When I thought about writing this series of articles, I asked myself, "What should I talk about?" I had a million things to write about concerning how to become a TF writer, and then how to become a better TF writer. Many things to talk about, such as the need to surf the Web for TF stories with plots that have already been taken, should you by coincidence write that story. There's the need to clarify that just because RUCT is around doesn't mean that werewolf or weretiger stories are not popular anymore (and of course the need to also clarify that when you're not wasting your efforts on transforming people into crustaceans just because writing about transforming people into crustaceans is difficult, your efforts are focused on what's more important: the storyline itself). Finally, I considered writing about how TF writing fits into the TF community, and how writers should best enter themselves into that community.
But I want to start with a concept that's very basic yet very fundamental. It is something that every aspiring TF writer, and every TF active writer that hasn't in specific detail, should learn.
How to write a TF story.
You're thinking, "Gosh, I already have the motivation, the imagination, and not to mention the compelling urge to turn people into animals, what else is there?"
When I was starting out, I thought that these three were all I needed to write a story. What I got was "Skye's Change." Hey, I still like the story, but the ending of it has left me little to spin-off. That's why you haven't seen any other stories centering around my first werewolf.
But enough about me, let's talk about you. Yes, you need motivation and imagination. Without them you shouldn't be writing. Beyond that, what you really need, corny as it sounds, is a plan. You have to do a few things before you begin to write the real substance of the story.
First off, you need to decide what you are going to write about. You can't just open up WordPad and write whatever you think up off the top of your head without any idea beforehand and expect to come out with a story. "What is my story about?" you must ask yourself. Let's say, for the purposes of this article, you want to write about a werelion. "What about this werelion?" you then ask. You think about it for a minute and decide that this is a story about a woman who ventures along the lower regions of the mountains for a hiking trip and meets this werelion.
What then happens in this situation? Most stories have a sort of conflict or problem that the characters within the story must either endure or resolve. Most stories without such a problem is more like a scenario. Like a sentence fragment that bears little effect on anything. A story needs a conflict because one or more characters within the story have to undergo some sort of change or become the bearer of a certain consequence. In fewer words, a storyline and its characters have to evolve into one form or another by the end of the story, or else the story stagnates. A story is meaningless if one or more of the characters within the story don't change, or "grow," and you need a specific problem for these characters to face in order to grow. In this particular story, then, the problem is that, every night a panther prowls in search of food the mountain area where the woman is traveling.
This is an example of the thinking of a TF writer. This is what he or she may go through at the start of writing a story.
Now, back to the werelion story. Once you figured out the general idea of the story, it's time for you to write an opening. Anywhere between a few sentences to a pair of paragraphs will make for an opening. Assume that you will be writing this story from the woman's perspective. She is in some mountainous region where the said shapeshifter resides. In the opening, you will present the woman and her setting. The opening can go something like this:
"Fresh air, good exercise, great big scenery. Claire loved the outdoors, and she especially loved hiking. She had never traveled this far upstate to go hiking, and the mountains seemed as adventurous as they get. No distractions, no worries, no troubles. After pushing paper and filing reports for three whole weeks without rest at her job in the city, Claire needed this vacation in the worst way."
The way I wrote it (or the way you wrote it for the purpose of this lesson), the opening is written so that the story defines the character. Who goes to the mountains? Obviously no one but the adventurous type. Obviously no one except those who love the outdoors. So, it makes sense that Claire is such a character. In certain stories, characters develops the plot, while in stories like this it is vice versa. But that's another article for now.
Next you will write an ending. That's right, a closing paragraph or two. This is so that, when you have a clearly written ending, you know which direction to take from your opening. Without an ending to guide you while you're writing, you may end up with a story that has a less than satisfactory conclusion. Here, you will have a basic idea of what is going to happen in the story that is going to lead to the written conclusion. I'll explain this further in a bit, but for now you write an ending that looks like this:
"The rain outside continued to fall. Claire rested Leo's head on her lap as she leaned against the cave wall. Her heart still beating quickly from all the action, she breathed a sigh of relief, relief that the panther had been killed. She wiped a spot of blood off Leo's cheek and tried to gently pet him to sleep as if he were a mere child. With the fire dying down, all she could do was get some sleep. She inched up along the wall some more while hoping not to disturb her lover."
Now, what possible direction could you take using this ending as a guide? Let's take one and guide you along the prospective storyline. First and most obviously, we see Claire venturing in the mountains. Maybe she loses her footing and plummets a good distance down to the rock beneath her, breaking her leg but not killing her (if the main character dies in the first page or so then there's a problem, I would say).
A couple of miles from the nearest semblance of civilization, Claire has to limp all the way to a nearby cave, hopefully a more comforting place to treat her wound. There, she finds Leo, who actually lives inside the cave. He gives her food and tends to her broken leg. She'll survive, but she'll have to wait a couple of days before she even thinks about moving small distances.
So she stays where she is for quite a bit of time while Leo takes care of her. They exchange stories and get to know each other, establishing a bond. He also explains that it is dangerous to wander outside at night, for wild animals walk about the mountains in search of prey. The thing is Claire notices that Leo is nowhere to be seen whenever the sun sets. On the fourth day of her recovery, Claire demands to know what happens to him at night. At her request, Leo stays at her side when the sun sets and, sure enough, he transforms into a half-human, half-lion creature. Leo tells her his story about how he became a werelion (that you will have to explain in detail).
