Hope (A Tool of Coercion in Totalitarian Governments - Part 4/4)

In many dystopian novels—indeed, in many novels with any sort of totalitarian or dictatorial government, and even some novels that don't have that in there—there are those oppressed individuals known as the masses. The repressed populace. They suffer the indignities of cruel governments and/or rulers, undergo horrific things in the name of "the greater good." But what about their good? What about the welfare of the individual? What stops people from rising up against these terrible things?

I'm going to use six different dystopian series, as well as references from history, as my examples when answering these questions, but it really all boils down to four very simple things: apathy, fear, blame, and hope. This blog will actually be broken up into four separate posts to prevent having to scroll through a lengthy research-paper-length post if anyone wants to look for something specific.

Hope

The fourth factor is hope. According to the dictionary, hope is aspiration, anticipation, optimism, faith, possibility—something good that people wish and strive for. But what does this, of all things, have to do with corrupt governments?

In The Hunger Games film, President Snow (one of the bad guys) sums it up fairly nicely. He explains that one way to redirect fear and resentment is with hope. Give the people something to hope for. And that is a useful tactic in any corrupt government.

The most obvious example of this I've ever seen is in the BBC Robin Hood series. Almost everyone knows the story of Robin Hood, how he robbed from the rich to give to the poor and how the Sheriff was so horrible and taxed the peasants into starvation and blah-blah-blah. Well, there's an episode in this particular series where the Sheriff does something completely off the wall, something no one would expect. When Robin's right-hand guy, Much, gets captured, instead of executing or torturing him, the Sheriff makes Much a lord.

Yeah, I didn’t see that one coming either. Gave him a nice house, some land, pretty servant girls, wealth, good clothes, etc. Now why would a bad guy do that? The Sheriff explains it to his right-hand man, Guy of Gisbourne—because of what it does to the peasants. "Look at that," they say. "That could be us," they say. "That could've been me. It still could be me if I play my cards right. We could go from cruddy poverty to that." Now because this is a TV show, Much of course is still allied to Robin and helps him out and so because of this loses all of his nice stuff, but that's not the point.

It was only after I'd seen that episode that I realized how this applied to what President Snow is talking about in The Hunger Games. That hope, that sense of "that could be me" is one of the things that helps promote the Games. The victor of the Games gets a super nice house, never has to worry about food again, gets nice clothes, a very generous stipend from the Capitol for the rest of their lives…and this applies to their family, as well. So Katniss winning the Games? All that good stuff goes to her mom and sister, too, whom she's been struggling to support for the last four or five years. The kids from Districts 1-4 actually volunteer (which is why they are almost always either seventeen or eighteen) in order to have the chance to get all of that.


Basically, when despair is rampant, people want to cling to hope, to the long odds in their favor—so long as the reward/outcome of those odds is kept fresh in their minds. Each district has a Victor's Square with lovely houses smack in the middle of it. Each district has a victor living in one of those houses. This only reinforces the idea, "Hey…that could be me someday, if I play my cards right." The slogan for the Games reinforces this too: may the odds be ever in your favor. 

We see a similar—though far less deadly—version of this "that could be me" ideology in The Selection, by Kiera Cass. In The Selection, there's a competition similar to The Bachelor television show, except the guy up for grabs is one of the princes of the royal family, and the girl selected will marry him, thus improving her lot in life as well as her family's lot. In a culture where social class is a rigorously upheld way of doing things, that's a pretty big deal. Of course, it might not seem like that if—like the main character, America Singer (I know, it's like the only major flaw in the book so far, but really?)—you have a boyfriend already and then get selected for the competition, since the hopes and dreams of your family will be riding on your shoulders. But again, this is a good example of the system-that-isn't-really-fair offering the-thing-you-really-really-want in order to keep the populace from exploding.

Sometimes, it's not even the prize in a competition. Sometimes it's just the hope or dream that you've wanted all your life, and the system can help you get it. In Caitlin Kittredge's The Iron Thorn, Aoife wants to be an engineer more than anything else in the world. It is her fondest, most desperate dream. And in order to get that dream, she has got to be careful, she has got to walk the line, and she has got to stay out of trouble, or that dream will go poof.

The same thing is in Matched, by Ally Condie. A lot of the adults, Cassia discovers as she goes through the plot of the book, have made the conscious decision to sacrifice certain things in order to hold onto what matters most to them. Cassia is exposed to the hope that if you play by the rules, you get rewarded with the thing you want the most—even during those times when the rules may or may not be fair. Cassia wants to be a sorter, a particular job she loves; that aspiration is threatened when she tries to flout the rules. She backs down (at first) in order to hold onto that dream.

"Eyes on the prize" is a technique used by a lot of totalitarian governments, but in small doses, to help maintain the status quo. Basically the corrupt ruling institution, whatever it is, continually reinforces the idea that "this thing you want could happen to you! As long as you don't screw up." By itself, it's a weak and ineffective tool. But combined with the other three…hey, it works.

Blame (A Tool of Coercion in Totalitarian Governments - Part 3/4)

In many dystopian novels—indeed, in many novels with any sort of totalitarian or dictatorial government, and even some novels that don't have that in there—there are those oppressed individuals known as the masses. The repressed populace. They suffer the indignities of cruel governments and/or rulers, undergo horrific things in the name of "the greater good." But what about their good? What about the welfare of the individual? What stops people from rising up against these terrible things?

I'm going to use six different dystopian series, as well as references from history, as my examples when answering these questions, but it really all boils down to four very simple things: apathy, fear, blame, and hope. This blog will actually be broken up into four separate posts to prevent having to scroll through a lengthy research-paper-length post if anyone wants to look for something specific.

Blame

The third factor is blame. According to the dictionary, blame is condemnation, accountability, culpability—basically, who's at fault for something. The blame game has been played by dictatorships for like, ever. The most well-known instance of this is found during the Nazi Regime.

