On Heroines (the Writer's Dread Terror)

    So I've been trying to write a novel for a while, but right now it's a trash fire, so I'm procrastinating on that and writing this.
    Might as well, one of my problems is a female protagonist.

   My Issues with Modern Heroines

   For the past several years, it seems that only two types of girls exist in fiction:
    1. The kick-butt warrior
    2. The love-interest

   Sometimes you'll get a combination of the two (say, in fantasy or science-fiction works) but for the most part a female character falls into one of those fields, and it becomes a trope.

    Now, before I go on, I do like some characters who fall into those tropes, such as Katniss Everdeen, Cosette, Wonder Woman, and Okoye.
   The problem with the pattern, however, is that it becomes exactly that: a pattern. From that, we end up with many generic characters that are easily interchangable . You could easily swap Snow White with Sleeping Beauty, or movie-version Ginny Weasley with Iron Man 2's Black Widow, and not much would change in the overall plot.

     Sometimes authors don't even seem to care about that. As long as a heroine can shoot and be the audience's eyes, that's all we need. Developing a personality just takes up time. Might as well just take a male character and change his gender, there's no difference, right?
 
    On the other end of the spectrum, some people say that if you have a female protagonist, the story has to be about them being female. I don't get that. We don't have too many stories with male protagonists just about them being male.

     But an even more frustrating trope (to me) is how female characters are depicted as perfect, be that as a male-fantasy 'she was the ideal woman', to the hyper-feminist 'she is a juggernaut of power, don't question it!'

   I'll be the first to admit I'm a perfectionist, but this creates a HUGE problem.

   The 'ideal woman' is just insulting on many levels...

   "You're all I ever wanted. You're beautiful!"
   "Thank you. But what else?"
   "What else?"
   "Is beauty all that matters to you?"
   "What else is there?"
                        - The Swan Princess
 
   As for the other, Captain Marvel was criticized for being arrogant and cocky, but the majority rebuffed this with the argument that Tony Stark was the same way and well beloved (so clearly we were all a bunch of sexist jerks.)
   What was forgotten is the fact that Tony Stark changes, and Tony Stark doesn't really believe he is all that great. His cocky attitude is a defense mechanism, not the default setting. While Captain Marvel ends her debut film smirking and telling Fury that he'll definitely need her again, Tony ends his debut film with these lines:

    "I'm just not the hero type. Clearly. With this laundry list of character defects, all the mistakes I've made, largely public... The truth is: I am Iron Man."

      ... Yeah, there's a difference.

      Worse still is when people try to justify flawed heriones' flaws as being their true strengths, such as Tris Prior's impulsive independence as 'strong and selfless', when really it just makes more trouble and melodrama for the story as her boyfriend has to rescue her 20 times.

      Hope for Tropes???

      But you've probably heard all of the above before, so I'd like to pose a new question:
      Can a character be a trope -- by definition -- and still be interesting?

     The answer I've found is: YES.

     I put up that anime art in the beginning for a specific reason. The character in it is Violet Evergarden. I'm going to have to give some details about the show to fully explain my point, so if you'd rather watch the show without any fore-knowledge, I'd recommend stopping here.

    ......... We all good?

   Okay, so Violet Evergarden was forced to join the army at age 10 and proved to be a natural assassin, showing no emotion or hesitation when it came to killing others. During this time, she developed a close relationship with her superior, Major Gilbert Bougainvillea, but they were separated after a battle which sent Violet to the hospital and ended the war. One of Gilbert's friends takes her in and gives her a job in his mail-company, which has the added business of writing letters for people. At one point Violet witnesses a love-letter being written, which brings her to realize that she has no idea what love means.
    At all.
    This isn't some angsty-romantic-philosophy situation.
    It's literally that she has no familiarity with the concept of love.
    The entire plot of the anime is her trying to figure out what love is.

    So what do we get from this?

    1. Violet is attractive
    2. Violet is a kick-butt warrior
    3. Violet could end up in a romantic relationship
    4. Violet's personality, to begin with, is a bit repressed

    BUT this is all okay with me because:

    1. Violet must grow and change to fulfill her story
    2. Violet's flaws are shown to be exactly that -- flaws

    It's a really beautiful story so I won't go further into it, but the points are clear. An interesting heroine has to be a person. Not an ideal, not a compromise. Just an actual person, with actual flaws, who has to change to achieve a better life.

   This is why the Winter Soldier version of Black Widow resounded so much more with me. Her flaw was set up in that she was secretive, independent, and didn't invest too much in honest, vulnerable friendships. Then midway through the film she's hiding under Steve's shield, crying in terror for her life. Later on she and Steve have a heart-to-heart about how it seems like they can't trust anyone to be honorable anymore. She has a flaw, the flaw is challenged, explored, and overcome.

    So, in summary, all we ladies want is to just have some engaging heroines, be they weird, fashionable, poor, rich, creative, logical, beautiful, ugly, tall, short, brave, afraid, whatever. Just give them a journey and make them really change.
    That's why we all remember Ramona Quimby, but not The Assassin Girl™ from fantasy world X.

