In 2010, I purchased 8 "Snowflake Pro Method" programs from award-winning novelist, Randy Ingermanson to give to some of my authors. The "Snowflake Pro" included his free online magazine.
I was about to reprint the first of his articles when I was thrilled to hear that I could reprint some of the last publication.
Here is an excerpt of his latest Advanced Fiction Writing E-zine. It's just in time for Halloween. You will learn a volume of information about horror creatures in this particular section. This is only one out of a long list of topics created in one publication. I have included the link for his website to access the entire courses and included the personal web site for "The Snowflake Guy."
Cheryl Haynes, President, FutureWord Publishing
These lessons are archived at:
Personal website :
Randy Ingermanson, Ph.D.
Creating: Why People Groups Matter
When you're developing the Storyworld for your novel,
part of your task is defining the set of people groups.
In the simplest case, you have only one people group.
In extreme cases, you have many people groups. THE LORD
OF THE RINGS is an obvious example, with its Men,
Hobbits, Dwarves, Elves, Wizards, Ents, Orcs, Wargs,
Huorns, Trolls, Balrogs, etc. This made room for all
sorts of alliances, animosities, truces, non-aggression
pacts, and betrayals.
I've recently read a series of novels, VAMPIRE ACADEMY,
by Richelle Mead, which demonstrates the power of
people groups for enabling a great story.
I'm not a big reader of vampire novels, but my
understanding is that there are two basic people groups
in a vampire novel, the humans and the vampires.
The TWILIGHT series made things more interesting by
adding in a third people group, the werewolves, sworn
enemies of the vampires. The combination of two
powerful and opposing paranormal people groups added a
lot of new directions for the plot.
VAMPIRE ACADEMY has no werewolves, but it uses four
people groups, making the Storyworld even more
interesting. Here's a recap of all four:
* Humans are generally unaware of the existence of
vampires, with a couple of exceptions. "Feeders" are
humans who voluntarily let vampires suck their blood
because they like it -- vampire venom releases powerful
endorphins that give the feeders a high. "Alchemists"
are a small secret society of humans who cooperate with
the vampires to keep their existence a secret from the
rest of humanity.
* Moroi are "good" vampires. They don't want to harm
humans but they do need a daily feeding of human blood
or they get weak. Moroi only drink blood from
cooperative feeders and they don't kill humans.
Moroi are generally tall and slim and beautiful. Moroi
women look like supermodels and Moroi men look like
movie stars. Moroi are not very strong physically and
generally don't do well in athletics.
All Moroi have magical powers, which come in four
different types, Earth, Air, Fire, and Water. There is
a fifth very mysterious and very rare type known as
Spirit which few Moroi know about. As a Moroi matures
into adulthood, he or she becomes adept in one of these
types of magic and can use it at will.
The Moroi are ruled by a King or Queen, chosen from one
of the twelve royal families of Moroi. Many Moroi are
religious, with the most common faith being Russian
Orthodox. However, many Moroi are agnostic or atheist.
They all get along fairly well and religion doesn't
play a major role in the story.
* Dhampirs are "half vampires" -- born from one human
and one Moroi parent. In previous centuries, this sort
of "interbreeding" was allowed, but it's now strongly
frowned on.
However, dhampirs continue to be born to dhampir-Moroi
couples. (You might imagine that this ought to result
in children who are 3/4 vampire, but through an
unexplained quirk of the DNA, these offspring are
genetically the same as any other dhampir.)
Dhampirs have no need to feed on human blood and they
have no fangs. They can much more easily pass for
humans than Moroi can.
Note that "dhampir" is not capitalized but "Moroi" is.
This reflects the fact that dhampirs are second-class
citizens. Dhampirs are unable to produce offspring with
other dhampirs, so they need Moroi in order to continue
their race. Because of this, dhampirs have taken it on
themselves to be the bodyguards for the Moroi.
Dhampirs are well-suited to be bodyguards. They are
very much stronger and faster than either Moroi or
humans, and they are natural fighters. Dhampirs
generally love Moroi and don't find it a burden to
protect them. That's good, because Moroi have a
powerful and deadly enemy . . .
* Strigoi are "evil" vampires. They are not born,
they're made, in one of two ways.
The less common way to become a Strigoi is for a Moroi
to intentionally kill a human while feeding on his
blood. This is so evil that it destroys the Moroi's
soul. However, it also gives him immortality and
extreme physical strength and speed -- much more even
than a dhampir.
Few Moroi would ever choose to become a Strigoi. The
problem is that Strigoi hate the Moroi and want nothing
more than to "awaken" them with a bite that drains all
their blood. This process converts a Moroi (against his
will) into a Strigoi. Of course, this is terribly
unfair, but a lot of things in life are unfair.