After WWI, when the German economy tanked and fell into a depression, one of the things Hitler did was blame a lot of Germany's problems on other people. The Enemy, as it were. Hitler blamed Jews, homosexuals, black people, Gypsies, Catholics, anyone who didn't fit into his concept of a pure race. Most people think about this from an objective standpoint and think that it's ridiculous that anyone would buy into that. How could the German-Jewish community have possibly destroyed the German economy? And why would they? What would be the point?

But if you look at it subjectively, that kind of mindset sort of makes sense. It's completely, morally wrong…but it makes sense. People ask questions that hint at this mindset all the time. Why me? Why did this happen to me (or my wife or my kids or my parents or whatever)? Why does God let bad things happen to good people? The inherent blame in those questions is obvious. The phrasing of the question pushes aside the possibility of a blameless answer. Most people refuse to believe that the answer to "why me?" is simply "because." People naturally look for someone to blame.

In a way, it's a bit like a defense mechanism. When something bad happens, people want a way to solve it. How can something be solved if no one and nothing is behind the problem? If it's one of those things that just happens? People need someone to blame. Someone to direct all of those negative emotions—fear, anger, even hatred—toward so they can feel as if it's possible to do something about it. Negative emotions need an outlet, a target. Blame gives that.

What does this have to do with forms of coercion in totalitarian governments?

One of the best ways to keep a group of people from noticing the enemies within is by giving them an enemy from without to deal with. During the Nazi Regime, it was everyone who was non-Aryan. During the time of the Hauns Mill Massacre, it was the Latter-Day Saints. During the Cold War, it was the Communists. And it's ridiculously easy to train someone to hate or fear another person, to believe they are the enemy. All you need is someone incredibly charismatic who knows how to manipulate people, and the proper setting for the manipulation to take place. Once you've managed to convince someone to draw the line between "us" and "them," it can take years, decades, or even centuries to undo that division. The blame game can be used most effectively to take the fear and resentment aimed at the dictatorship and direct it outward at someone else—the Enemy.

Although we see this a lot in dystopian novels (and in a lot of fantasy novels as well, such as the small-town mindset found in Eragon's home village in The Inheritance Cycle or even the anti-outsider point of view we get from the Hobbits in Tolkien's works), we don't see it everywhere. For example, it's not in Beth Ravis' Across the Universe* series. And in certain other series, such as The Iron Codex and Ann Aguire's Horde Trilogy (Enclave, Outpost, etc.), the Enemy really does exist. In Enclave, there really are zombies out there that people need to be defended from; same as in Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth, which has a small settlement with a rather dictatorial government in place. In The Iron Codex by Caitlin Kittredge, there really are monsters that want to kill people, as well as people with magical powers who work for the enemy government who are spying on the US. Those threats are actually legit. But legit or not, the government can still use them in these novels.

In Matched by Ally Condie, Cassia is afraid of two types of people at the beginning of the book. One: the Enemy that the Society is currently supposedly at war with. Two: a class of people known as Anomalies.

Of course it would make sense for her to be afraid of someone her country was at war with. Of course if anything crazy-terrible happened on the border with those enemies, and the government said the enemy did it, that would make sense to believe it.

But what are Anomalies? Why does blaming them for bad things reinforce Cassia's belief in the system of the Society?

Anomalies are people with an intense predisposition for violence and cruelty. At the time of the Matched Trilogy, which is at least a couple hundred years in the future, the Society has figured out how to screen for that sort of thing. It seems a little drastic to push anyone with this predisposition out of society, though, doesn't it? Why would anyone be okay with that? That's prejudice; it's infringing on civil rights.

Because of the blame game. The decision to exclude Anomalies from the Society was made before Cassia was even born, but she fully supports it. Why? She's afraid of them. She's been taught her whole life to be afraid of them, and her one exposure to an Anomaly only reinforced that. Because of the rules of the Society, people are safe—for the most part. Cassia's never experienced a crime, never had anything stolen from her by another person, her house has never been broken into, she's never been beat up, nothing. The most anyone has ever done to her is call her names or exclude/ignore her (which in and of itself is bad, but explains her reaction to the following).

Her one brush with an Anomaly was when her neighbors' son was brutally murdered by an Anomaly when she was a kid. In a country where murder and assault and rape are almost unheard of, this of course has a serious impact on her. It reinforced in her mind, "Of course I should be happy that the Society does what it can to protect me from that sort of thing."

Which is how manipulative governments work; they give you something to be afraid of, something that makes you grateful for their protection, as a means of reinforcing their control. People do it to other people all the time. Why can't groups of people do the same thing?

I'm going to branch out real quick and talk about a novel that actually isn't a dystopian novel per se, but does have a bit of a problem regarding the government up to a point. It's more the military, actually. This novel—Lia Habel's Dearly, Departed, which takes place about 300-400 years in the future in another country—is set in a country where the military has almost as much power over the lives of private citizens as the government does. For the most part, the military doesn’t abuse this power, but when they do, it's chalked up to being for "the greater good." Why? Because everything the military does that seems so horrible in the novel is claimed to be a means of defending against the enemy group that this country has been at war with for the last hundred or so years.

In Delirium, pretty much every horrible/inconvenient/annoying/awful thing that is done by the government is said to protect people from the Enemy—the Invalids. Every terrible thing is blamed on the Invalids. You actually see a great example of this in book two, Pandemonium. In Pandemonium, a terrorist attack takes place in a major city. A terrorist group takes credit for it; this group is made up of "Invalids." However, the government blames the attack on all Invalids, not just the militant group responsible, furthering the fear of anyone who refuses "the cure" for the deliria.

