible for the popularity of books like The Hunger Games. Or it may just be that teens, like the rest of us, just want to be told a good story.

My favourite YA dystopian novels 
(with a bit of cheating so I can include trilogies)

The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins

The Uglies trilogy by Scott Westerfield

The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness 

Unwind by Neil Schusterman

Shipbreaker by Paolo Bacigalupi

My favourite adult dystopian novels

The Road by Cormac McCarthy

The Unit by Ninni Nolmqvist

Never Let me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

Farenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

For more information on Cracks and Dark Ride, go to www.carolinegreen.net 

Click here to buy a copy of Caroline's new book, Cracks.

Phobias and Fears... by Savita Kalhan

I have lots of them. Heights, sheer vertical drops; wasps, bees, hornets, well almost anything that buzzes and gets anywhere near me; enclosed spaces like tunnels and caves; dark places – even a deserted street at night, which is more frightening because it is deserted, and then, bizarrely, becomes even more frightening when you see a lone figure walking towards you; cemeteries, at night; the woods, at night, but also in the daytime if they’re deserted. Yes, there is a general night/dark theme going on here, and a fear of bumping into someone when no one else is around. People do go for walks on their own all the time. But not me.

I have lots fears and phobias where those came from, and I haven’t even started on the nightmares. No, I don’t eat cheese just before going to bed, and I’m not completely insane.

We’ve all got irrational phobias and fears, and some rational ones too. I think I have a lot of them. Am I unusual? I don’t honestly know. I’ve asked family members about theirs, and I do seem to have far more than they do. They tell me it’s down to my overactive imagination. They tell me I’m far too superstitious, and suspicious, and that I always see the worst possible scenarios and imagine the worst possible outcomes.

Life would be so much easier, and far less scary, if my imagination wasn’t so overactive.

But I guess I need it to be that way. I’ve found a way of using it in my writing. Writing about them has not made the fears and phobias lessen in any way. They’re still very much present. I just wonder what would happen if I underwent hypnosis to sort out some of them. How would it affect me? How would it affect my writing? Would it become less dark? Would I find myself drawn to writing humorous light-hearted, heart- warming fiction? I did try my hand at writing that way, but it didn’t last long. It didn’t feel right.



The book I’m working on at the moment is getting very dark. You’re probably not surprised to hear that if you’ve read The Long Weekend. It’s not an intentional thing. It’s just the way the book is flowing. The story is set mainly in the woods and I found a local wood called Hell Wood, yes, that's its real name, and it's very apt. I haven't summoned up the courage to go there at dusk, and I'm not sure I'll be able to venture there at night. It'll give me nightmares! I was going to add a piece about my worst nightmare – one that has been recurring for years. But I won’t as it might give you nightmares.



Hell Wood



Caring For Awkward Characters – by Guest Author Nik Perring

This week we are delighted to welcome Nik Perring as our guest author at the Edge. Nik is the co-author of Freaks! and the author of Not So Perfect.

For me, Story is all about characters. A story is, in my opinion, what happens to the people in it. They shape it, by their actions and their circumstances and how they react to them. You can’t have a story without characters. 

So, as an extension of that, I think it’s fair to say that you can’t have a good story (however you qualify that) without having a good main character, or ensemble. And how do decide who your characters are going to be? Well, that’s the difficult bit, isn’t it, especially when we don’t find out who they really are until we’ve seen how they’ve reacted to the troubles that are put in front of them in our stories. 

For me, the best characters are the ones we can see a bit of ourselves in. Empathising is important – we have to care, one way or another, about what happens to the people we’re reading about - but what can be equally important is recognising the traits we might wish we didn’t have, or the ones we dislike to see in others. And I’m not really talking about the broad character types – the bullies, the tyrants, the liars – though they can all make for being exceptionally interesting – I’m talking about subtler things. I’m talking about things like insecurity and selfishness, about vulnerability and not quite understanding the world as, it would appear, the rest of the world does. I’m talking about the characters who struggle, who worry, who might be anxious or uncomfortable, or awkward or just plain weird. 

I’m talking about the things that make the characters real, that make them human in the same ways we are, and that’s what makes us care what happens to them. Because, really, that awkwardness, that sense of not quite fitting in – it’s something I think we’ve all felt to some degree at some point in our lives – and that’s what makes us, us. 

But it’s not just about empathy, nor is it only about honesty. It’s so much more than that – it’s about opportunity. As I said earlier, if our characters are interesting and good, then there’s a good chance our stories will be too.

Nik Perring is the co-author of Freaks! published by The Friday Project (HarperCollins) and the author of Not So Perfect (Roast Books). 

He blogs at http://nikperring.com and tweets as @nikperring, and his characters tend to be very awkward and very weird indeed.

LASTING IMPRESSIONS

Paula Rawsthorne wonders what childhood character was for you?