(Art credits: Violet Evergarden by Tomachi-chan,
Screenshot by Netflix)

The Art Elite Problem

         So once upon a time I was listening to an excerpt from a Klingon opera (as you do) and got curious to see if anyone in the comment section had cared to put up some translations. Turns out that someone in the comments had the same idea as me, but she asked for them.
         They got one response.
         "Why don't you just learn the language."

         (I went back to try finding the exact conversation and I think I did, but there were a ton of people who came to that person's defense, so the knave in question deleted his comment.)

        Now, it may have been that the response was meant to encourage the other individual, but in the context and attitude, it doesn't come off that way at all.

        This frustrates me so much. Art is one of the few things in the world that can be easily shared. Not everyone can learn how to ride a bike through the internet, but we can learn how to paint, sing, dance, or speak a new language (this current quarantine state is a great time for it!) but what's the good of that if we who know how to do the things are condescending and outright hostile to those who don't?

        This is a problem that I've realized I had with some of my older posts, thus some of them are missing and will be rewritten (or not) but how do we address the problem? How do we keep from slipping into that mindset?

        After mulling it over for a bit, I came up with this list of ideas. There are probably a lot more out there to help, but this is just what I could come up with on the spot.

        1. Don't punish the behavior you want to see. 
        (This could really be applied to anything in life, actually...)

        2. Don't scorn those who are as inexperienced as you once were.
        Don't pretend that you never sounded awful when you started playing an instrument. Smile and applaud the kids who are in their first concert, no matter if your ears are bleeding. They're doing their best.

        3. Recognize that some things are just generally -- be it due to history, location, or technology -- not as well-known as others, and be patient with teaching those who want to learn (see #1.)

          This is my favorite example of this:

"I don't think you're inherently a racist if you don't know how to color black skin. You probably just haven't practiced it enough!"

   This makes me so happy. Let's face it, for a lot of us, we didn't grow up with superheroes or princesses other than White™ until War Machine, Falcon, Tiana, Esmeralda, Kida, Jasmine and Black Panther came along. (Plus, 3 out of those 4 princesses were sexualized quite a bit, so even if we saw them we weren't allowed to draw them.)

    Peachdeluxe, wherever you are, thank you. Thank you so much.

    Sincerely, a white artist who's trying really hard and prone to anxious over-thinking.

         4. Explain things to people who are trying to follow along.

            If you're a violinist who's talking about a really hard piece and you're ranting about 'all those double-stops!' but you don't stop to explain what a double-stop is to an inexperienced listener, they're just going to get confused and your words will have no meaning.

         5. Be the person you needed when you were younger.

         Not much to explain there.

         6. Remember Ratatouille!

So. We read an Amish romance (part 3)

       Well, we made it. There was wailing and lamenting, curling up on the floor, long nights of staring into space, but we made it.
     
       Was it better than when it began? Yes, in a way.
       Was it enough to make up for the nightmares we had the night after we finished? Oh, no. Not even close.

        The first two books earned 13 pages of notes each.
        This one earned 15.

        And I'm honest about the nightmares.
        That happened.
        Thanks, Beverly.



        The Premise

        Amish woman Lettie Byler has left her community of Bird-in-Hand to search for the child she bore out of wedlock, which was taken away from her at birth by the witch that is her mother, Adah.
        Lettie's daughter, Grace, and the English outsider, Heather, have teamed up to look for her.
        Heather's convinced her dad to pay the bill for a health retreat in hopes that it'll cure her cancer.
        Judah has to prove he's changed and become a man.
        Yonnie's still the best.

       Let's go from there.

       Resolutions

       In the middle of this convoluted mess, at least four questions were clear.

       1. Will Lettie and Judah's marriage be better?
       2. Will Adah and Jakob be punished for their actions?
       3. How long will it take for Heather -- who conveniently admitted (via "This is really out of character for me, but...") that she was adopted -- and Lettie to realize that they are mother and daughter?
       4. When will Grace get it through her gelatinous skull that Yonnie is the best man in the entire community of emotionally-abusive twerps and it's okay to be in a relationship again after her ex-fiancee started dating her 'best friend'?

       At least three of these were answered, and only one in a satisfying way.

      Grace, true to her nature, goes back and forth, so torn between her feelings that she never makes the choice until all obstacles disappear, thus making that 'choice' mean nothing.

       Lettie comes back and tells Judah what happened. First he's upset and walks away from her, then the two-by-four of reality hits him and he realizes what he's done. The very next day he goes back to Lettie, admits where he went wrong, begs for forgiveness, and takes her home (as contrary to what the community expects.)

      When Heather and Lettie finally meet, Lettie -- who up to this point has been studying strangers' lips to see if they resemble her ex's -- doesn't so much as spare her a glance, and Heather's more interested in the scandal than anything else. It's Adah who reunites them.

