Guest Post from Halsted M. Bernard: Critiques, Counts, and Quests: Motivational Tools for Writers

Hello. I love, read, and write fantasy fiction. Oh, and I’m a vegan.

When I sell my fantasy novels at Comic Cons, I’ll usually sneak a little reference onto the bottom of my table white board, such as Vegan, or Vegan-friendly. In my mind, this covert signal will draw vegans to my table, whispering, “I am one too. Tell me, sister, about your fiction.” Like that first moment of connection in a dystopian novel. This doesn’t happen. Instead, people skip all the other great things on the board, point right to vegan, loudly state, “Look, it says veggan!” and then laugh. This hasn’t dissuaded me from the attempt. About half of those times, someone will ask, “Vegan-friendly fantasy fiction? What’s that?” They laugh. Then when I start to answer, they leave. Even more often, they point and laugh, then turn away.

In my mind, whenever someone asks what could be vegan about fantasy, it proves to me that they’ve never been a vegan reading fantasy. In addition to a lot of the violence and war in the genre (it’s usually a central component, even outside of grimdark), the best scenes feature someone riding their steed in a fine leather vest to grab a hock of ham. I’m not even sure I know what hocks are, but I have concluded they are key to the development of fantasy heroes. So, you know, my fiction is just focused a bit differently. In fact, I think that diversity and exploration is what fantasy is all about.

I’m not here to get into all of that, though. I’m here to talk about one of Cat’s and my favorite subjects: yummy food. Now, I’m not an authority on gourmet cuisine. Go to a vegan restaurant or check out many amazing online vegan chefs for that. (I’m particularly fond of Richa Hingle.) Hey, I’m not even a great cook. But I haven’t eaten meat in almost a quarter century, so I can definitely speak to “what we eat.” Don’t worry. This is just a quick blog to spark some ideas. But if you don’t mind eating plants, here are five simple foods you could give a spin.

This is a vegan staple, and yet so many people have never even heard of it. First, where to procure?

Any health food store should sell it in bulk, but even a standard grocery store should have a little plastic can of it. It’s rich in B vitamins and is often described with a nutty or cheesy taste. (It’s really a “yeasty” taste but no one wants to say that for obvious reasons.) Online vegans often say to sprinkle it on popcorn, but I find it a little dusty that way. Bloggers always show it on avocado toast, but the avocado doesn’t need it. I use it as a savory seasoning: in soups, in pasta, or even to make a quick vegan mac & cheese. Just get a bag and throw it on or in stuff. It’s good.

I do love a good tofu (I am so serious about tofu), and especially love when I can find local or handmade tofu. But there’s another common plant protein which with you may not be familiar. Seitan is essentially seasoned wheat gluten (or “wheat sausage” if you will), so it’s no good if you avoid gluten or eat gluten-free. Savory and rich, I really think you can’t beat a good homemade seitan. (Despite having more than one young hipster brag to me how much they love “eating Satan.”)

There are all kinds of searchable recipes, and I’d recommend using ones that incorporate lots of rich broth””and beer. (You don’t need the beer; it’s just got a flavor that works really well in seitan.) And if you don’t want to try making it, buy a good brand like Upton’s. It won’t be as juicy from the box, but still hearty and delicious.

I guess I should clarify that I’m a real-deal vegan. Without getting into it, that means I follow a belief system (an ethic) that also influences my diet. Not just a diet. This sometimes creates clashes with various plant-based diets that focus on health or shirk away from processed or commercial products.

No one should eat all packaged products. But if I had to, it might be the Gardein filets! Very likely in your grocer’s freezer too. It’s easy. Bake a couple of filets or tenders, cook a fresh tortilla (I buy ones without lard or non-vegan dough conditioners), and make a wrap with a few greens, some hot sauce, and a swipe of vegan cream cheese or mayo. I’m thinking about it now. Sigh.

