Managing monsters/bestiary

[Unmentionable]

As I begin to delve into the world of science fiction and fantasy writing, one of the my biggest motivators is to create monsters; grotesque beings like things created by Lovecraft, or the famous xenomorph, or the myriad creatures found in video games like the Resident Evil series. It seems like new ideas come to me daily.

That being said, there are some questions that have popped up into my mind. Some times I come up with an absolutely phenomenal creature but am torn over where it should go. Should I put it into the pseudo-fantasy Lovecraftian dytopia or the (slightly) more realistic sci-fi setting? I don't want too much repetition but often times I come up with beings that I would love to see in multiple universes, but I don't want to see them lose their uniqueness. Which pantheon should a particular god be placed into? Will readers react badly to two different creatures have striking similarities yet being completely unrelated to each other? Is it possible to go overboard with genetic family trees? Sorry if these seem like stupid questions, they've just been running through my head the last couple of days.

 

[psychotick]

Hi,

I can't really answer your questions I'm afraid - except of course to say that sticking to certain pantheons is useful. For example I just wrote The Godlost Land and based it on ancient Greek mythology. That meant I could have some monsters like gorgons etc, but couldn't have others. Because I particularly wanted to have unicorns and griffins, I had to alter the story a little to accomodate two different pantheons. I actually needed a land where ancient Greek mythology could sit side by side with Norse and Saxon etc.

But I share your love of creating monsters. Every book I write I really want to write a companion book for it - a beastiary. Unfortunately I can't draw a straight line with a ruler so it's never going to happen.

Cheers, Greg.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Firstly, welcome to chronicles.

As for your questions - honestly, the more you write your story, the more such questions will be answered. We can't tell you how to objectively set your criteria, because as you write certain details will become more relevant or irrelevant. Completing the first draft gives you the first crucible by which you can better answer any and all such questions.

 

[Unmentionable]

Thanks for the advice. I do agree that things do start to fall into place once you start writing, it's just that the flood of ideas coming into my head can be so overwhelming that it's hard to organize them. Also, like I said before, I want to avoid repetition in different stories so that they each remain unique.

 

[K.S. Crooks]

Don't worry about repetition until you are well published. Use your creatures, beings and monsters whenever and wherever you think you want them in your stories. As you go through a story you may find that a creature needs to change or be replaced to better fit the plot. Write the stories you think you will like the best and use creatures. You may not know which story a creature works best in until a few are written. You can always reuse or alter anything until the book is in print.

 

[Dan Jones]

Welcome to Chrons, @Unmentionable !

As long as your monsters are consistent with your world, and conceivably make sense with the plot, that's a good starting point.
I wouldn't worry too much about the biomechanics and chemical makeup of your monsters if your main plot hasn't been fleshed out yet.

What I would say is - if you're not writing a comedy - don't try and fuse two distinct 'genre' types of monster. For example, having 'monsters' and zombies in the same plot. Or dinosaurs and little green men. For some reason that will seem a bit beyond the pail for most readers (excepting, as I say, comedies that subvert genre). There are a few exceptions, and even fewer ones that are any good, but it's a pretty good rule to start with.

Remember that line from Ash in the original Alien: "I think it's safe to assume it's not a zombie..."

But first and foremost; get your characters and plot sorted

 

[Toby Frost]

But robots and aliens, that's a different matter... I've never realised how ironic that line is before.

I agree with everyone saying "story first". In fact, I'd say that about almost everything that isn't directly related to writing the book. There's a great temptation to approach SFF as if writing a travel guide or the background section of a role-playing game, but at the end of the day much of the information that would be in a book like that won't make its way into the actual story (although it's handy for the author to know).

 

[Dan Jones]

But robots and aliens, that's a different matter... I've never realised how ironic that line is before.

Well indeed! I wonder if it was in as a joke, like the fried eggs thing, or was unintentional?

 

[Toby Frost]

The more I see Alien (and it's been a few times) the better Ian Holm's performance seems. When you look at the slapstick villains in a lot of films - Hannibal Lecter springs to mind - Ash is really subtle. And robots make great monsters.

 

[Avid Scifi Fan]

It may be harder to work a plot around one of your creations, but not impossible.