      On that note...
     Adah and Jakob are never punished. While Lettie must confess her sins to the entire membership, Adah is given a private confession. Jakob says he doesn't feel convicted, so a confession isn't necessary (because that's how it works, evidently.)

       Our Local Witch

       Oh, lovely, nurturing, long-suffering Adah.
       We hate Adah, but we hate the fact that Beverly tries to victimize her more.
     
       When Lettie first opens up to family about her past... well, this is how it goes:

       ""I thought I was in love, Hallie. And I was hardheaded, too. Wanted my way, no matter what anyone thought of my beau. So I disobeyed my parents and broke their hearts." Lettie was quiet a moment. "It's no wonder Mamm made me give the baby away."...
       ... Hallie made a sad sound and leaned forward, her arms on the table. "Well, I hope you don't believe that -- what you just said." She locked eyes with Lettie. "Because, my dear Lettie, that's not why your Mamm would've insisted on you givin' your baby away," Hallie said quietly. "Don't ya see? She made you do it out of love. For you... for your baby.""

   

      ....... Let me get this straight.
     Adah, our Adah, who -- Let's see, ah yes! -- called her first-born grandchild 'the sinful offspring', who emotionally abused her daughter apparently before AND after this event, who moved into her daughter's house to daily remind her that the family repute depended on her never telling her husband the truth about her past, who manipulated and controlled the entire family since day one, did all this because she loved them?

      Sure. Sounds legit.

      And in case you're wondering, this conversation happens when Lettie comes home:

      ""When you make your confession before the membership... must you reveal everything? I mean all the personal details?"
    "I want to do the ministers' bidding... to come clean."
    "'Tis a thorny issue, the confession."
    Lettie replied softly, "It's up to the bishop what questions are asked of me."
    Mamm's lips drew into a stiff line, and her cheeks flushed...
    ...Mamm reached out and placed a hand on Lettie's arm. "I wish you'd give it more thought, dear. Consider the consequences that such a disclosure might cause."
    "For me?" Lettie whispered. "Or for you?""

    Also Adah would rather her daughter be shunned for 6+ months rather than confess publicly.
    But, you know, it's clearly because she loves her.

    That's also probably why she doesn't want Grace to be friends with Englishers.

    Alternative Title: The Book of Bigotry

    Sometimes I look at Beverly's photo on the back of these books, and I wonder, does she realize that she's technically an Englisher? Because she certainly doesn't write like it.

    This is the most bigoted, sectarianistic book in the entire series.

    Englishers are, by Beverly's account, the most self-centered, greedy, fast-paced, impulsive, rude people in existence, leaving Amish characters to marvel that one of them "could even be considerate".
    (Note: I'm not saying that we aren't capable of these, but blanket statements are very dangerous, and as all this is going on, the Amish folk are always described as being self-controlled, gracious, kind, industrious, etc. etc. etc. And imagine hearing someone say that they're shocked someone of your background could have any good qualities. Yeah. Great way to alienate your audience, Beverly.)

    To punctuate this, we got one scene that's sole purpose was to have two English characters talk about how great the Amish are. Nothing else. At all.

     Alternative Title: The Infomercial Catalog

     We got all the infomercials. Infomercials on the Amish, infomercials on jam, infomercials on the effects of 'the American diet'.

     Did you know that the true cause of addiction in our world is diet? If we didn't eat red meat and fries we wouldn't have alcoholics, obviously.

     
       Heather the heathen

      It has been verified that Heather's only purposes in this series was to be Lettie's daughter and get a smashed-together salvation story. And boy, did we get it.
   
      Instrumental in her salvation journey is her experience at the health-lodge -- which is VERY illegal (see part 2) and meets nearly all of the criteria of being a cult -- and Jim, a guy she met online under an anonymous name and never saw until he drove 5 hours to meet her. Within minutes of their visit, he's spewing such lovely romantic phrases as:

      "I knew you'd be this pretty, Heather. From the way you expressed yourself... I knew."

      Oh, but don't worry, he's a Christian, and he wrote her a poem prayer, and he used to work at Busch Gardens when she went there all the time with her parents, so they're not total strangers and it's not creepy at all when he touches her arm without reason, immediately asks her to go on a date, , and all that. It's fine. He's also super attractive, so yeah.

      The moment of salvation is in itself only explainable as, 'this girl's body is going through a chemical cleanse, thus her emotions are everywhere.' One minute she's a skeptic, the next she's praying "a prayer of broken hearts and broken wings." There's no build-up, and no consequences. It's just fluff.