Going back to book one for a moment, Lena (the MC) often says, "Well, this rule here is annoying, but it's to make sure we don't have an epidemic. If the Invalids weren’t so crazy, we wouldn’t have this problem." That right there is a perfect recreation of the same anti-Semitic thinking people entertained in Nazi Germany.

Not only that, but whenever someone has a thought or makes a statement along the lines of, "Well, but this still seems a bit much," the people who have already been "cured" respond by blaming something and someone else—the person making the statement. You actually see something similar in the real world right now. When someone young is upset or unhappy about something, I can't count the number of times an adult responds with, "You'll forget about when you're older," or "I know it seems like a big deal now, but when you're older, it won't bother you so much," or words to that effect.

In a way, that's what the "cure" for the deliria has done and that's what people in the world of the Delirium Trilogy do now: they blame these feelings of dissatisfaction on the intense feelings that are so common (and normal, contrary to their opinion) feelings to be found in people that young. "When you're cured, you'll realize you were overreacting." Those words simultaneously cast blame on the deliria and the nature of a person before the "cure," as well as acting as a subtle and probably unconscious warning that too much of this might make people think you already have the deliria. Once the "cure" is administered, these feelings go away and the person only has a sense of contentment.

Regarding Caitlin Kittredge's trilogy, in The Iron Codex the blame is actually adequately placed for the most part. For example, the city of Lovecraft enforces a curfew set at sundown. Seems a little ridiculous, right? Except that that’s when all the monsters really do come out. The only people who should be out there are the City Guard, who keeps the monsters from going to close to people's homes. If anyone else is out after dark, the government assumes they're "heretics" who associate with these highly dangerous creatures. And for the most part, they'd be right.

Same thing regarding those people executed as heretics—they associate with the Crimson Guard (that's world Russian forces; remember, TIC takes place during the height of the Cold War, except on steroids), they dabble in things that might attract the monsters, or they associate with people who do the dabbling. This is 100% true in every case we've seen so far.

Does that mean all these people are evil? No. And that's the problem. But we'll talk more about that in my review of book one of TIC, The Iron Thorn.
In The Hunger Games, the Capitol deflects the blame for a lot of things onto other people. The biggest example of this is the event of the Games themselves. For the most part, only the people in the Capitol buy this. No one in the districts believes it. And the government blames the Hunger Games on two groups: one, District 13, who started the rebellion/war that the Games are still punishing; and two, the other districts, which according to the government still need to be kept under the Capitol thumb so they never think about rebelling again. Unlike with a lot of dystopian novels, the blame aspect of coercion isn't actually used that much. This is its main example, but it's a big one, so I felt it should be included.

Lastly, there is one of my favorite futuristic novels, Veronica Roth's Divergent. In Divergent, the main government isn't actually corrupt. It actually works quite well. But a small faction of the government doesn’t like the current heads of state, and so she is playing the blame game in order to roust them from power. It's because of Abnegation (that ruling faction) that the other factions don't have cars. Abnegation is hording supplies from the other factions. Abnegation is doing this, Abnegation is doing that. And all of this anger and resentment and blame gets stirred up so that when this woman eventually takes power, people (for the most part) ignore the other horrible things she did to get into power in the first place because they're too busy being ticked off at the group she did all those horrible things to.

Now, blame isn't as widely used as an effective manipulation tool in novels like these as other methods are, such as fear and apathy. But there is one other tool that, when used in small doses, can help quell the rebellion beast stirred up by the others: hope.

Fear (A Tool of Coercion in Dystopian Governments - Part 2/4)

In many dystopian novels—indeed, in many novels with any sort of totalitarian or dictatorial government—there are those oppressed individuals known as the masses. The repressed populace. They suffer the indignities of cruel governments and/or rulers, undergo horrific things in the name of "the greater good." But what about their good? What about the welfare of the individual? What stops people from rising up against these terrible things?

I'm going to use six different dystopian series, as well as references from history, as my examples when answering these questions, but it really all boils down to four very simple things: apathy, fear, blame, and hope. This blog will actually be broken up into four separate posts to prevent having to scroll through a lengthy research-paper-length post if anyone wants to look for something specific.

Fear

The second factor is fear. According to the dictionary, fear is a feeling of alarm, dread, panic, apprehension, horror, concern, or terror. Everyone knows what it means to be afraid of something. Everyone's afraid of something. I'll tell you what—almost everyone is afraid of dying. And if they're not afraid of dying, they're afraid of either a boat-load of pain or someone they love experiencing a boat-load of pain/suffering…which leads me to our new examples for this particular thread of explanation.

In Divergent by Veronica Roth, a lot of crud happens to a lot of people, and things get ignored that shouldn’t, because people are afraid of what will happen to them. In Divergent specifically you see the kind of fear often found in school bullying situations, where someone is afraid to speak up for fear that they'll be targeted next.

At one point, a combat trainee gets several knives thrown at his head by order of a sadistic teacher. No one does anything because they're afraid of being the next target…until Tris, the main character, stands up and says "enough," and stands in the other kid's place so she can take his punishment. She volunteers for the punishment everyone else is afraid of—which is actually the point of the book; she's what's known as Divergent, someone whose aptitude tested high for both selflessness and bravery. But that's neither here nor there and will be touched on in my review.


There is another point where a different trainee is punished for "cowardice" by being forced to hold herself suspended for five minutes from a bridge. If she falls, she'll die. No one says anything because if they do, they'll have to do the same thing.

I should back up for a moment here and explain why they obey this whacko. He is their instructor for the initiation into Dauntless, the warrior clan of their city—which they chose to enter of their own free will. If they fail initiation, they'll be factionless, which basically means they'll be homeless, without a job, without contact with their families, living on their own on the streets. They were raised from early childhood that this is bad (aren't we all?) so even those who aren't sickos like this particular teacher still have to live with that fear, that potential consequence.

