I've been tagged

...by Catherine Stine.

Thankfully there's no hits, burns, push-ups or noogies.

What is there instead?

The Tag rules:

You must post the rules.
Answer the questions and then create eleven new questions to ask the people you’ve tagged.
Tag 11 people and link to them.
Let them know you’ve tagged them.


Catherine's Questions:

1. What was your favorite novel you read in 2011?

That's a hard one. I read... 60+ books last year on my Kindle and a ton of *real* books as well. Hmmm. I'm going to choose 'Plain Kate', by Erin Bow or 'the Night Circus', by Erin Morgenstern

2. Your favorite all-time book? (Can be any genre or age level)

Wow, okay, that's even harder. After staring at my bookshelves for 17 minutes, I can't choose one. I'll come back to this. Alright. I shuffled my five favourite books with my eyes closed and picked one. 'The Solitaire Mystery', by Jostein Gaarder is the winner.

3. What book character would you like to party with?

Depends on the kind of party :) I choose the Golux from 'The Thirteen Clocks', by James Thurber. We'd have some wacky times...

4. Do you ever watch TV to study plot format? If so, which show?

Not really. I like watching them for facial expressions, body language, the music/soundtrack, and other strange things. Or simply 'cause a character makes me laugh or I like the sounds of an actor's voice :) I tend to not overanalyze when I'm watching/reading for entertainment, but I think about them later and draw out bits and pieces of useful information.

5. Where was the strangest source you ever got a plot idea from?

A sentence that a drunk girl once spoke at a party. Okay, that isn't strange in itself... but I kinda twisted it into something else and then it exploded into a hurricane of converging ideas.

6. Funniest character in a novel? Why?

The gun in 'Red Robe', by Jon Courtnay Grimwood. 'Cause a talking, sentient gun who swears is damn funny :)

7. Which actor/actress would you want to play the lead in your novel?

Let me get back to you when I figure out if my character is male or female...

Just kidding. Sorry, I really can't answer this question.

Honestly, maybe it's because I grew up in an extremely multi-cultural city, but I don't like how stereo-types come out due to descriptions. I'd rather my characters be imagined as whatever race the reader wants them to be. I may picture a character as Indian or Korean in my head, but I think it's more important to show characters as real people rather than wrapping them in an exterior layer which categorizes them.

But I can say, in all the stories listed on my site that I'm working on... only 3 of the main/secondary characters are clearly 'caucasian', and 2 of those are in Project #1, which has a really large/varied cast. Usually I don't put in much visual description, except when it's important to the plot, like Faith's appearance in Project #2.

So, if I can't even pin down a particular race, there's no way I could possibly decide on a specific 'face'.

8. Most sympathetic fictional villain?

Dracula. I love that through the entire book, no character ever tries to sympathies/reason with him. They simply label him as a monster (which I'm not arguing, he is, and that's awesome), but at the time when Dracula was written, they still judged people from other cultures as monsters and sought to destroy them with the same level of dedicated arrogance. Whenever a story (historic or fictional) is shown from a completely one-sided view... I always get deadly curious about what the other side would say. I've always been a bit of a devils-advocate.

9. Do you prefer fantasy, sci-fi, realistic fiction or a blend. Why?

To read, realistic fiction for sure, often with a touch of oddness thrown in. Magical realism, I think that's what it's called... To write? Probably the same, but more fantastical. I'm not really into magic, but I like strange, unexplainable situations and I love creating cultures/etc. But I like realistic, broken characters.

10. What place and time would most inspire you to write an historical fiction?

I'd love to write a historical fiction about a part of the world where that hasn't ever been done. Like the Philippines, Borneo, Iceland, Madagascar or somewhere. Anywhere non-Western-centric with a heap of their own unique myths/etc.

11. Finish this YA dialog line: “I’ve never told a friend this before, but…”

"...seriously, that dress really makes your ass look fat."

And thanks for this award, too!



So now I have to tag 11 people! ...and I'll pass on the award, too. 

I've never actually done this before, so I ask your forgiveness in advance :)

I'm going to use my amazing powers of deduction (ok, my amazing powers of laziness, hey, this is the weekend) and tag my 11 newest followers who have not already been tagged and who have linked websites on their profiles:

D.M. Seymour

Veronica and Thomas

Aileen Albon
T.Z. Wallace

Adhi Das

Keru

Angie

Erin Michelle
Lydia Kang
SanWrites

Green Monkey

Angie, Lydia Kang & Green Monkey all get bonus points for having dyslexic friendly websites! (no word verification) THANKS! I love you guys for not giving me a migraine when I'm trying to comment on your posts ;)

Now for the questions:

1. What's your favourite letter of the alphabet and why? (you're not limited to the English alphabet)

2. What's the most disgusting/odd combination of food you've ever eaten?

3. Favourite word?

4. If you had to get a tattoo, what would it be and why? If you already have one, use that as your answer.

5. What fictional character is most like you and why? Could be personality or appearance, from a book, movie, graphic novel, whatever.

6. The bitchy blonde female character -> love? hate? overdone? (bonus points for including your favourite blonde joke)

7. Do you usually write characters who are the same gender as you are? Ever tried the opposite?

8. If you could swap places with a character and live in their fictional world/universe for a day, which would you choose?

9. What's your favourite fairy-tale/myth/folk-tale/fable/nursery-rhyme, and would you ever write a re-telling of it?

10. If you could turn your significant other into an animal for one day, what animal would you choose and why?

11. Does Pluto deserve to be re-instated as a planet?


EDIT: If anyone else wants to play/answer the questions, go ahead! Just include the link, or answer directly in the comment section :)