     The Conclusion

     As I said in the beginning, the series got better. Judah and Lettie have a stronger relationship, Yonnie has finally been recognized as good, and Lettie is forgiven by the church.
     But none of that can change how disturbing this series is.
     It probably would have done better if it was a single book, so that way we wouldn't get the wrong moral lessons and authorial opinions expressed in the first book (like the ideal wife being hard-working, happy and hot concept, which works as a starting point for Judah's growth, but is confusing when it is never challenged until halfway through the second book.)
     All the characters are over-emotional in places they shouldn't be, and non-emotional in places they should be.
     There is no reason or realism.
     There are no solid opinions, other than the Amish being perfection incarnate while the rest of the human race is corrupt and selfish.
      Conflict -- the very blood of good storytelling -- is avoided at all costs.

      Overall, this is probably the worst series I've read, up to date.

      What I'm trying to say is that if your readers come upon a scene that's well-written, with strong theme and character development, then pause to look at each other and sincerely ask:
     "Is the author dead?"
     Then you're probably doing something wrong.

     This is not to say that Beverly Lewis can never write something good, or that it's a completely hopeless genre, but it's going to take a lot of work to make that change. Plus the humility to acknowledge that sometimes we write crap. That's what the editing process is for.

   
   

 

So. We read an Amish Romance (part 2)

   For the backstory on this, here's the first part of this series:
https://rummageandreason.blogspot.com/2020/02/so-we-read-amish-romance-part-1.html

   Mamma Mia, here we go again.

   It was really hard to condense 13 pages of notes into this.

   Book Two of Beverly Lewis' 'Seasons of Grace' trilogy continues the story of the emotionally stunted Byler family and the angsty Englisher Heather with all the speed and suspense of tar sliding down a molasses-coated slope, raising such deep questions as, 'What is forgiveness?' 'Is chemotherapy the only answer to cancer?' and 'Why did we do this to ourselves?'


The Premise

    Picking up from the end of the first book, Lettie Byler has run away from home to find the child she bore out of wedlock, who was taken away from her at birth.
     Her daughter, Grace, wants to go after her and bring her home - or find out why she left.
     Judah nurses lambs.
     Heather - the English girl - has come to the Amish community to pursue natural cancer treatments.
     And in the midst of all this, Yonnie - a young Amish man - has taken to helping around the Byler farm and seems very attentive to Grace, in his strange ways. After all, he's the only man Grace has ever known to thank her for cooking meals.

       The Good Parts

       *Deep breath *
       Okay.
       This book was actually better than the first one, because at least three characters were actually doing something.
        Lettie's quest to find her lost child is the saddest and most compelling of all the plots, as we grow to know her better and understand her situation.
        On the other hand, Heather is still extremely obnoxious and stupid, but at least we got somewhere.
         Then we have Yonnie.

         Yonnie is the BEST THING to come out of this series (so far.) He's a true gentleman, he cares about others, he takes the time to get to know a girl before asking if she'll court him (apparently a shockingly rare thing in this community,) he listens to Grace, encourages her interests without bargaining for anything in return, and generally doesn't care for the local gossip as a source of information. Also he has a super cute dog. Don't ask me how I know it's cute, I just know it is. It's a German Shepherd.

      The Consistently Irritating Parts

      This community is the worst.
      The Byler family is the worst.

      Grace is so saintly in every way it's nauseating. This sort of seems like a double-standard, considering what I just said about Yonnie, but let me explain:
       The problem with Grace is that she's so perfect, nothing she does is ever portrayed as a flaw. Yonnie is often called out on for being 'too happy' and very talkative, but Grace is portrayed as being the true patron saint of the community, no matter what she does. Her hypocrisy, judgementalism, and weak-will are all glossed over as good things, and she is never allowed to mess up. Her opinions change so often, we can't say for certain what she truly believes.
        Also she's evidently the emotional anchor for her family, the one who all the others - parents included - go to for validation or comfort, and you know that ain't right.
        (Note: I'm not saying family members shouldn't share concerns and problems with each other - that's actually the biggest problem this family has. What I'm trying to say is, it's okay to seek comfort from each other, and natural to look for some validation from those older/wiser/more experienced than you, but it's not okay for a parent to put their kids in that situation, where they have to validate you day in and out. You're the parents. Act like it.)

       Judah is still irritating, but getting better. He definitely grew through the book, so we can forgive him for being a self-centered jerk in the beginning since he recognized that he was a self-centered jerk at the end and was moving to fix it.

       For context, beginning of the book:
      'Perhaps my lost, runaway wife see me as the good shepherd, going after that lost sheep, as I send my daughter to look for her instead of myself because I've got work to do.'
      'I hope my daughter gives up this foolish notion of looking for her mother - what would the community think?' 

        End of the book:
        'I am the worst. I should've listened to my wife, I should've put in more effort - How could I have been so cold?!'
       
        Plus he marched into his in-laws' house, sat his father-in-law down, and said point-blank: 
        'Tell me what happened to my wife before we were married.'

        Heather is just stupid. To be fair, I'm no fan of chemo either, but she's so set against it that she doesn't look for more than one alternative, she does no research on that source, and is fully willing to put her life in the hands of a 'doctor' who shouldn't even legally be practicing*. Then she starts swooning over a guy she met online, under an anonymous name, and has never seen or talked to in person. She's also awful in that she treats the Amish like an exotic aesthetic instead of people. 
        Oh, and our strong, independent feminist evidently has no job, so she fully expects that daddy will pay off the whopping natural-treatment bill, no sweat.