Back the girl on the bridge. If she falls, she dies. If she refuses to do the bridge-punishment, she fails initiation and gets kicked out of Dauntless, leaving her factionless, alone in the world, and totally screwed. No one says a word as she holds onto the bridge until Tris can't take it anymore and starts cheering for her (imagine a deadlier version of the Chocolate Cake Scene in the movie Matilda). One of Tris's friends also joins in, spurred on by Tris. And when the five minutes of punishment are up, even though the teacher says it's not okay, Tris and her friend help the girl back onto solid ground. But they are the only ones who are willing to face punishment by doing this.

In Delirium and The Iron Codex, the things everyone fears are pretty much the same: getting sick with an incurable disease and being ostracized from society because of it.

In Delirium, nearly everyone is afraid of amora deliria nervosa because they're raised to be. It didn't start out that way (it evolved over about 100 years, I seem to recall) but by the time the first book takes place, everyone is raised to fear this particular "disease." It's considered a contagious mental illness.

It's almost like the Communist Scare in the 50s—anyone who may have the deliria, as they call it, is considered high-risk, practically an enemy of the state. People will lock themselves in their houses to get away from it. Sure, there are rebellions who know it's all a load of crud, but those people who don't are basically brainwashed by the fear of getting sick and losing everything. You see in Requiem, the third book in The Delirium Trilogy, just what happens to people even associated with someone who might be "sick."

And of course in The Iron Codex by Caitlin Kittredge, people fear the necrovirus. At least there, they have somewhat tangible "proof" that there is such a thing. The government's scientists and researchers claim that anyone infected with the virus will go mad (which, most people accused of having the virus do go mad, but for a completely different and understandable reason; case in point, the MC's mother). Once they lose their minds, they start mutating into these monstrous creatures that roam the land around the walled city of Lovecraft.

Why isn't this totally bogus? Because the monsters actually exist. The government's not making that one up. But in order to explain where the monsters really come from, they'd have to explain alternate worlds to the populace, which would not go over well. And there is something that connects those people who contract the "necrovirus" and go crazy to these monsters from other worlds. So this particular fear is based on legit concerns and evidence twisted to suit government theories. Clever.

Add onto this that in The Iron Codex, America's in the middle of the Cold War, except now we've got monsters and madness-inducing viruses to worry about, and unlike the whacky US, Russia sometimes works with these monsters. They just basically turned into the Antichrist. So then we've got the fear of being called a Communist during the Cold War in a country where witches are still persecuted and anyone who's a Communist is generally considered a witch, on top of the necrovirus and the monsters. And the government of Lovecraft (and the US) is promising to keep everyone safe from all three of these terrible, terrible things so long as everyone continues to be good little boys and girls.

Fear of a specific group is an effective tool, all right. Look at Nazi Germany. How did Hitler turn so many people against the Jews and other non-Aryans so that things like the Night of Broken Glass occurred? Fear. The Jews, according to the Nazis, were the enemy.

You see the same thing in Delirium—the Invalids, the people who refuse to be "cured" of the deliria, are the Enemy, they're out to get you. In Divergent, there's talk of an Enemy beyond the city gates, and that's one of the things Dauntless are supposed to do—defend the city against this Enemy. In The Iron Codex, there are heretical Communist witches who consort with virus-spreading monsters, and they're the Enemy. And in Matched, there's a war supposedly going on in the Outer Provinces that helps to reinforce the idea that only an Enemy, or people classified as dangerous by the Society, would attempt to attack that same Society.

And what does the government always do in these novels? The government offers to protect its people from these Enemies that seem to be everywhere.

A type of fear that's used in Delirium and Matched (and to some extent in Divergent) is the fear of the unknown. The biggest instance of that is Matched, but we'll explore that last. For now, we'll touch on the other two.

In Divergent, fear of the unknown is a big problem. People are afraid of being factionless because without their faction, they feel they have no place, no purpose, no role in society. Having been there before, I know how scary that can be. So do a lot of young people beginning to enter adulthood.

And even the antagonists of the book have to deal with fear of the unknown in their own way. They have to deal with those who tested as Divergent, people the villains are afraid of. Why do they fear those who are Divergent? Because being Divergent means you're harder to understand, harder to predict…and that makes you harder to control. That makes you an unknown factor. So it isn't just the oppressed masses that can be manipulated by their fears.

If we look at Delirium, you see a more subtle form of this fearing the unknown. The deliria is a "disease" that brings with it a rollercoaster ride of emotions and feelings that can sometimes make you feel like you're crazy. You definitely feel out control. That lack of control in and of itself can be scary, especially when pressured (as many young people are) to always be and feel in control of yourself.

But this use of fear is especially strong in Matched. Why do people give up their choices? Because they are afraid of making the wrong ones. Why does Cassia, the MC, choose to be Matched for a spouse instead of trying to find her own love? Because she's afraid of what will happen if she isn't. Why does she follow the rules of the Society? Because she's afraid her life will fall apart if she doesn't.

You see this most strongly in the main plot of the first book (since this fear no longer rules Cassia in books 2 & 3). Cassia believes she is Matched to her best friend Xander (which makes her really, really happy). Then her Match Card supposedly "malfunctions," showing her someone other than Xander, and she practically has a panic attack because she literally doesn’t know what it means or what to do.

In times of stress, what are two of the most common pleas people make? "I don't know what to do" and "Someone help me."

Translation: Please, someone take over for me because I can't handle this. Fear will make you need someone to trust, someone to hand over the reins to when you can't take it. And if that trait, that inability to handle opposition and stress and unhappiness, is slowly nurtured by the shape our government and society is taking in response to that flaw? It's a never-ending circle, and eventually, it would get to the point where people are at in the Society in The Matched Trilogy.

