This is the last time that I’ll tell you just how much I really learned,

This is the last panel post from Norwescon, this year anyway….

Special Warfare, a panel I waited for all weekend long. I knew it was going to be full of info I could use in my spy novel, given my characters. Four pages of notes, people. Settle in for a long one.

The first thing they asked was how many authors in the room, almost everyone raised their hand. To which the presenter gleefully responded, “Fabulous, my boss only gave me the time off because I told him I could be a liaison between Special Ops and the writing community and then maybe you’d all start getting this stuff right.”

We’re listening – educate us.

When you use the term Special Operations what that really designates is a multi tier system of teams from various entities which come together for one off assignments. Each team member will do something unique that forwards the team to the goal. The system is so compartmentalized that people on your own team may have no idea what you do until you do it.

Tier one: Special Forces guys. They specialize in unconventional warfare. Train local populations, area studies, recruitment, sneak and peak, intel gathering, setting up bases. They try to avoid going toe to toe if at all possible. Generally, they go not blow up bridges, take over airports, etc. Yes, yes, they have done so in some circumstances, hence the word generally.

Tier Two: Direct action. Popular example: Rangers.

Two definitions of a Ranger. A) serves in a Ranger battalion. E1-E4 are not eligible to Ranger qualify. They are technically Airborne Infantry. About 50% of E5s have gone to Ranger school. B) Those who have gone to and graduated Ranger school.

Rangers have a great quote: “If everything is going according to plan you’re probably in an ambush.”

These are the guys who seize the airport, blow up the bridge, grab the required human target.

Tier Three: Civil Affairs – the humanitarian branch. They also do psy ops. Counter insurgency, establishing the legitimacy of the government in control in the host country. Build schools, lay roads, dig wells. They have an all female cultural support team who have airborne, cultural sensitivity, and language training.

Their command and control structure is flexible. One of the presenters explained in his current command structure an O5 (E5 equiv) is over an O6, because the O5 has more experience.

Special Operations interviews people for positions rather than simply placing them. This had led to the idea that they don’t play well with others.  In the 70s, 80s, 90s the regular military was suspicious of Spec Ops and would deny them materials. Just in the last ten years or so are people who have gone the Spec Ops route being promoted into top positions, Admiral and General.

Both the Ranger and the Spec Forces men on the panel confirmed having women in their units. They also felt that after a trial period the men of the unit ceased to consider the sex of the soldier fighting with them, ie the woman was only a woman until she proved herself a soldier.

What does an op look like?

A rumored operation went something like this. In a joint Civil Affairs, Spec Forces, PsyOps operation they made it appear that a volcano was going to erupt. When the enemy forces in the area fled, SpecOps moved in and relocated the villagers who were hostage. Neat and Clean. Not a shot fired, or so the rumor goes.

I’ll leave you with a quote from one of the panelists (Joe Malik – http://m-j-malik.blogspot.com/)

“Special Operations enforces the political will of the nation through violence.”

Hero or Villain? The argument still rages on in certain circles where geeks have too much coffee or beer and need something to do late into the night. Snape may have been JK Rowlings’ greatest creation. I don’t want to launch a debate on that. But I do want to look at what I heard at Norwescon’s panel on balancing your characters so that each hero is a bit of a villain and each villain is a bit of a hero, complex and completes human beings on the page.

First, how to make your villain closer to grey:

-Give your villain some of your own characteristics, so you are sympathetic to them. It will translate in to your writing.

-Use a traumatic experience from your own past to build some back story for your villain.

-Look closely at the people you love, what are their bad habits?

-People love scoundrels and villains because they do what we wish we could do and they have fun doing it.

The one point about villains that really grabbed me, FEW people think what they are doing is evil. The villain of your novel is really the hero in his own mind. Write a scene from the villain’s point of view to grasp what is lovable and human about your villain and to see what flaws your hero actually has.

Hero:

-If you are convincing enough with the flaws in your hero, you will push buttons in your readers. But that might be the goal of your work.

-Flaws give room for growth in your characters.

-Their flaws should impact the story.

