Poem: "Moral Traditions"

>> Not to mention, being a horror story, neither character survives.<<

There are so many stories in which the lesbian character(s) dies, it is much detested by lesbian readers. Also, backforming characters from one culture or trait to another is much more difficult than writing them that way from scratch.

Writing is a learning process. The more you do, the better you get. When you know the rules, you can work with them or think about how to bend or break them and still have a good story.

>> Perhaps my relative success with poetry spoiled me. I seem to have much less trouble finding homes for my poems.<<

Same here. I still write fiction, but I put more energy into poetry these days. I know that my fiction is good; I know how to identify good fiction. But it doesn't sell nearly as well as my poetry, especially counting my crowdfunded poetry. That's one reason I keep poking around with crowdfunded fiction, trying to find a version that will work for me and allow me to tap into my large audience. People like it when they read it; there's just a bottleneck problem.

>> My major problem is that the stories I really want to write don't necessarily follow the current rules of writing for publication (like, for instance, my wizardly story daring to have a wizard use his wizardly powers to deal with the problems he faces in the story).<<

I've had that problem too. I deal with it by watching for markets that specialize in unusual types of fiction. So for instance, The Lorelei Signal focuses on strong female characters; I've placed several stories there, including some pretty far-out ones like "The Political Courtesan Strikes Back." I've found the adjustable search engines like Duotrope's Digest to be indispensable for this.

>>I'm finding there is more freedom of expression in visual art than there seems to be in fiction writing.<<

That may be true, although art also has rules and people can be just as snotty about those.

>> All I ever hear in the writing realm is "you have to do this" or "you cannot do that" (the whole "adverbs are evil" mantra is a good example ). I find it very frustrating, and a bit discouraging.<<

As a writer, I always found that aggravating. As an editor, my rule is that you can have all the adverbs you can handle competently. I don't believe in throwing out one of the eight parts of speech just because some people misuse it. One time at a convention, a particularly annoying editor on a panel started a diatribe about how adverbs should be banned from fiction, and when it got time for audience opinions, I voiced mine as "Lolly, Lolly, Lolly, get your adverbs here!"

I was somewhat surprised when a large portion of the audience joined in. The whole panel sort of sat back with stunned faces. I don't think it had occurred to them that plenty of readers like adverbs.

>> So, is the idea that poetry is a harder sell than prose coming from people that can't write poetry? <<

No, the market really does suck for poetry. There are more fiction markets than poetry markets. Fiction gets more respect than poetry. Current teaching of poetry, when done at all, is usually bad and encourages bad poetry.

In order to succeed, you have to be able to write good poetry, where "good" means "stuff that people enjoy reading enough to give you money for" rather than "stuff that will impress academics with its opacity." Then you have to find markets for it so that people can actually see it. I suspect that more poets succeed by thinking outside the box than in it.

One thing to consider is how much practice you've had with each form. I started hardcore practice on poetry in junior high. I wrote a fair amount of fiction but didn't start producing serious volume until high school or college. So I know perfectly well that my fiction skills are behind my poetry skills, although the fiction is well into the professional range by now. One reason I do a lot of Torn World stories, despite the very low pay, is for sheer mass-practice.

>>Don't get me wrong, I appreciate your honesty. Now knowing that stories where the lesbian characters die are detested by lesbian readers stops me from making what could have been a dreadful mistake. Of course, it also takes away that added bit of motivation I thought the change would add to the piece.<<

Well, to understand what the "Dead Lesbian" cliche means for a writer you need to know the context. That is, lots of stories have one lesbian and wind up killing her off. Most people who aren't lesbians haven't identified this as a pattern which makes it an easy mistake to make. But when the only people like you in a story always seem to wind up dead, that gets maddening after a while.

So then a writer, knowing this trend, can work with it or around it. Does this character, who has to die, have to be a lesbian? If no, use some other orientation or just don't mention who they sleep with. Does this character, who has to be a lesbian, have to die? If no, have someone else open the monster door. If there is a lesbian character who has to die for compelling plot reasons, is she the only lesbian in the story? If yes, try adding another lesbian who will survive to the end. Knowing about the boobytrap, and why it's a boobytrap, can help avoid it without mangling a story. Identify what your tension attaches to and try to figure a way around the trap.

Conversely if you're interested in the idea of the Dead Lesbian as a motif, then you might explore it in fiction. Why does the lesbian always die? Is there a glitch in the flow of fate? A curse? A deity who has it in for dykes? Karma crush deaths caused by bigots reincarnating as lesbians who die horribly? Those all lead to different places, and they all make some kind of meta-comment on the trope.

>> I'm starting to think it isn't worth the effort. My time might be better spent drawing. There are only so many hours in a day and days in a week, and if my prose fiction is going nowhere, then maybe I shouldn't waste much time on it. <<

Now that's a decision that only you can make. I certainly do some of my steering based on what is popular or profitable -- I'll do more of things that sell well and generate buzz.

The tension concept there isn't bad. *ponder* Might it work if you set the story in context of a lesbian community? If it's not an everybody-dies kind of horror story, the presence of other lesbian characters would provide a buffer. But if you've only got two characters and they both die, yeah, they should be something other than lesbians (or any minority, really, tokendeath being a widespread trope).