Now, is everyone like this in the series? No. There's a whole rebellion going on that Cassia finds out about in book 2, and it's been going on for years and years. But the point I made above is a big foundation of the Society.

So that's fear of the unknown used to a society or government's advantage. Then, of course, there's fear of the government itself. You see this in Enclave and The Hunger Games, and even a little bit in Matched.

In The Hunger Games, rebellion is quickly squashed without mercy. The first time the districts rose up against the Capitol, the bad guys firebombed the entirety of District 13 to charred rubble and smoke and then, after executing every high-ranking member of the rebellion they could find (and probably their families, though I don't remember), they instituted the Hunger Games as a reminder that rebelling against the government will get you nothing but suffering. And while the harsh living and working conditions of Districts 5-12 also contribute to the difficulty in striking back at the government, another thing that does it is fear.

Unfortunately you don’t see this in the film, but in the book you find out that anyone suspected of committing "treason" against the Capitol is rounded up and turned into something called an Avox—basically a slave-class person subjected t experimentation, who can't speak, who's wired with some kind of "disobey and you die" device. They basically torture you, experiment on you, and make you into a slave. Fun stuff.

And then of course, there's the basic principle you see a little of in Britain during the rising tensions between the Saxons and the Normans, as well as between the Nazis and the non-Aryans—the fact that if you tick off the wrong person, they can and will kill you without mercy or fear or reprisals. Each district has a company of Capitol soldiers chillaxing there. Apparently the ones in District 12 are nice, but the ones in District 11 are psychotic. We don't get any details about the others, just that they're there. And yes, I suppose the populace could attack and kill the soldiers…but the soldiers are better fed, better trained, and they're armed. And of course, everyone remembers what happened in District 13.

In Enclave, it's barely touched upon—the same as in Matched—but one thing people worry about in those books is what happens when you break the laws; what kind of effect the government's punishments will have on you and those you love.

In Matched, Cassia is threatened by an Official who says she can ruin Cassia's chances of getting her dream job, can have Ky (her real love) sent somewhere horrible, screw up her parents' careers, etc. At the end of the book, Cassia is threatened with having her citizenship taken away.

And in Enclave, Deuce is thrown out of her enclave—though luckily, her partner cares for her enough to follow her so doesn’t die alone in the tunnels from zombie death—when she's framed for breaking the law; this fate is one of the reasons she's always been careful to walk the line.

Fear. Fear is the mind-killer, to quote Frank Herbert. Fear can destroy people's hearts and wills, but it has to be wielded carefully or that fear can turn into a desperation that ends in mass suicide/homicide for everybody. And that is where blame and hope both come in.

Apathy (A Tool of Coercion in Dystopian Governments - Part 1/4)

In many dystopian novels—indeed, in many novels with any sort of totalitarian or dictatorial government—there are those oppressed individuals known as the masses. The repressed populace. They suffer the indignities of cruel governments and/or rulers, undergo horrific things in the name of "the greater good." But what about their good? What about the welfare of the individual? What stops people from rising up against these terrible things?

I'm going to use six different dystopian series, as well as references from history, as my examples when answering these questions, but it really all boils down to four very simple things: apathy, fear, blame, and hope. This blog will actually be broken up into four separate posts to prevent having to scroll through a lengthy research-paper-length post if anyone wants to look for something specific.

Apathy

The first factor is apathy. According to the dictionary, apathy is defined as indifference, a lack of concern, or a lack of interest. Basically, a state of apathy is a state of just plain not caring. It's a sad truth that most people (in this country, at least) can't be roused to a true state of caring unless something directly affects them or someone they know. The most you'll get is, "Oh, that's horrible." And then they'll move on to something they feel is more relevant to them. I saw this constantly in high school, in students as well as adults. I was even guilty of it myself due to my PTSD, but that's another story for another time. Sadly, a lot of people just don't care about anyone beyond themselves or their sphere of friends and loved ones. How many people ignore a kid being abused by their parents in a parking lot? Or walk by someone being ripped to shreds by their peers? I'm not saying everyone does this. I know they don't. But a lot of people do. And that is often the first thing a lot of people do in different dystopian novels, though for many different reasons.

In Ann Aguire's Enclave, which is actually a horribly written book but with viable and very-well developed characterization of the MC (for the first 2/3 of the novel, anyway), there's a girl named Deuce. Deuce is a fighter for her enclave who lives in a world of kill-or-be-killed, predator-and-prey. She believes she can't afford to care about anyone who can't take care of themselves because that is how she was raised in a world where failure to protect yourself means death for you and countless other people. So though she feels some guilt, when the council of her enclave votes for the death of a blind nine-year-old boy because he's basically a drain on their resources and can't take care of himself or contribute to the welfare of the community, she doesn't protest (even silently).

A similar thing happens later in the novel (in the final third that really just makes me want to know what this author was smoking when she wrote it*, yet sadly this part sort of fits with Deuce's personality) when Deuce meets a guy called Wolf. Wolf is not only a thug and a killer, he's an admitted rapist. But because he can fight and Deuce and her partner are in a dangerous area, she puts aside what he's done in the past—including kidnap and try to rape Deuce and their third member—in order to use his fighting prowess against their enemies. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, but her total acceptance, her attitude of "that was then, this is now" is exactly the sort of "don't care" attitude I'm talking about in this post.

* The thing that just totally throws me isn't that Deuce allows Wolf to live and uses him fight with them; it's that he's the second guy in her little love triangle and she's okay with that. She actually finds him attractive. I'm just like, "What kind of crack-acid do you smoke?" This is near the middle of the final third of the book, so I finished it anyway, but I just could not believe this. And people complain about Stephenie Meyer and The Twilight Saga, and how Edward's abusive. Um, Ann Aguire got optioned for a trilogy, I heard there might be a movie, and she's a best-seller. Not as big as S. Meyer, but still! With an idiot like that for a heroine? Really? Okay, rant over.