Just as certain settings would limit your available creatures like ancient greek, nord, african, asian, etc. your creatures may be better suited for certain settings or plots. For example:

Say you had a hive like insect that you wanted to work with. This might limit your plots to army invasion type scenarios as the hive grows.

likewise, is your creature a "monster" or an "alien/animal". To me this means a "monster" would be more unrestricted and could be any creature of fantasy, physics and biomechanics need not apply. Where as I would expect an alien/animal to follow some basic rules of biomechanics and physics, which means it would come from somewhere else (intelligent or not) and there may be others (not a one off a kind type of creature).

Just my thoughts, hope it helps.

 

[Dan Jones]

The more I see Alien (and it's been a few times) the better Ian Holm's performance seems. When you look at the slapstick villains in a lot of films - Hannibal Lecter springs to mind - Ash is really subtle. And robots make great monsters.

The acting in the first film is top notch (like your good self, I've seen it uncountable times). Every one of those guys gives a throughly believable performance, and in ensemble they work even better. Re: Ash, his character would definitely have been a clanger if Ian Holm had hammed it right up. Perhaps credit to Scott for that too (although his other films do tend to have hammy - if occasionally brilliant - villains).

Back to the thread... Alien is therefore one of those stories that worked in two very different types of antagonistic (just focusing on the first film) monsters very effectively. So... @Unmentionable ... maybe that's a film worth studying to find out why, if that's the road you want to take.

 

[Unmentionable]

I greatly appreciate all of the advice. On the comment of keeping monsters within a universe thematically similar, one of the stories that I'm crafting literally does have nearly every monster under the sun and is very much like Underworld fused with H.P. Lovecraft fused with the Alien series (I love the black 'purity' that xenomorphs exude, and some of the earliest concepts for the creatures were genuinely awe inspiring) fused with Star Wars. Now that is speaking very broadly, but it is going to be a wild, extreme multiverse (currently, I writing a story where five alien sorcerers are about to declare war on each other at an assembly on a purple planet with no visible atmosphere that's been split in two by means of the irresponsible use of arcane magic). Another one that I am making is more straight sci-fi and another is more epic fantasy but even those are pretty weird.

 

[Dan Jones]

Well, good luck with that! We'll be looking forward to seeing them

 

[Phyrebrat]

Do your monsters exist for their own sake? What are their motivations? Is it braaiiiiinnns or domination? Blood or one-of-us-one-of-us-ness? Are you interested in creating a story or a simple mythology behind each story? Once you know how they sit in their own landscape you'll be far more qualified to answer your own question .

I identified recently that my monsters ended up being metaphors for something else; remember how Romero's zombies were a symbol of commercial consumerism. Do any of your creations have such a bias? It's not necessarily imperative they do, btw, but I find it easy to categorise and write mine as they all have their own goals rather than being a malevolent obstruction to the MCs goals like a Boss in a video game.

They may not, but if they do, it might help.

pH

 

[Unmentionable]

Do your monsters exist for their own sake? What are their motivations? Is it braaiiiiinnns or domination? Blood or one-of-us-one-of-us-ness? Are you interested in creating a story or a simple mythology behind each story? Once you know how they sit in their own landscape you'll be far more qualified to answer your own question .

I identified recently that my monsters ended up being metaphors for something else; remember how Romero's zombies were a symbol of commercial consumerism. Do any of your creations have such a bias? It's not necessarily imperative they do, btw, but I find it easy to categorise and write mine as they all have their own goals rather than being a malevolent obstruction to the MCs goals like a Boss in a video game.

They may not, but if they do, it might help.

pH

Since they're so diverse, it's hard to pin them down to one or two motivations. The alien sorcerers that I am talking about care pretty much only about accruing as much power as they can, and extending their dominance across Earth. I'm going to have them conducting slow-moving warfare across several time periods and dimensions against each other, with very little direct conflict between them. There are slave creatures as well, at least one interstellar empire, and a group of vampire covens with widely varying ambitions. And this is only one universe that I am creating.

As for the symbolism, there will be some metaphors for past and present political events, but I don't want things to be too heavy handed. I am writing a back story for one of the sorcerers right now, and though his current trajectory is heavily based around simply gaining as much power as possible, I might put in other motivations as well. One theme that I am exploring is that of experiential knowledge, and how gaining too much knowledge too quickly, or the wrong knowledge altogether, can have terrible consequences. Some beings don't care about the consequences while others will very much regret their delving into arcana.