“But I’ve had cashews,” you say. “That’s just nuts.” But vegans use them as an easy source of cream or milk. You do really need a high-quality blender (e.g. Vitamix) to make this work, but if you have one, it’s very simple. It’s recommended to soak the cashews first (we soak a bunch then freeze them), but not required. You can make a quick milk just by blending cashews, water, and your preferred sweetener (or not). I use this for delicious fresh lattes, with a touch of maple syrup.

My favorite use is a quick red sauce (e.g. vodka or masala) by blending a handful of cashews, a can of tomatoes (with green chilies, even better) along with whatever vodka or spices you want. That can be poured over pasta, or used to simmer peas and tofu, or to dip that Gardein you bought, or for whatever!

5. Just grab a plant

No, seriously, I’m not trying to get out of a fifth item here, but once you think more about plants, you’ll remember something you haven’t had for a while. I mean, I can’t just name all the plants. What do I eat? Sometimes a quick stir-fry. Other times a sandwich or freshly mashed guacamole. I can make soup dozens of different ways, all delicious and inexpensive. Stock spices. Stock your favorite grains. Simmer veggies in a rich sauce. Add fennel to pasta. Slice okra. Char corn. Glaze Brussels’ sprouts. Make a slaw. Throw in herbs. Or chop hot peppers. Bake potatoes. Add some Miyoko’s cheese or butter.

I could just go on and on, because quick staples I make for lunch are flashing in front of my eyes. Veggies are great! And maybe, like my fantasy heroes, you’ll be inspired to try one this week. If you do, tag me! I’d love to see what you make.

I hope that was fun””and maybe gave you some ideas for your next meal. I know I’m hungry, and since it’s five o’clock here, I’m off to break into that vegan wine. Want to connect? You can find me and my links at edebell.com. And you can check out my upcoming epic fantasy saga Diamondsong there too!

Author: E.D.E. Bell was born in the year of the fire dragon during a Cleveland blizzard. With an MSE in Electrical Engineering from the University of Michigan, three wonderful children, and nearly two decades in Northern Virginia and Southwest Ohio developing technical intelligence strategy, she now applies her magic to the creation of genre-bending fantasy fiction in Ferndale, Michigan, where she is proud to be part of the Detroit arts community. A passionate vegan and enthusiastic denier of gender rules, she feels strongly about issues related to human equality and animal compassion. She is the author of the Shkode trilogy and the editor of the new anthology, As Told by Things. Her latest book Escape (Diamondsong Book 1) is available for preorder now! You can follow her adventures and social media at edebell.com.

Enjoy this sample of Cat’s writing and want more of it on a weekly basis, along with insights into process, recipes, photos of Taco Cat, chances to ask Cat (or Taco) questions, discounts on and news of new classes, and more? Support her on Patreon.

this writing advice and want more content like it? Check out the classes Cat gives via the Rambo Academy for Wayward Writers, which offers both on-demand and live online writing classes for fantasy and science fiction writers from Cat and other authors, including Ann Leckie, Seanan McGuire, Fran Wilde and other talents! All classes include three free slots.

Note from Cat: I copy-edited Alanna’s recent novel, The Traveling Triple-C Incorporeal Circus and was pleased to do so because I think it’s one of the outstanding fantasy books of 2019. It is gentle fantasy, an on-the-road feminist version of Peter Beagle’s A Fine and Private Place. I highly recommend this book, particularly to people who love literary fantasy. If you enjoy her essay, please check the book out!

I still remember the moment I learned what fanfiction was.

I was in seventh grade and deep deep deep in an obsession with the Harry Potter novels. I was speaking to a ninth grade girl in the same school play as me and she mentioned that she loved Harry Potter as well, and all the extra stories she had found.

Extra stories? Had JK Rowling written something about Harry Potter that I hadn’t gotten my hands on yet? Where could I find these stories? This girl corrected me: no, these were written by other people, but they were about all sorts of things not in the books. People were writing these stories and all I had to do was look for them and I would have no end of Harry Potter, long before the next book came out. This revelation rocked my world. Who else knew about this concept? What was out there for me?