        (*The 'doctor' in question is a naturopath, and there's a scene where it's explicitly pointed out that she doesn't have any certificate that equates a medical doctorate. This makes the fact that she calls herself a doctor and prescribes treatments to people very illegal. Also she's a very bad doctor, as she immediately attributes Heather's cancer to 'the American diet' without asking questions such as, 'Do you smoke?')

         But the supreme, unquestioned crown of awful, terrible people in this town is Grandma Adah. From the first book, we got that she forced Lettie to give up her child, but we weren't prepared for how utterly cold and unfeeling she is about that fact. Her primary concern is not for the safety or well-being for her daughter, but the family reputation, and if Lettie's return should endanger that, perhaps it would be best if she never returned. 
        We also gather that she and her husband Jakob emotionally neglected - if not straight-up abused - Lettie, considering that when a total stranger intentionally makes Lettie a cup of tea exactly as she likes it, Lettie begins to cry and explains that no one has ever been so kind to her. NO ONE.
         And yet Beverly still manages to victimize her.

        Jakob was a sexist but generally loving and gentle guy in the first book.
        In this one he's grumpy, vindictive, and manipulative. 
        
        Adam went from respecting his sister to threatening her to marry or else.

        As for the community, the fact that a man who is affectionate and attentive to his wife and children is so unheard of and 'strange' pretty much explains it all.

       Sleep-deprived Writer Complaints

       What have I learned from this book?

        1. Random subject jumps for no reason whatsoever are fine.
        2. Everybody loves a flawless heroine.
        3. Describe EVERYTHING. Even the little movements that signify nothing can be  milked for every little fiber of detail.
        4. It's perfectly fine to use only half of a definition for a word! (Thus rain smells 'musky'.)
        5. There's no such thing as adjectives setting mood. (Clearly, 'murky' paints a peaceful picture!)
        6. Repetitive info dumps are completely essential every time.
        7. Describing what a character looks like every time they appear is absolutely essential (because, y'know, the audience might have forgotten what they look like in 5 minutes.)
        8. Always maintain stereotypes.
        9. Your characters' assumptions about others' thoughts and motives must be %100 accurate.

        Generally Weird Things

         'I'm having an emotional breakdown - off to the front yard!'
         "Hardly anyone Grace had ever known had ever changed their eating habits unless they were dying."
         16-year-old has the body of a 6-year-old (it's either that or she's incredibly obese.)
         Romantic descriptions of everyone (unless they're fat.)
        'My naturopath doctor can surely use her feminine charms to change my dad's mind.'
         Romanticizing the effects of cancer (Heather is 'slender' now, not 'scrawny' or 'bony'.)
         Everyone is bipolar.
         Very clearly having sex-scenes while dancing around the fact ('trust' being used as another word for doing the you-know-what.)
         "She literally shuddered."
         "Eavesdropping was one of the perks of his job."
         'Only a woman could make a kitchen-dining-room considerate floor plan!'
         The great sub-plot of the sandwich.
         Crackers and warm milk.

        And our personal favorite:
        "Yonnie's going to put his feet under your table tonight!"
        "Tonight?" Grace exclaimed.
        "And every night - except for Saturdays and the Lord's day."

         ........ Something about that sound weird, or is it just me?

        The Question of Forgiveness

        The dominant moral question in this book is: Can Lettie forgive her mother for what she's done?
        Beverly's answer is: Yes. "When you understand, you will forgive."

         Okay. Let's take a moment here to think about this.

        Louis Zamperini was a US bombardier in World War II. At the midpoint of the war, his plane crashed in the middle of the ocean, and he and two other crewmen huddled together on a tiny raft for 47 days. One of them died on the 33rd day. They endured rain, circling sharks, starvation, and a fly-by shooting by a Japanese aircraft. When they finally came ashore they were taken prisoner by the Japanese.
         For the next 25 months, Zamperini was moved from prison camp to prison camp, tortured, beaten, starved, and neglected. In the midst of this, a guard named Mutsuhiro Watanabe decided to make it his task to break the American down. He personally abused Zamperini, beating him with a belt buckle across the face, forcing him to complete mindless tasks to the point of exhaustion, and humiliated him with every chance he got.
          When the war ended, Zamperini returned home a changed man. Nightmares plagued him. He took up drinking. He nearly destroyed his marriage.
        Then he went to listen to man named Billy Graham preach. Zamperini found salvation through that experience, and his life turned upside down. He and his wife raised two children. He ran a center for troubled youth - people like him in his younger days. And he wrote a letter to Watanabe.