I wonder what attracts us to certain fictional characters when we are kids?  Is it something about them that we identify with?  Is it because their lives seem so much more exciting than our own?    Did we want to be them or, at least, be friends with them?

As a child, the character that left me wide eyed with admiration and joy was the magnificently anarchic Pippi Longstocking.  How I loved (and still love) this super strong girl who lived with a horse, monkey and suitcase full of gold in Villekulla Cottage.  In my eyes, Pippi had it all.  She was a nine year old free spirit, outside the control of adults and society (she did try school once but was asked not to come back).  She could eat what she wanted, go where she wanted and, very importantly, go to bed when she wanted.  She never seemed damaged or upset that her father was absent and may now be a Cannibal King.  She wasn’t lonely as she had Tommy, Annika and Mr Nilsson. She wasn’t self-conscious about her unique appearance or the way she dressed and she revelled in telling the most outrageous stories with utter conviction. 

Pippi Longstocking was radical, confident, fearless, quick-witted, generous and loyal.  She loved life and made each day an adventure.  As a kid (and still now, as an adult) Pippi felt like the girl for me and I hope that Astrid Lindgren’s magnificent creation continues to entertain and inspire readers for generations to come.

So, which fictional character made the biggest impression on you during your childhood and why?

10 things an Edge author can't live without ....... by Miriam Halahmy

1.  Chocolate – don’t get me started.

2.   24 hour access to the local police station  The Hayling Island police suddenly started to follow me on Twitter when I posted a blog called  Vulnerable kids, crime and easy money. The comments on Facebook veered from ‘Sort out your greenhouse plants!’ to They must have read Illegal!’

3.  Other authors on the Edge.  So that we don’t actually fall over the Edge,  if you get my meaning.
4.   Readers who can cope.  Please apply by snail mail in triplicate. There is a rigorous physical as part of the selection process.
5.   The Inner Critic  Mine is a tiger ( apt, you might say.) It prowls around the garden watching for the moment when it can pounce on my shoulder, as I sit  in my study, staring hopelessly at my manu and growl, “What a load of rubbish!” Exactly what I DON’T need. However, at other times, my tiger will enter quietly ( probably after a large kill next door) and say, “Redraft that scene and I do LOVE the book.”

Yes we need our Inner Critics – no, we mustn’t let them rule the writing jungle supreme.
6.   Chocolate   Ah ha! I see you don’t know me very well. Of course we have to have 2 points out of 10 devoted to chocolate!
7.   Howlers  My best one ( back to the police again, folks, sorry ) God Cop! My editor delighted in pointing this one out to me, as you can imagine. In Hidden I have two policemen, Good Cop and Bad Cop who turn up and harass Alix and Samir as they try to hide their illegal immigrant.  If you live your writing life on The Edge you’re bound to spill out a great howler from time to time.

So what is it that some of my fellow Edge members can’t live without?? ( I’ll let you know when it’s safe to take off the stab vests.)

8.     The Internet  I know that as writers we're meant to turn the thing off, but honestly I do so much research that the Internet is a truly invaluable resource.  I use Wikipedia, baby naming sites, Google... and I use an online thesaurus and dictionary that stops me making ridiculous mistakes!  Bryony Pearce
9.    Real live teenagers - to talk to about storylines, slang, pacing and believability. Hearing from readers is the best motivation of all, and my own teens and their friends are my best advisers. Keren David
10.  A heart! You need to care about the characters and the stories you write. If you don't care, you'll have nothing to lose and the writing will have no edge! Dave Cousins
11. Inspiration  : What do you mean we can't have eleven? We're Edgy, get over it : Inspiration  Whenever/wherever I find it. I read, watch, write and experience as much as I can. I never know what might spark my next novel idea.  Sara Grant. 
12.  Yeah yeah - we're almost done..... Katie Dale can't live without her laptop.  Paula Rawsthorne can't live without TIME i.e. to let her ideas and plot ferment....can't get much edgier than fermentation, can you? And last ( but not least) Savita Kalhan can't live without books -in fact she can't live without spaces actually lined with books ( imagine trying to get a shower in her house then.)

       We are The Edge authors - this is what we can't live without.  How about you guys???

Death and the teen reader by Keren David

Death is a favourite subject for YA authors. Dead boyfriends, dead siblings, dead friends. Teens hovering between life and death. Murder. Suicide. Terminal illness. And that's not even going near the paranormals.

I think it's natural and good that teens would want to read and think about death. It's sad but true that most of us will suffer bereavement  in our teen years. My husband's dad died when my husband was 17. His teenage years were scarred by his beloved dad's illness and loss. Books which tackle big subjects like death, illness, suicide and bereavement help teens understand what they or their friends might be going through. It should never be a taboo subject.

But when I read a lot of teen books, I often worry about the way I see death and bereavement portrayed. In fact I find it bothers me far far more than anything to do with sex or drugs or violence. And those are the subjects that invite debate and controversy. The messages that YA books give about death are less likely to be challenged.

