Magna Carta One

As I mentioned in a previous post, here's my Magna Carta I.

Well, just to refresh your memory, Chris Baty talked about two Magna Cartas of noveling in his NaNoWriMo primer <a target="_blank" href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/redirect.html%3FASIN=0811845052%26tag=fantasis… Plot No Problem</a>. The first is all the things I think go into a good novel. (That's what this one is.) And the second is the list of all the things that I think should be definately left out of a good novel. (That's for a future post.)

So, without further ado, here's my Magna Carta I, Elements of "Good" Fiction:
<ul>
<li>Violence. Lots and lots of violence.</li>
<li>Mystery</li>
<li>Exotic locales</li>
<li>Magic, or at least the hint of magic</li>
<li>Religious beliefs</li>
<li>A real villain who has good points (ie. "loves his mother")</li>
<li>A tough "everyman" hero who's good but has bad habits</li>
<li>Surreal interiors (ie. Basement hothouse, warehouse filled with Asian antiques, building facades that hide something super cool)</li>
<li>Smart use of current technology</li>
<li>Slightly futuristic/near future sci-fi stuff</li>
<li>Exotic creatures</li>
<li>Characters who change based on the plot</li>
<li>Characters who LEARN during the course of the book</li>
<li>Something criminal, or potentially criminal</li>
<li>Books, lots of books</li>
<li>Libraries</li>
<li>Big, strange houses filled with rooms of unusual things</li>
<li>Quirky supporting cast</li>
<li>Characters who worry about bills, money and similar every day concerns</li>
<li>Characters who have bodily functions</li>
<li>At least one scene inside a bathroom</li>
<li>Guns</li>
<li>Knives and swords</li>
<li>A monk, or hermit, or wiseman or guru</li>
<li>Characters with strange things in their pockets</li>
<li>Secret organizations</li>
<li>Adventure and daring-do and, maybe, even a bit of swashbuckling</li>
<li>Memorable images</li>
<li>Cinematic moments: action and description</li>
<li>Humor from what the characters say, not bad writing (ie. Humor from the characters being funny with each other.)</li>
</ul>
Up next... My Magna Carta II, Elements of "Bad" Fiction.
(And, sadly, I had computer trouble last night on my main system, so I have sincere doubts that I'll be able to make up my 12000 word deficit at this point. Still, I keep working at it. Hope springs eternal!  And, yes, this also appeared on my other blog: <a target="_blank" href="http://www.ryumaou.com/hoffman/netgeek/">Diary of a Network Geek</a>.)