Little Big Magic

The nerd in me loves a good magic system. I often forego writing for days or weeks at a time, just to play with the background ideas-- not just the system, but the fickle rules or even sentience of magic. In so many ways, magic isn't so much an outside force as it is woven into each of us. Whether you're religious or spiritual or atheist, there's something of a universal soul in the concept of magic.

Another magic I'm drawn to in fantasy is the romance of it. This may be due to my bedtime story/Disney princess/fairytale past, but while it includes human romance, it's not quite that isolated. What draws characters and elements, etc. goes beyond just lust or aesthetics, encompassing the curious unknown of the magnetic and chemical forces that link things seemingly polar opposite as well.

Fantasy has seen so many shifts in interests, as a genre. The distinctions all kind of blur, to the chagrin of exclusive fans, but essentially, fantasy encompasses everything with a made-up structure, no matter how much they are based on logic. Women tend to gravitate towards the paranormal/urban romance category, while men tend to go for the sword-swinging epic genre. Yet there are so many subgenres where magic and myth set the stage--the beauty of it is that anyone can set up shop here. I've always loved to balance the emotional aspect with the epic. I'm not normally an emotional or even patient person so there's a bit of compensation for exploring what I'm not.

I explore many magic systems over the UnQuadrilogy. Element-based, soul-based, channeled through wands, innate to a species, even a gem-based one I've termed jeulomancy. Along the way, it becomes a thread that pulls characters together or pushes them away. It becomes an invisible astrology, something irresistible or fought against. You fight the magic subconsciously, but on a conscious level, the struggle to rebel against it can be just as costly. Being ignorant is never the most dangerous aspect. Unacceptance too often beats that.

What makes it into the story often takes an extreme--either magic is significant and life-altering or it's innocent and banal. Some people lose fascination with fire once they realize there's no magic involved. Some of us sit dreamy-eyed by every bonfire, finding magic in every unpredictable lick of light. 

Because of this, I try not to define what magic is, even to my characters. You can see when it's a boon or a bane to them, but there's always that sense that it's a constant ignorance of what it truly means that sometimes keep them from defining it. The longest lived characters always seem to wield it with a sort of resignation and acceptance, but even in relative mastery, the ignorance of all it is remains. They warn the novices not to mistake however easy they make it look as license to disregard its lures, dangers, and volatility. Age, however, is not the deciding factor. Magic is full of its early prodigies and reckless elders.

What makes magic work time and again is how it fits. I'm sure there are plenty of fantasy fans who gobble up just the facts of the system, but the true magic doesn't start until you combine the sentience. If it doesn't have its own thirsty demands, then the motivations of its users and conduits can be the fascinating part.

Even though the movie Maleficent was not as good as I hoped it to be, the concept was one I'm drawn to time and again. No matter how drippingly evil a villain appears, I love the added dimension of their idealistic struggle for balance, the way the world might have twisted them to their role. Even when they seem to be born bad seeds, I like to see where they might have tried to do something good or heroic only to have it explode. I like to sympathize with the villains sometimes. I also like when the hero sometimes does something to rock you off of liking them faithfully. When it comes down to what we actually do in the what-ifs, the choices made often bend our minds as to what tools we stock up, just in case. A hero who has always been able to solve their problems with a sword is likely to fail when a problem comes along that a sword can't fix. Likely but not sure! Some people have the devil's luck when it comes to adapting to new situations. Or maybe handling a sword has a parallel we just didn't see until they do.

Magic, in the sparkly power sense, is not the only thing I'm looking at as a fantasy writer. I'm looking for all the paths it take. How can something that seems all-encompassing make sense in a finite sense? What challenges do the characters really face once we start breaking the limits? Many stories have failed when the magic becomes too big and invincible.

That's why I look at the little big magic. Drawing careful limits, explaining why they could just wave a wand and make it all better. I'm not a huge Lord of the Rings fan but it's hard not to come across the big-ass birds of Gondor dilemma. Why couldn't they just fly to Mordor? It seems like when you have the shortcut right there that it should be glaringly obvious that they just went on a needlessly complex adventure for the sake of filling pages. Even a novice like me could spot some of the glaring issues with that like, oh, say, the big ole Eye of Sauron or the countless winged spies that litter many a fantasy realm. The elves themselves needed some big sticky compartments. Galadriel herself would have been without rival if not for that. It is made clear that the elves with the One Ring would have been the end of everything. Limitations and logic don't need to be fully explained, but there should always be enough of it for the reader to draw some kind of conclusion. That fans can manage to build cases for these vagaries is part of the fun.

I've seen many a popular story picked apart. The teleporting timelines of Westeros is an interesting one too. I don't believe even the original writers consider the depth so much as fans do. Even JK Rowling with her anal hand-written clusterfuck charts. That's a little part of what makes the magic big too. Ive always enjoyed a story that acts as a solid guide. Let the details work along the way. I can honestly say that half of the gripes people have when they nitpick at stories either went unnoticed or just didn't break the story for me. Maybe it's because I'm a writer and I can see where the thought might have evolved amd derailed from the original intention into something better. While I try to be a monster for consistency, I can see where minor points can slip by every edit until someone catches it.

Magic is where you look for it. We're fickle creatures, yes, all of us; each of us chained to moods and circumstances that paint what we are open to at any given time. Our favorite desserts can taste like sawdust following terrible news and we may find magic in something we've overlooked for years until we look at it a certain way.

Books are magic or they're a way to pass the time when there's nothing better to do. This isn't going to be the same for everyone.

So why should I, as a writer, assume I can tell you how to feel about magic or love?