Superfly Weekend Edition (Just a dollar extra!!!!)

[MsFish]

You're behind.  I switched novels and started my word count over.  Whoops.  

[The Jade Knight]

And yet, your word count is still higher than mine.  Sigh.

[Oldie Black Witch]

It looks like we have a superfly night crew online tonight! Go y'all!

Have fun guys. I'm off to bed so I don't fall asleep at work again.

[Chimera]

Oh, I see. Taunt us with your presence and then go to sleep.

Sleep is highly over-rated (says the insomniac who actually would like to sleep).

[stacer]

That was me last night. Bad night, that. Which probably means I should go to bed now, but I want to write. But I can't think of where to take the story at this point.

[Oldie Black Witch]

Oh, I see. Taunt us with your presence and then go to sleep.

Yup.

[Chimera]

What story are you working on, stacer? Are you doing something entirely new or more Black Bull?

[stacer]

Both. I have had some flashbacks lately of high school, certain scenes and themes of life in small-town Illinois that might make an interesting YA. I've been toying with the idea of making Maggie (Black Bull) a contemporary farm girl in contemporary farm country Illinois. This is what's making it so hard, though. Instead of urban fantasy, I'm attempting, I guess, rural fantasy. You don't see too many contemporary farm girls in fantasy today.

But the problem is making the connection between them. I don't want just an alternate-universe story. I want to fit the folklore into the framework of a contemporary story. This should be easy to draw upon Scandinavian and Scottish folklore, because that area I grew up in is all Swedish and German and Scottish. But it's still not quite there in my head.

[Chimera]

That sounds really interesting! At one time I toyed around with some ideas for the story of East of the Sun, West of the Moon in a modern setting (which is a variant tale, as you know), but I never got very far. I think it could be a cool twist if you could pull it off. It might be difficult, though, if you didn't do some sort of alternate-universe. Then would it be more like magical realism--or more like Harry Potter, where the magic is in our world, but hidden?

[The Jade Knight]

What is Magical Realism?

My novel is also Modern Fantasy, and might combine elements of Magical Realism and Harry Potter-style "hidden Fantasy".

[Chimera]

That is one I have always been a little sketchy on. Stacer might have a better definition as she is "in" with the publishing business.

As far as I understand, magical realism is more "literary" in public opinion than fantasy. The book (not necessarily the movie) Big Fish is supposed to be magical realism--magic things just kind of happen and it is not really pointed out or explained. I think EUOL told me that 100 Years of Solitude was magical realism (I haven't read it) in a discussion one time.

Definition online for magical realism:
A chiefly literary style or genre originating in Latin America that combines fantastic or dreamlike elements with realism.

And Wikipedia has a definition too. Oh, and it lists 100 Years of Solitude as an example, so I was right about that.

[stacer]

Chimera has pretty much summed up my understanding of it. Basically, "magical realism" is the way to palatably introduce magic/fantasy to a readership that doesn't get fantasy, who insist upon their books being "real."

[Chimera]

And it is usual marketed in mainstream or literary fiction rather than fantasy, correct?

[stacer]

Usually. In YA it just goes in the YA section.

[MsFish]

So basically, the term "magic realism" was invented by snobs who won't read fantasy, so that they can justify the fantasy that they do read.