      "As a result of my prisoner of war experience under your unwarranted and unreasonable punishment," Mr. Zamperini wrote his former guard in the 1990s, "my post-war life became a nightmare … but thanks to a confrontation with God … I committed my life to Christ. Love replaced the hate I had for you." 
                                                                - Wall Street Journal, 'The Defiant Ones'

     Forgiveness shouldn't be dependent on understanding. Sure, understanding why we suffered is great, but saying that we can only forgive if we understand is a very narrow, cold idea. In my opinion the most amazing aspect of forgiveness - the aspect that gives it it's shocking, amazing nature - is when we forgive without understanding. When we say, 'I don't know why you did it. I can't imagine why you did it. But I care about you and want the best for you. I love you.'

     Book three addresses this further, but that's another post and I need to take a break.

     Basically, 'The Missing':

      Have a nice day.

So. We read an Amish Romance (Part 1)

  Introduction

   Once upon a time, there was a popular literary genre, briefly summarized as, 'British schoolchildren get shipwrecked and have wonderful adventures on their own while remaining fully civilized'. Around the same time there was a man named William Golding who loathed that genre. So he sat down and wrote The Lord of the Flies, which took the same general premise, then applied realism to it, creating the horrifying reality of what society would become without any form of moral governance or discipline.

  What does this have to do with Amish Romance? Basically, most of my friends and I agree that it's an overdone, repetitive genre severely lacking in any realism. So my siblings and I decided to write a satire of it, much in the spirit of The Lord of the Flies.

   So we supposed we should probably read some Amish Romance.

   We had no idea it'd be this bad.

   The Premise of The Secret

   Lettie Byler - an Amish wife and mother of 4 - has taken to wandering the roads and fields around their farm at night. Though described as 'moody' in the past, the other characters observe that lately she's been more so than normal, ever since she went for a walk with a stranger at a barn raising.
   Grace, Lettie's eldest daughter, is concerned for her mother, but also preoccupied with her impending engagement to Henry, a shy, quiet man of upstanding repute in the community.
    Judah, Lettie's husband, is concerned for his sheep.
    In the middle of all this, an Englisher girl named Heather finds out she has cancer and decides to pursue natural therapy in Amish country.


 The Problems of The Secret

   Whoooooooooooooo boi.
   We got a lot.
   We're up to 13 pages.
   Single-spaced.
   I'll try to trim them down just enough to cover the major points.

   The Technicalities:

   From a dry writer's perspective, the writing style of this book is just... terrible.

   To be fair, I've never published a book, let alone the 100+ that Beverly Lewis has, but that's partially because I have a habit of creating projects too ambitious for a beginning, and partially because I'm a perfectionist - thus the many many writing articles, books, and magazines that I own and reread every other day.
 
   When you're learning how to write fiction, there are certain technicalities that you're taught from the get-go, such as:

    1. Avoid dumping a ton of information on the reader at once
    2. There has to be a point to what you bring into focus
    3. Pacing. There's a strategy to it.
    4. Use good grammar (unless you're writing dialogue for a specific character type.)
    5. Be careful not to repeat phrases (unless they mean something, I.E. "May the Force be with you")
    6. Be clear in what point of view (POV) and tense you're writing in.
     7. Be consistent with 'the rules' of your world (unless you're drawing attention to something suddenly different.)
 

    Pretty easy rules. And yet this book manages to ignore every single one of them.

    In the prologue, we get a whopping TON of information, jumping back and forth between every time frame and tense, from the main problem of the plot to a summary of Grace's father's personality to the fact that Grace's brother is going to be married soon to her opinion of his fiance to how Grace has to preserve her reputation of being an industrious woman by never being late to work and then suddenly back to the main problem. If that sentence made your brain hurt, that's a lot easier than the 4 pages of that all to tell us, "Mama's acting strange for no discernible reason and Grace is concerned," which is also a summary of the first 11 chapters, too.

    Another thing which isn't necessarily talked about in writing circles - probably because it's supposed to be obvious - is giving your characters set opinions.
   Everyone alive has an opinion on something. Even if someone says it's best to avoid conflict and be open-minded about things, that's a set opinion and if you argue against it, they'll stand to defend it (hello, conflict!)
   This point sort of bleeds into the sections on characters and motive, too.
   Basically, your characters need to have set opinions, personalities, etc. and through that, you, the storyteller, should portray the world in a manner to show your opinions of it. (One great example of this is Fairest by Marissa Meyer, a book set in the midst of a sci-fi story, that is solely the villain's backstory, from the villain's perspective. Now, it brushes the side of justifying the villain, but it doesn't in that it compares and contrasts her personality and her view of love with that of the other characters, so that despite feeling pain for this villain, you can still see that she is warped and evil in her actions.)

    The Characters:

    Generally, you want the audience to at least empathize with your characters. Liking them is good, but empathy is the bare minimum you can reach, which sometimes works out for a good story! In Iron Man, for example, Tony Stark is a terrible, condescending, selfish jerk for the entire first act, but we end up rooting for him from the beginning because we've seen his charisma, how he puts others at ease - joking with soldiers escorting him across the Middle East, only to see those soldiers abruptly murdered in front of him, and him unable to help no matter how hard he earnestly tries.