When sitting down to get to know your characters be sure to include their most appealing and least appealing traits. What’s that you say? You don’t have coffee with each character before you start writing your work? shaking head. You should know how each main character would behave in any situation, even the ones you don’t plan to include in your plot. Nanowrimo has a questionnaire to help, http://blog.nanowrimo.org/post/61118193819/nano-prep-the-official-nanowrimo-character

Last night at the Wednesday writer’s cafe, we started talking about what topics from Norwescon I still had in my little notebook to cover for my blog. When I got to Writing with Historical Accuracy, my dear friend David asked just what is historical accuracy and why should anyone care?

The second part of that question is easier to answer than the first. If a writer is taking the time to write historically based fiction, they obviously care about the history. And as a reader if you pick a historically based piece of fiction you care as well. Otherwise you’re just writing fiction. Speaking as a realist, you either have the history bug or you don’t. shrug. Dusting off hands, moving on.

So now to tackle the first part. I went to a number of panels at Norwescon that provided historical information. I’ll try to merge it all together here into one sort of historical interest list.

-Try to make the circumstances fit your character.

-Roll your well researched historical details into your plot points, so they don’t just feel like window dressings.

Military:

Army infantry moves at about 1 km a hour if you want them to be able to fight when they get to their destination. For further information about movement rates, water and food requirements http://fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm3-05-213.pdf. Happy Reading.

Women who fought:

23% of the soldiers in Victorian England were women.

The binding of feet in China was a response to how brutal the women were as soldiers.

Japan had entire female armies of the Samurai class.

During the religious crusades, the Muslims buried their female warriors as honored combatants.

Random Bits:

Did you know in a given county in early rural European states the wagons were made to the width of the ruts in the road, reinforcing said ruts. Made it hard to go across multiple counties in one go.

Until the 1800’s if you were poor you ate out. Kitchen construction and cooking fuel were expensive.

When traveling, an inn would not provide you with a plate or bowl for your stew. Those were expensive. In fact they were an excellent way to store your wealth, metal plates. Enjoy your crust of bread with stew in it.

Looking back I don’t feel like the panel on Historical Accuracy really talked about how to be accurate or why you should be accurate. So I’ll say this on how. Research. I spent 3 months last year researching for my Nano novel, and that was just a fluffy little chick lit/romance piece. Go to your library, make friends with the librarian. Get really familiar with the catalog system to your library. I have found by playing with my keyword search and choosing an abundance of sorting characteristics I find books I had no idea would be a gold mine of information. Then read. Read. Read. Read.

Final thought, when all else fails find a historian for your time period, make friends with them, keep them in drinks, buy them dinner, clean their house, so they keep feeding you interesting historically accurate information to hang your plot on.

darlin’ you give b plots a bad name.

You play your part and I make my name

you give b plots a bad name.

-My thanks to Bon Jovi for writing songs so easy to parody.

So just what is a b plot you ask. I’m glad you did. Let’s pretend I am writing a novel about a time traveling journalist, the main plot is that fantasy and what happens to him in that fantasy. But man can not stand alone. So let’s give him a wife who’s constantly being irritated by the fact that he leaves his breakfast dishes on the side of the sink every morning instead of putting them in the dishwasher. Now if we leave it at that the story is somewhat flat. The wife serves no purpose other than to put her husband’s dishes in the dishwasher each morning when he pops off to another time line. (And we wouldn’t want that now would we honey?) So how does one write a purposeful b plot?

Thankfully Norwescon provided a panel for that too.

-Humanizing your characters adds a level to your storytelling.

-The A plot and the B plot should thematically work together. The resolution of one should resolve the other.

-Even though men do not emote you need to help your reader feel their emotions, because they do have them.

Common Mistakes in B plots:

-B plot characters that are robots designed to serve the A plot character.

-The relationship moves too fast, with instalove.

-Writers add the B plot as an after thought.

-Lack of romantic conflict in the B plot.

I’ll add a mistake that frequently bothers me when I read fiction. I’ll use a little quote from my son who didn’t know I could hear him while he was playing lego star wars. “No Luke, don’t destroy Boba, he’s really a Jedi in disguise as a bounty hunter.” Unless you are a five year old, these one sentence reveals of epic proportion that change the entire direction of the saga, will not fly no matter how high it’s midiclorian count.

Your B plot can add a lot of emotional resonance if you give it some forethought. Don’t just toss in a relationship robot to do your main character’s bidding, unless you’re writing for Joss Whedon.