In Matched, the main character, Cassia, is one of those rare individuals who has rarely questioned the Society—the totalitarian system in which she lives. Though there are some things about the Society's rules that she doesn't like, she doesn’t really care about them enough to worry. Why? For a very different reason than Deuce: Cassia knows what the Society has provided for her in exchange for these "small unpleasantries."

In the Society, for example, Cassia opts to get married eventually (she can choose to remain single for the rest of her life if she chooses). The boy who will become her husband is dictated by the Officials based on the data they've collected about her personality and other traits compared to the boy's over the course of their lives. That would irritate the crud out of me, but not Cassia, and with valid reason—her parents were Matched by the Society and have a very happy and healthy relationship, a relationship just like the one Cassia wants for herself. She knows other people who've been happily Matched with their spouse by the Society as well. So this lack of choice doesn’t bother her because of the happiness of what is basically a guaranteed outcome. She's seen the process, seen how it works, and seen the results—which are results she wants.

The same applies to most of what's going on in her life: her job, her recreational activities, even her diet. In the beginning of the book, the restriction of her choices doesn't bother her because she's trading the ability to choose for what she believes she wants based on what she's seen from other people.

The one time Cassia almost violently breaks this mold of not caring, of trading her choices for happiness, is when her father dies. In the Society, people die at eighty years old on their birthday, by government mandate. This sounds outrageous. Crazy. Absolutely ridiculous. But even though Cassia is stricken by her grandfather's death, even though she at times thinks that it isn't fair, she still has that mindset of trading choice for happiness.

This also touches a little on fear, so we'll explore that in another segment of this blog series, but again—her desire for a specific outcome that she sees all around her helps Cassia set aside her concerns about the Society (when she has them, which only happens regularly once the plot picks up).

In The Hunger Games, we see apathy in its worst form: people who don't care because they worry too much about themselves to be bothered with other people. Now, let me again stress, not everyone is like that in the series. And those that are have good reason. For the most part, the people in District 12 are barely scraping by. Katniss and her family nearly starved to death after her father died when she was twelve because they are so poor. She basically lives in one of the ghettos of Panem (the country in which this takes place).

Though a few of her neighbors in District 12 help her out a little—this is the starting point for her relationship with Peeta Mellark, the other tribute from District 12, who risked a beating from his mother to give Katniss and her family a few burnt loaves of bread—they can't help very much because they, too, are in dire straits and can't afford to help. Those that aren't in such straits simply don't care. An example is Peeta's (relatively) wealthy mother, who would rather give the burnt bread to their pig than give it to a starving child. And the government of Panem actually actively encourages this attitude towards neighbors as well as between the districts, helping to discourage any teamwork between the different districts against the Capitol.

Specifically with Districts 5-12 in The Hunger Games, the Capitol also encourages another form of apathy: the lethargy/uncaring induced by lack of will/strength. As I mentioned previously, most of these people are not wealthy. They barely scrape by unless they resort to poaching (as Katniss does, which is illegal and is actually a capital offense). When every minute of the day is filled with the efforts to feed yourself and your family, most people don't have the energy to plot political unrest or rebellion (though some do). They are literally too tired to do anything, even care, most of the time.

And onto that, one district could not take out the forces of the entire Capitol, and it is very difficult to travel between the districts. The Capitol has, of course, done this on purpose to keep communication to a minimum between districts, to keep them from banding together. You see a similar concept in detention in schools—teachers keep the kids separate to keep them from talking to each other. In Panem, distrust of the other districts is also pumped up because of the event of the Hunger Games within the story. This helps contribute to the general attitude of, "It's too difficult, too risky, without enough payoff" in regards to rebellion.

In The Iron Codex by Caitlin Kittredge, the apathy comes more from an established class hierarchy than anything else. Example: a well-to-do family doesn’t give a flying rat's buttered carcass if a homeless person labeled as a psychopath and a heretic (similar in this world to being called a Communist) is carted off to prison without a trial, or killed in the street, so long as they don't have to step around the blood puddle.

The same applies to those individuals in this world who contract what is known as the necrovirus, a so-called sickness that turns people into monsters. So long as everyone who "matters" is kept safe from the virus and the inhuman things it breeds, they don't care how those who're infected are dealt with—especially because it has no cure.

You see the same thing in Lauren Oliver's Delirium. In Delirium, the MC Lena doesn’t care about many of the restrictions placed on her: a city-enforced curfew of 9:00pm; rules about fraternizing with males (yeah, you saw that); censored reading, movie, and musical material. She only cares about being kept safe from the "disease" that killed her mother by causing her to commit suicide and nearly killed her sister—amora deliria nervosa (aka intense emotion).

And this really ties into the fear-aspect of the totalitarian government. Without fear—fear of what happens to me, be it from a natural influence such as starvation, or a manmade influence such as government reprisals, or something like a highly contagious illness—most people don't have the "don't care" issue in these novels. Their apathy is heightened by their fear. So long as they are kept safe, they don't care what has to happen to ensure that.

Which leads us to our next blog post: Fear as a Tool of Coercion in Dystopian Governments.

Magnus Bane from Mortal Instruments: City of Lost Souls (Evil on the Part of the Heroes Part 2)

Lately in books (and when I say lately, I mean in the last four or five years) I've noticed a disturbing flaw in a lot of the things I read: the lack of repercussions falling on characters after serious offenses of some kind. Granted, I've also seen this in movies and books, but not really. It's far more prevalent in novels. And this bothers me, because it usually results in one of two things: either unrealistic writing, or previously-likeable characters becoming bad guys without the author intending it to be this way.