Here are some things that concern me.
 - Suicide as a device in which a troubled teen gets lots and lots of attention for their grievances. Isn't that potentially encouraging vulnerable young adults to think that suicide may be their only way to get a hearing?
 - Bereaved parents who fall apart. Of course, some do. Losing a child is one of the hardest things to live with. But in teen fiction it is now so common to find a bereaved parent slumped in hopeless depression, going into a mental hospital, abandoning her family (I'm sorry, but I struggle to believe in the mother in Annabel Pitcher's Carnegie-shortlisted My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece who responds to one daughter being killed by terrorists by leaving the other two), or becoming consumed with xenophobic hatred, that I long to read about those who have managed to become stronger, more loving and more compassionate as a result of losing their child. A notable exception is John Green's The Fault in Our Stars. The conversation between Hazel and her parents about their plans for when she dies is an important, cathartic and deeply moving scene, and it rings far truer than almost any other portrayal I've read of parents in this situation.
 - Sentimental afterlifes in which dead teens can spy on their friends, seek revenge on their killers, comfort their parents, snog good looking boys and generally carry on as though they are still alive. Of course there are exceptions (Tamsyn Murray's brilliant Afterlife series gets away with lots of post-death snogging because it blends laughs with real sensitivity). I mean a gluey Lovely Bones type of afterlife.

I once saw a press release for a new paranormal series which read 'All the cool kids in town are dead'. That's obviously just silly, and most teen readers recognise that. But sometimes the subliminal messages in teen books are surprisingly un-life-affirming, and sometimes the messages about bereavement are almost undermining.
 Am I right to worry about this? And am I alone?

Write What You Know?

Edge Author Katie Dale asks "Should you write what you know?"

The saying goes "write what you know", but where would fiction be if we all did that? No magic, no vampires, no dystopia  - no Harry Potter, no Twilight, no Hunger Games...

But authenticity - and consistency - is important, as there's no faster way to alienate a reader than to describe something inaccurately, whatever world/planet/magical location is being described. If the reader knows better than the author on any element of the story - be it the geography of Forks, or London, or the right technique for shooting a bow and arrow - it can jolt them out of the reading experience and unnecessarily interrupt the enjoyment of an otherwise good story.

But even if the book is a contemporary realistic novel, it is practically impossible for a writer to be an expert on every single aspect of the story they are writing, even if they are an expert on the main theme. I'm continually surprised by the amount of research I find myself having to do in order to write accurate depictions and scenarios, from which flowers are in bloom at a particular time of year, to the motor skill development of a three year old, to sentencing guidelines for different crimes - it's seemingly endless! But it's also fascinating, and sometimes the research itself can take your story into a whole new direction.

When I started writing Someone Else’s Life, I had never heard of Huntington’s disease. I was writing a story about Rosie, a girl who was deliberately swapped at birth, but I needed a reason why she would discover the switch had occurred, and I decided that the reason could be genetic. So I started researching genetic diseases and stumbled upon Huntington’s disease, a hereditary condition with symptoms similar to the physical effects of Parkinson’s plus the mental decline of Alzheimer’s. I was surprised to discover that while there are around 6,000 reported cases in the UK it’s thought that there may actually be up to twice as many cases, because people often hide their condition, are mis-diagnosed, or even decide not to be tested.

Why? Because there is no cure.

This got me thinking. What would Rosie do? What would I do, if I were at risk?

What would you do, knowing that you could never change the results? 


Suddenly, instead of being a novel centred around one girl discovering her true identity, Huntington’s disease became the beating heart at the centre of my story, which consequently evolved into a  much deeper, more emotional tale about secrets and lies, devastating ethical decisions, the complexities of family, and the enduring strength of love through any adversity, and because it was a real disease affecting thousands of people, I felt a huge obligation to be completely accurate in my depiction of the disease, and consequently spent a long time researching the disease, and talking to people affected by it.

Likewise, Mark Robson, author of Devil's Triangle and ex-pilot, told to me how when he was writing a scene about a character falling off a cliff he needed to know exactly what that felt like. Of course, research has its limits, so he didn't go out and jump off a cliff(!) but instead went to an indoor skydiving centre and convinced them to let him go in the simulator with no protective gear on! He described how his hair felt like it was being ripped from his skull, and his eyelids turned inside out - details he would never have guessed without trying it himself.

Of course, there are some things you just can't research - the temperature of a vampire's skin, the smell of an undiscovered planet, the feeling of a spell leaving your magic wand - for those you have to let your imagination run wild! But by doing so you are creating your own frame of reference, which must, in turn, be adhered to for the rest of the book - or series!

But if you can, I'd say do write what you know, as much as you can - even if it's not what you already know - for who knows what exciting, unexpected, weird or wonderful places your research will take you?!