The same process can convert a dhampir into a Strigoi,
but dhampirs are much better able to defend themselves
than Moroi are.
Since Strigoi are immensely powerful and fast, they
would quickly convert all the Moroi on the planet into
Strigoi if it weren't for the dhampirs, who are sworn
to protect the Moroi.
What can a dhampir do to fend off a Strigoi? After all,
the Strigoi are immortal. The answer is that Strigoi
can be killed in three very specific ways: by beheading
them, by burning them, and by stabbing them through the
heart with a silver stake.
Traditional vampires can't tolerate the sun. In VAMPIRE
ACADEMY, this changes. Dhampirs are not affected by
sunlight at all. Moroi feel weakened by the sun, but
they can survive sunlight without actually dying.
Sunlight causes massive damage to Strigoi, and so does
any wound inflicted with a silver stake.
Neither dhampirs nor Strigoi are able to do magic. Only
Moroi can do magic, and this could help level the
field. However, Moroi traditionally have thought it
beneath them to use magic to fight. This is now
changing as the Strigoi threat increases. Some Moroi
believe they should learn to defend themselves. Most
Moroi resist this idea.
VAMPIRE ACADEMY is a young-adult novel set at a
training school for young Moroi and dhampirs. The Moroi
are being trained to take their place in Moroi society
(which may include blending in to human society). The
dhampirs are being trained to protect their Moroi
masters from the Strigoi.
All six VAMPIRE ACADEMY novels are set in a single
school year and the summer that follows it.
The heroine of the story is Rose Hathaway, a young
dhampir woman in her final year of school. Rose's best
friend is a Moroi, Princess Lissa Dragomir, the only
remaining survivor in the royal Dragomir family.
Rose wants to be Lissa's guardian when they graduate
from high school, but there's a problem. The two girls
have recently returned to school after running away
from Moroi society and enjoying two years of heady
freedom. Now they're behind, and Rose won't be anyone's
guardian unless she can catch up.
Which means she needs extra tutoring. The tutor
assigned her is a new Russian dhampir named Dimitri
Belikov. He's young and exceptionally strong and quick,
and already has six Strigoi kills to his credit.
Dimitri is a badass guardian, and he takes no guff from
anyone, least of all from twerpy know-it-all Rose.
Rose has a seriously bad attitude, and she wouldn't pay
much attention to Dimitri except that she has to catch
up in order to be assigned as guardian for her bosom
buddy Lissa. And also because Dimitri is inconveniently
hot and Rose has a major crush on him.
That's the Storyworld for VAMPIRE ACADEMY, and it makes
possible a strong set of characters and a complex and
exciting storyline. There's plenty of romance (fair
warning: there's quite a lot of hanky-panky) and plenty
of high-intensity fighting.
There are also numerous secondary characters, with a
full range of high school crushes, boyfriend-girlfriend
drama, petty jealousy, and popularity battles.
I don't want to say either too much or too little about
the story arc of the six-book series, but I'll add
this. Suppose that one of your friends was made a
Strigoi unwillingly. Now that friend has no soul and
has become completely evil. The friend remembers you,
but he or she no longer has any love for you and only
wants to kill you -- or else "awaken" you as a Strigoi.
What should you do? Given the Storyworld I've
described, the moral thing would be to track down that
friend and . . . kill him or her. It would be hard. It
would be horrible. But if you genuinely cared about
that friend, you'd have to do it.
Friends don't leave friends as Strigoi.
Of course, none of this could happen in an ordinary
Storyworld. Adding new people groups to the Storyworld
gives you the chance to creates new complexities in
characters, relationships, and plots.
If you liked the TWILIGHT series, you might like the
VAMPIRE ACADEMY series. If you hated TWILIGHT because
Bella was boring, you might very well love VAMPIRE
ACADEMY because Rose and Lissa are both very live
wires.
In case you want to know more about the VAMPIRE ACADEMY
series, I'm including a link below to the first book in
the series on Amazon. Before you buy anything, PLEASE
read the editorial reviews, paying special note to the
phrases "vulgar language," "steamy sex," and "mature
readers." If those are showstoppers for you, then this
series is not for you.
Standard disclosure: This link includes my Amazon
associates code.
This article is reprinted by permission of the author.
Award-winning novelist Randy Ingermanson, "the
Snowflake Guy," publishes the free monthly Advanced
Fiction Writing E-zine, with more than 32,000 readers.
If you want to learn the craft and marketing of
fiction, AND make your writing more valuable to
editors, AND have FUN doing it, visit
http://www.AdvancedFictionWriting.com.
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