And it isn't just beginner authors who do this, though they've done it, too. Even some of the most experienced authors have made this mistake sometimes. And of course authors in between the newbies and the veterans do it too. We're going to take a look at one of them now: Cassandra Clare.

I've read the first five Mortal Instruments novels, and the original trilogy (Bones, Ashes, Glass) was beautifully written and I loved it; I'd give the trilogy as a whole a 4.5 rating. But book four dropped down from 4.5 to a 3.5 with some of the stunts she pulled (I'll review that book later), and then when I read City of Lost Souls, it dropped to a 2 for so many reasons. But we're going to focus on one plot point from that novel in this essay about character repercussions—Magnus Bane and his villainy.

Now some people might be freaking out, thinking I'm giving away spoilers for one of the three latest Mortal Instruments novels (City of Fallen Angels, City of Lost Souls, and book 6, City of Heavenly Fire). I'm not. Let me say that first. I promise by all the godlets of bookworms, this blog is not a spoiler about Magnus Bane, High Warlock of Brooklyn, turning evil or joining the evil Shadowhunters or whatever.

However, there is a plot point revealed in this blog from City of Lost Souls,
so if you don't want it spoiled, do not continue.
And for anyone who hasn't read City of Bones yet,
you're in for spoilers galore.

You have been warned.

And now onto my point.

Magnus Bane has, for eight books of the nine-book Shadowhunter series by Cassandra Clare, been a good guy and a hero.

— He's a friend to Will Herondale, one of the two male leads from The Infernal Devices

— He is apparently on amicable if not downright friendly terms with Jocelyn, Clary's mother, before the start of City of Bones, since he was willing to wipe Clary's memory nearly every day of her entire life just because Jocelyn asked him to

— He's a friend and ally to Clary and the gang in City of Bones and City of Ashes.

— Also in City of Ashes, he claims to be in love with Alec, Jace's parabatai

— You learn that Magnus is allied with the local werewolf pack, headed by the man who becomes Clary's stepdad, in City of Ashes

— Near the end of City of Glass, he becomes the open boyfriend of Alec; they pretty much declare their love in front of the entire Clave

— He holds the warlock seat on the new council between vampires, warlocks, werewolves, fairies, and Shadowhunters that is formed between City of Glass and City of Fallen Angels

— In City of Fallen Angels, Alec and Magnus are officially an item

— Magnus is also an ally of the Clave, the Shadowhunter ruling group

— During City of Lost Souls, he has all these ties—ties to Alec, to Clary, to the surviving two Lightwood kids (Isabelle and Jace), to the Clave, to Simon—and helps in the great big battle near the end

Basically, he's thrown in his lot with the good guys. The end. He's someone his friends can count on. He's brave, he's compassionate, and he's a good friend and good guy.

How is he a villain, then, you may be asking?

Before I go further, allow me to state that for my own personal reasons, I actually don't like the pairing of Alec and Magnus, so it's not like I'm hating on him because of any romantic slash-yaoi love. With that said…

Alec is eighteen years old. A fresh eighteen who's never had a relationship before, who will one day grow old and die because Shadowhunters are not immortal.

Magnus is an immortal warlock, who is hundreds, if not thousands, of years old. He has centuries if not millennia of experience with romance and life in general.

Yet because Alec briefly considered—and then discarded—a spell to make Magnus mortal so they could live their lives together until one or both of them died, Magnus goes and dumps him like some prissy preteen girl who, like, omg, can't believe Alec would do that.

Well, okay. Not quite villainous, no. Immature and pathetic (all of Magnus's accusations about Alec could all be turned around by Alec and used on Magnus; hypocrisy in a relationship irritates me. Lack of forgiveness for anything less than deliberate spousal/domestic abuse also irritates me), but not villainous.

No, it's what Magnus does after he dumps his young live-in boyfriend that infuriates me.

Magnus cuts ties with everyone.

With Jace.

With Clary.

With Alec.

With Simon.

With Isabelle.

With the Clave.

With Clary's mom.

With Clary's adopted dad.

Now, keep in mind:

Magnus has been a friend of Jace's bloodline (Will Herondale from The Infernal Devices is Jace's ancestor) for at least a couple hundred years.

He's been friends with Clary and her mom since Clary was a baby.

As the High Warlock of Brooklyn and a survivor of the battle from City of Glass, he has a whole lot of important ties to the Clave.

He's the warlock representative to the Shadowhunter Council.

He's an ally to the local werewolf pack, headed up by Clary's stepdad and Magnus's friend.

Yet because of a lover's spat, because of his personal problems that have nothing to do with anyone but him, Alec, and this one chick who's dead so she doesn't count, he severs ties with all of those other people.

He even says in the break-up conversation that a big, dark war is coming, one that will pretty much smash into everyone and everything on the planet, and that it's going to be super-super bad. Yet because of him being angry with Alec, he's not going to help. He's not going to maintain the alliances he's made. He's not going to keep his commitments. He's not going to help the other people who have done nothing to him, whose only "crime" is that they know Alec.

Magnus Bane, High Warlock of Brooklyn, centuries-old warlock and son of a Greater Demon (probably), seat-holder on the Council, veteran of the Valentine-Demon War, is going to go off and sulk about his hurt feelings while people he supposedly once cared about die in this war that's coming, a war that he is obligated to participate in because of oaths made and friendships forged.

I mean, think about what that's saying. "I'm sorry, everyone who's been a friend and ally to me these last eight books, but I'm ticked off at my ex-boyfriend, so you can all go die in a hole for all I care. I'm going to Paris. Ciao!"

(-_-)

Seriously?

I'm not saying Cassandra Clare is a bad writer. She's actually a brilliant writer, one of few I enjoyed reading (until City of Fallen Angels…but that's another story). But I wonder if she realizes just how this looks, what Magnus has done. I wonder if she truly understands the depth of the betrayal he's committed by doing this. That's the only thing.

