Young Writers Society

I started reading a book the other day. By Salvadore or something. He had his main character, Drizzit or along the lines of it. But the funny thing is? He based this charcter off of being a dark elf in the land of oh-so-dark. um. okay. And there were these lizards they use as mounts to stalk eachother. alrighty then. Seriously folks!

What is with the current stuff out there that thinks elves should be the main focus of your book? I don't understand. Human empathy is needed to create connections with the reader, making the novel or story somewhat appliable to the audience. If you seperate this link, by using a main character that can't be shoe-stolen, then you better have one good idea of a story. But not even, the book I was reading, Homeland, was just plain sandpaper on rock. And my friends all say how good the whole series is. I think they like it because it makes a referance of good fighting abilities of the main character; killing an whole army of orks single-handed. Since they all play WC3, WoW (Warcraft III and World of Warcraft) they like it because of the isolation of the character and plain violance of it too. Killing an army of orks must be good ehh? Non the less violant.

Just thought I put out my opinions!

~BS

*blinks*

It's called fantasy for a reason. Don't like it? Try some non-fiction.

Ah the wisdom hits the boards! *stares* Okay.

I'm making a point of why would an author lack his humane qualities in his books. Not of whether I like them. I'm not asking whether you like it or not, as that is not apart of my topic. As you can see, I'm again making another point to keep the question or topic in a more specialized point of view. Anyone else?

~BS

So you mean why do elves seem to be in every single fantasy novel (according to you anyway)? I dunno. I read plenty of awesome fantasys where there are no elves. Some people just think you can make any fantasy some best-selling epic if you throw in elves. And actually, that formula seems to work. I can't comment on the actual book, as I haven't read it, but there is a discussion of this author in the Book Review forum. Perhaps state your opinion there?

I write fantasy, I use elves, dwarves, humans, etc. Some people like to escape the real world, which is one reason why they read these kind of books, well, that's my opinion.

What I hate about elves is the way everyone makes them tall, and noble, and gracful and not showing any emotion. They're not like that! They should be fun, and laughter and by god they should get drunk!!! Well, that's what the 'elves' (I didn't call them elves, but they sort of are) in my book are like. They have a big hall, under a big tree and light big fires and have big parties, get drunk and eat lots of meat (I figured they'd be more in touch with plants so they wouldn't eat them as much as humans) at the end of each day.

It's a lot more... intricate... than that Z.

He is a dark elf, yes, but he shares the emotions and personality of a normal human. But what makes the story good, is it's a change from the cliché valiant human with long blond hair and a noble steed. Drizzt is more impetus and less scheming. He is more passionate and less glorious.

And in his journals in every seperate part of the book, you gain a deeper understanding of the main character and by the end of the book, you feel like you know him. He talks of events and deep feelings and beliefs.

A character does not need human empathy to be a fictional thing you can maybe even relate to.

Yeah, exactly.

1) Thats his style. If you don't like it, try some human fantasies like Harry Potter or something like that.

2) He does have a lot of emotion in that book. You can actually escape the real world and think that elves are humans. Those were very good series, and I don't really know what your point is? That using elves in stories are bad? Okay then, what if I said that using humans in stories is bad, also?

In my story, my character is also going to be an elf (surface elf, not dark elf) (and yes Éloeré I completely agree with you; elves should be more laid-back than the belief they're all elegant and pale). My story will be one with humans as just another character, and as diverse and wonderous a world as you can imagine.

Crazy? Or stupid?


You tell ME after the saga has been published.

Why does all (most) non-fantasy fiction revolve around humans?

*blinks*

What, you want it to be about a dog? Well, it's easier to connect with humans. But that doesn't really relate, Brad.

In my opinion, fantasy books use elves a lot because they're the closest you can get to being human without actually BEING human. In other words, they want it to be more fantasy than regular fiction. And they figure that having elves instead of humans is the best way to do that. *shrugs*

[sarcasm. heehee]

Exactly Crysi, I personally don't have the human empathy thing where I have to be able to relate to some human character, but a lot of others do.

So that being said, elves can be used to satisfy the author as well as the human sympathizers...

Yeah, now that I think about it...

Well, I think that most don't use humans because humans are very, very, very boring sometimes in books, because everyone knows everything about them and can connect. But if they use elves, then people will want to read more, because they will want to find out stuff about elves, whereas if it was a human, it would be more boring...or something...like...that.

There's your answers Z