To make this summary short, the panther strikes, Leo defends Claire, they eventually fall in love, Leo passes his curse on to her, panther strikes again, Leo is badly wounded by the attack, Claire then uses her newfound strength to destroy the beast. Finally, in the written conclusion, Claire returns Leo's kindness by taking care of him and his injuries.
And THAT is why you wrote an ending before you wrote the middle of the story.
Writing an opening first, ending second, and the middle last is sage advice for all writers, TF or otherwise. By doing so, you are able to follow a set path as opposed to writing without any direction and just whatever makes sense.
Now, as you are writing the middle leg of your TF story, you're going to write at least one transformation scene. In this case, you will at least write about Leo first transforming into a werelion. First, before you do anything to write this particular scene, you had better know in detail what a lion looks like. So research it a bit more just in case. Looking up Compton's Encyclopedia, a rreal lion (male) can measure up to ten feet from head to tail. He stands about three feet from shoulder to paw. His fur is a yellow-brown color, and he has a coarse mane on his head, neck, and shoulders. Of course, in the storyline set, Claire will become a werelion herself, so a female lion doesn't have a mane and is short a foot on the male. Leo (and later, Claire) is a werecreature who assumes a form that resembles a cross between a human being and an animal, so it is your job to visualize the changes between a human and a werelion.
Ask yourself some questions. What happens in this scene? What is the first change that Claire (and the reader) notices? Then what is happening to Leo's form? Is he wearing clothing, and if he isn't, what becomes of his clothes during the transformation? How is Leo responding to his own transformation (i.e. Is he writhing in pain on the floor or is he painlessly standing still as his body changes shape, or is it something in between?)? And how does Claire react to all this?
What your answers to these questions are becomes important parts of the transformation scene, which looks like this:
"Outside, the last bit of sunlight dipped below the horizon, leaving the torch on the cave wall alone the only light to illuminate the cave. Leo waited patiently at Claire's side, and remained there for to her to watch.
"Leo clenched his fists as Claire watched from her view on the cave floor. To her surprise, he grew a foot in height as the hairs on his chest began to lengthen. He undid his pants and threw them to the side, revealing legs that had the same thickening yellow hair on his chest that began to spread to his shoulders and arms. His muscles bulged and his body continued to grow in mass, stretching and tearing his underwear which remained to cover his groin.
"Claire was in complete shock, but as she was unable to move she could do nothing but watch. He opened his mouth to moan in pain, revealing sharp teeth that reflected the light of the torch. His eyes developed a yellow tint before Leo shut them as he experienced increasing pain. She looked between his legs and saw a tail grow from his body.
"His feet grew longer and developed claws, claws which resembled the ones on his fingertips. By now, hair--fur, thick, beautiful fur had completely covered his skin. The hairs along his face tangled themselves to form a wavy mane. Leo hunched over Claire, who shrieked in fear. He was still changing, and she could still hear his fur sliding out from under his skin. Leo grew so large that the strap of his underwear finally broke, leaving not an inch of clothing on his body. In its place was a thick coat of fur from head to toe.
"When it was over, Leo raised his arms to the ceiling, leaned back, and let out a great roar that echoed throughout the cave and into Claire's ears."
Now, wasn't that fun? The way the storyline is set, you will write a few transformation scenes before the story's over, but this first one is typically the longest. Every TF scene hereafter is shorter than the first; by this point in the story, the reader knows what a werelion transformation looks like and doesn't need to waste reading another three or four more paragraphs to find out what it is a second time. Basically "as the sun set yet again, Leo took the shape of a lion once again" will suffice, but you might want to put in two or three more sentences for substance. Nonetheless, this later transformation is considerably described in less words than the first TF.
One exception, though, is a scene of a different transformation, in this case Claire's transformation. Again, a male lion looks considerably different than a female lion, but even for Claire's change it can be written in less words than the first TF, which is Leo's transformation. "She didn't grow the mane that her lover possessed, but her yellow fur was as thick and beautiful as Leo's" is just as descriptive after the first TF scene.
Out of the list of the fundamentals of TF writing, the last basic is simple. After the transformation, then what? In TF stories, unless the character is wearing a fursuit, the character who transforms physically must also transform mentally, or else it is a cheat (meaning it would be odd for someone to turn into an animal or half-animal and retain ALL of his or her mental faculties). An increasing appetite, animal cunning and instinct, or dislike of humans - hey, perfume not in moderation can get pretty repugnant - is a change not involving one's physical makeup. Even if you have only one of these mental traits in the transformed character, it's much better than someone who turns into a half-animal just because it's a good costume for a Halloween party.
The mental state of a transformed character is very important. It is part of a character's personality, and what the character does and thinks all the time that he or she is this animal can potentially affect a character in great detail. Say a werecreature, who is fully aware of what is going on, is unable to control his savage hunger, and in turn kills and devours an innocent human being. Obviously it will have serious consequences for the character, who during the time he was that animal enjoyed something he would have repulsed during his time as a human being.
In this particular story, you could say that, after Claire was given the curse to shapeshift into a werelion, and after her killing the panther, she had come a long way from that paper-pusher from the city. This is the kind of the growth that was discussed earlier in the story. Again, if a character does not change, the story is meaningless.
This is the basic lesson of TF writing. Now, obviously, if you're a new TF writer, you will start writing stories simpler than this, to say nothing of stories that are much shorter than the storyline above suggests. But if you want to get to Carnegie Hall (so to speak), you have to practice. I'll leave you with that for now. Class dismissed. :)