Through middle and high school I set about reading as much fanfic as I could get my hands on. I wrote a great deal of my own, testing out ideas just for the thrill of making a mark on stories I loved, but didn’t have the courage to share it online until I was in college. That became yet another revelation, a world that I could now access as an active participant. It was some of the best concentrated writing practice I have ever gotten, and best of all, there was an eager audience ready to read and support what I had put out there. I know for a fact that a lot of that practice paid off in my professional life.

Sometime around 2013, I got invested in a few audio dramas, particularly the fitness app Zombies! Run, which used audio clips to tell a zombie apocalypse story in the second person, with “you” as one of the survivors who had to run to escape danger. I fell in love with many of the characters and set about writing as much fanfic as I could, but found myself with a unique challenge. The only way I and the rest of the audience had ever interacted with these characters was through their voices. No visuals, no narrative prose to set the scene, no facial expressions to analyze, we only had a few sound effects and the dialogue. So if I wanted the readers of my fic to know when the snarky Canadian radio host was speaking, as opposed to his sappy British partner, I had to make sure their dialogue “sounded” as close to the dialogue of the show as possible.

Once I started focusing in on dialogue, this became a personal challenge for me, beyond what fanfiction already was. Could I write a fic with only dialogue and make it clear who was speaking when? How about a scene with more than two people? If I read this dialogue out loud, could I imagine the character’s voice actor saying it, or would it sound strange in their mouths? What sorts of words and verbal tics did these characters use that I could employ to indicate when they were speaking? The harder I worked at getting these voices down, the more positive responses I got from my new friends in the fandom and the harder I tried. (And in a fortuitous story of the modern age, I became friends with another fanfic writer for Zombies! Run who, six years later, is now my fiancee.)

When it came to writing my debut novel, The Traveling Triple-C Incorporeal Circus, I took those lessons and utilized them as well as I could. A large portion of my novel concerns the three main characters (two ghosts and a mime) embarking on a road trip and talking with one another along the way. Giving Chelsea, Carmen and Cyndricka distinct voices became a vital part of my writing process, and thankfully my work has been worthwhile, with reviews pointing out the distinct voices as a strong point of my book. Spending so much time working with voices that other writers had laid out for me helped me to find unique voices of my own, and I could not be happier about that.

Which is not to say that everything that works in fanfic works in a novel.

One of my biggest struggles was getting back into the habit of writing exposition. In fanfic, you can always assume that the reader knows the world, setting and background of the story you’re working within. More than once when writing Triple-C, I had to remind myself that all of the rules of the ghostly world were not already common knowledge, that I had to set the stage and articulate whatever the reader needed to know in order to enjoy the story. Sure, if I was writing an alternate universe story in fanfic, I would need to sketch out the world more, but in my writing in the “canon-verse”, I had gotten lazy about exposition. At least a few of my early editors were confused why the ghosts could not get into a car for the road trip and save everyone some time. (The answer to that, incidentally, is that the physical car would move through the ghosts’ incorporeal bodies, leaving them behind.)

Without the thriving fanfiction community that I was part of, I think my novel would look (and sound) very different from how it does today. And I know for certain that my life would look different without the people I met through my fandom days. I have not been very active in writing fanfiction for a while, but every now and then I dip my toes back in to stretch out some old writing muscles and remind myself what I love about it. Writing fanfiction is not a lower or lesser way of writing than original work; they can feed into each other and overlap, each with its own strengths and weaknesses.

And beyond all of that, no matter if you ever make a cent off of it or not, writing fanfic is fun. Because really, what’s better than writing an angsty canon divergence fic or a fluffy Tattoo Artist/Florist AU? Nothing.

About the author: Alanna McFall is a novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. Originally from Minnesota, she lived in a number of places on either coast before landing in the Bay Area, where she is a resident playwright with PlayGround San Francisco. Alanna is the 2019 winner of the June Anne Baker Prize for female playwrights representing a gifted new comedic or political voice. When not writing, she is a theater administrator, avid cross-stitcher, and podcast nerd. Follow her work and upcoming projects at alannamcfall.com or find her on Twitter as @alannamcfall. The Traveling Triple-C Incorporeal Circus is her first novel.