    I hate every single one of the characters in this book.
    Except maybe the elder brother. He's the only one with a brain and moral backbone in this circus.

    The protagonist, Grace, I think was supposed to come off as perfect - a shining example to stand against the resident regular American girl, Heather - but with every passing page, she just becomes more bland, spineless, and ultimately self-contradicting. The only real scene suggesting a character arc was when after chapters of sadness, she has one. half. chapter. of anger towards her mother for walking out on them, then breaks down in a tearful prayer of repentance and suddenly she has a new outlook on life and never has any flaws ever again in this book.

    Her father, Judah, is just... Well, these are some jewels from his personality:

     - Pondering how long it will be before his wife gets over her sadness and behaves 'like a good wife'
     - Telling his wife, as she's trying to tell him what's been bothering her, to talk to someone else
     - Telling his wife to just stay busy to distract herself from her problems
     - Literally running away from her as she's trying to explain her pain to her
     - Fuming over how his lambing season would be going so much better if his wife were there (so she could miraculously save the life of a lamb that no one else could, apparently)
     - Mourning to himself that his wife treated him coldly and cruelly by walking out on him
     - When he's questioned about why his wife walked out on him, his only explanation is that he hasn't been having sex with her for a long time, due to his work and his age.

     Also he's victimized in all this.

     Lettie herself is really in the anti-hero zone right now, as we're so mad at Judah we can understand why she walked out on him, AND she seems to be doing it for a noble plotline of her own, but at the same time she didn't have a second thought for the children she left behind really. She just worried if she disappointed poor, lovely Judah.

    Heather is a terrible, cliched depiction of an unsaved American girl, complete with inner monologue about prayer being a waste of time and listening to bands of girls hating boys at 'teeth rattling' volumes. Oh, also she says WebMD is a reliable source of information, so take that as you will.

    Grace's fiance, Henry, is the boyfriend who's just too perfect at first, and then the more you hear about him, you realize he's a guy who basically seems ashamed to have her as a girlfriend and has the backbone of a cream eclair. (Tip for y'all, if the person your dating is 'too shy' to openly, publicly show that you're dating, that person isn't adult enough.)

    Grace's grandmother Ada is vying for second place as the worst person in the world, due to the fact that she - no, I don't care about spoilers anymore - is super passive-aggressive to her neighbors and forced her daughter to give up her child born of wedlock immediately, not even allowing her to see the baby and then forced her into marrying another man she didn't love and turned out to be very emotionally abusive (but, y'know, he's steady and dependable that way.)

     Also she describes the baby as a 'sinful result' of Lettie's actions, which is extremely horrible.

    The only character we actually like would be the elder brother, Adam. Adam is the only one with a brain. Adam straight-up challenged his dad's emotional abuse, AND also listens to Grace's problems and doesn't force her to change her opinions, respecting her decisions for her life!

     The rest of the children are just unnatural. Their mother walks out and the youngest daughter comes to the blissful conclusion that 'she must've had a good reason, so I don't worry about it!'

      While we're on the topic, these characters just have the most bland and unnatural reactions to a traumatic event - like abandonment - that I have ever seen. Grace gets a lump in her throat, then goes home and makes breakfast for her family, all the while wondering and worrying about why their mother left them.
      Now, to be fair, there are many different ways to respond to sudden trauma, but this senario just doesn't work. Some people freeze, unsure of what to do, some people break down instantly, some people go into task-mode, etc, etc.
     We could argue that Grace is going into task-mode, thus the resign to make breakfast and go from there, but it doesn't quite match up with the whole internal monologue of sorrow. When you're in task-mode, you do not think emotionally. Your sole focus is getting what needs to be done done. Emotions are obstacles. That is task mode.

      The Community Representation

      One of the most prominent comments we found in public reviews of Beverly Lewis' works was that it 'made people long for a simpler life'.

       *Deep breath *

      She undeniably romanticizes every single minute aspect of the Amish life, from bonnet-ties to 'majestic silver silos', but the Amish community in this book is so fraught with casual abuse and suppression, we can't tell if she's trying to critique it or romanticize it.

       This Amish community is quite frankly a cult, with the bishops decreeing whether or not you can have gas or solar power (thought it's mentioned that in 'stricter communities' they dictate how many times a married couple can have sex, so, y'know, it's not so bad.)

       And for a Christian romance, not one of the married couples in this book have healthy, Christian relationships. They don't talk to each other or ask for each other's input in any decisions, and often their tasks around the household seem to be taken for granted (such as when Grace takes on the role of 'mother' to her siblings, no one so much as thanks her or gives her any form of affirmation.)

       Overall, the book's treatment of women is both depressing and insulting. Ada's husband is constantly making sexist remarks, such as, "Of course she's moody, she's a woman," all the women are flawlessly beautiful, and the general end goal of all the statements amount to: 'Women should be hardworking, content, HAWT, and never upset about anything' (Seriously, every time Grace is deep in thought and disturbed, the other characters see her as 'sullen', while when her father is in the same state, he's described as 'distressed' and 'suffering'.)
     
     The point:

     There is none. Seriously. We have no idea what she was trying to say with this.

So, to sum this all up:

   But we're reading the sequel anyway to see if things get better.
   

Some Updates

    I realize that I haven't written in quite a while, but now I have a minute so I wanted to update anyone who reads this on some changes to the blog while I'm here.

    First off, I changed the name! The old one 'The brain that wouldn't be silent stxcfggfzblahblah' was really too long and this new title hopefully gets the actual point across.

    Second, I was reviewing some of my older posts and realized that some of them have a really elitist 'I'm so smart y'all be dumb to not agree' tone to them. That is NOT the tone of voice I want to create on this blog and I get annoyed with media that has that tone in the first place. Sincerest apologies, and I'll be editing some of those articles hopefully soon.

    Also I moved.

    Anyways, hope to put out some good content soon. I'm probably going to reevaluate the focus of this blog soon to bring more order into this, once I get the time.

    Take care, get a good night's sleep, and stay hydrated.

A P.S.A. about AFTER

     *Deep breath*
    So I used to work at a movie theater. I used to work at a movie theater when the film After came out. I'm not really one for the teen-romance genre, so I didn't give it much thought. During theater checks (go in, make sure screen/sound was working and audience was behaving properly) I'd see little snippets of it and just roll my eyes in detached mockery/annoyance.
    But now I've noticed that the film (and it's original form, an online fan-fiction piece) has been getting more and more attention. Most notably for how terrible it is.
    A Youtuber I watch did a review on it with the full severity of judgement that the story deserved, but she used examples from the book that were rather... graphic in portrayal, so this is my cleaner, layman review for anyone who might be interested in/curious about the hypes surrounding this book.

(Please note, I haven't actually read the book or watched the full movie, but I've gathered enough information on it to have a fair understanding of the content. This isn't a review of writing style, word choice, or cinematography. This is a moral review of a book that should never have been written.)

    Basic summary: After is the story of a young woman going to college, meeting this mysterious bad-boy named Hardin, falling in love with him, abandoning her friends, family, and career goals, moving in with him, having sex, and then finding out that it was all a trick - in a game of 'Truth or Dare', he told his friends that he could make her fall in love with him. Yet in the end, our dear, darling, stupid protagonist goes back to Hardin after he sends her a sappy letter about how he really did grow to love her etc, etc, etc.

   It's bad enough that this was a Harry Styles fan-fiction.
   It's bad enough that the author was 22 when she wrote it.
   It's worse that it was published as an actual book, made into a movie, and advertised as some great romantic story for the young generation.

   All this book says is: "Hey, girls, you know what's some great boyfriend material? That one guy who gets really mad when you see other guys, who constantly lies - so mysterious! - and who says that Elizabeth Bennet was wrong to call Darcy a jerk for being condescending and insulting to her on a constant basis, because we all know that's how you know he REALLY likes you!!! *wink wink*"

     Or, to be blunt:

     - It's okay if your boyfriend is condescending and secretive
     - It's okay to give up all your life goals because you've entered a relationship
     - If a guy you know violently hurts himself because you went out with your actual boyfriend, it means he really likes you and you should give him a chance!!! Give that widdle sweetheart a kiss so he feels better!!!
     - Your boyfriend doesn't need to be held accountable for his actions
     - True love = Sex every other day
     - If a guy says he loves you - even if he manipulates, abuses, and uses you for personal gain and amusement on a consistent basis - then he absolutely loves you and you just need to give him a second chance!!!!!!

    This story sickens me. It makes me want to rip a punching bag open with my fingernails. It shouldn't even exist, let alone be heralded as something good.

   Girls, if a boy you know - boyfriend, friend, whatever - acts like this, GET OUT NOW.
   Boys, if a girl you know - girlfriend, friend, whatever - acts like this GET OUT NOW.

   You can still wish for someone to have a good life and find a good lifestyle, but if you're actively putting yourself in a vulnerable position and empowering them in the hopes that one day they'll wake up and treat you better, you're only hurting yourself and telling them that it's okay for them to act that way.
     YES! It's going to be painful! I KNOW!!! But in the long run, you're far better off without them controlling your life. Sometimes you've got to hit the breaks, stop being the giver, and make the decision that is good for you.
     Otherwise it'll never stop.
     It'll just happening, over and over and over.
     And after that, it's really hard to pick yourself back up again. But it is possible.

(If you'd like a more in-depth review of the movie, Alex Meyers on Youtube has an excellent video on it (He didn't pay me or anything to say that, he just does a great job pointing out the red flags and showing the essence of the story without it getting too sensual, etc. all the while in an entertaining and easy-to-follow style.))