Magnus Bane, High Warlock of Brooklyn, just got dumped into Team Bad. Which really, really sucks for Team Good. And it kinda sucks for him, too, because there's a special place in Hell for traitors, which is exactly what he is.

— LA Knight

　

Welcome to the Early 19th Century!

All right, all you aspiring authors out there!

Good morning (or afternoon or evening, whichever). For those of you who like to read historical fiction, good for you! For those of you who want to write historical fiction, go read some. Best way to get a grasp on what the genre's all about. And of course there are a million different times a historical novel can cover, from the prehistoric era (as in such books as The Clan of the Cave Bear and The People of the Raven) through Regency and Victorian England—always a fun era to read about—to World War II. Most things newer than that aren't considered "historical," per se. Not old enough, I guess.

But this blog entry is specifically about two fun eras in English/American history that I personally love to read about: Regency England and Victorian England and America. For good classical examples of what those are see Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen and Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur C. Doyle.

Now there are certain rules about writing in these time periods that every author should know; vocabulary every author should familiarize his- or herself with. For example, in Regency England (which describes books set as early as 1785 to as late as 1825) men didn’t play pool, they played billiards. Different name, different rules. In Victorian England and America (late 1800s to the 19-teens), love letters between courting couples didn’t end with "love So-and-So," but with something slightly more platonic, such as "your devoted friend, Such-and-Such."

Why do I mention this? I read a lot of historical fiction. I especially love Pride and Prejudice sequels, though I also like entirely original historical stuff for its own sake. And one of the things that just drives me crazy is when I see something anachronistic—something that doesn’t fit in with the time-period. Now some things are understandable, little detail-mistakes not everyone would catch (such as in James Cameron's Titanic; apparently Jack promises to take Rose to some American attraction that wasn't built until 1916, even though the Titanic sank in 1912). But certain things, like vocabulary, can make or break the suspension of disbelief in a novel.

Here's a list of Regency/Victorian vocabulary that will serve you in good stead:

— Billiards—the British version of pool

— Bluestocking—a girl/woman who enjoys education for its own sake and likes to read

— Dowager—a formal term for a widow, especially a widow from the aristocracy or landed gentry

— Dowry—the monetary settlement given to a woman (and thus her husband) by her father or guardian when she marries

— Foxed—drunk

— Landed gentry—someone wealthy who doesn’t possess an aristocratic title like "duke" or "earl" but owns their own estate; popular examples are Mr. Darcy, Mr. Knightly from Jane Austen's Emma, or Mr. Rochester from Jane Eyre

— Mater—the Latin word for mother, often used by British high society as a term of affection (or sarcastic disdain) for a parent in conversation

— Old maid—a young woman past the standard "marriageable age" (which is normally no later than twenty-five or twenty-six years old) who remains unspoken for

— Out—to say a young woman is "not yet out" means she hasn’t been officially presented to society as an eligible bachelorette. The age for this can range as young as sixteen and as old as nineteen, though rarely later

— Pater—the Latin word for father, often used by British high society as a term of affection (or sarcastic disdain) for a parent in conversation

— Regimentals—a common term for a British Army uniform

— Season—the height of the social life in London, where everybody goes to meet people, rub elbows with society's finest, and present sons and daughters in need of spouses

— Ton—British high society, which includes landed gentry as well as aristocrats

— Whist—a popular card game

There. Bet you guys didn’t know most of these. And these aren't the only terms you should bone up on, and my blog isn't the be-all, end-all of research. If you want to write a historical novel, seriously—do your research! There're all kinds of things to learn about the culture, the language, etiquette, etc. It's actually pretty fascinating.

- LA Knight

Melting into Dystopias

As a writer who is friends with other writers, of course my friends and I all read. And of course because we both read and write, we like to discuss the books we read; what we think of the plot twists, the characters, etc. We debate points, consider outside possibilities, predict possible outcomes, and ferret out weak spots.

So during one such discussion, my fellow writers in my writing group and I started talking about dystopias. We've all seen them. The most famous ones right now are The Hunger Games (the second film, Catching Fire, came out semi-recently), followed by the Divergent Trilogy, the first film of which premiers in mid-March. Then there are the classics like Soilent Green and Fahrenheit 451.

But it seems like these days, the classification of dystopia is being thrown around a lot when it doesn't really fit well with the actual premise of the book.

What is the biggest theme of a dystopian novel? A dysfunctional government, seething with corruption, that's basically out to get you. Screw up once, you're dead meat. In Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, reading actual books is a crime that—if you refuse to surrender said books—can result in your execution.

In The Hunger Games, if you defy the Capitol, they come after you hard (case in point, the ultimate destruction of Districts 12 and 13). In Lauren Oliver's Delirium, anyone who breaks the laws to prevent "infection" from this supposedly contagious mental illness is sanctioned, then put in prison or punished in some horrible way. I recently wrote an essay, actually, about the difference between utopia/dystopia and straight-up dystopia novels, highlighting the acknowledged tyrannical fist of a corrupt government.

But a lot of books these days that I've seen have been labeled as dystopias when honestly, it doesn’t actually seem like they are. Maybe it's a sales ploy sort of thing. Maybe it's to make more people buy the books. I don't know. But I'm seeing less dystopia in my dystopian novels these days, and I'm not sure how I feel about it.

In Kiera Cass's supposedly dystopian novel The Selection, we're introduced to the kingdom of Ilea, which is run via a caste system. While they have rebellions, and the laws can be fairly strict (being pregnant outside of wedlock can get you thrown in prison unless you were sexually assaulted), there isn't really anything corrupt in the government that we see in the first novel. The government isn't tight-fisted or cruel or tyrannical. The king and queen genuinely care about their subjects and their kingdom. What is so dystopian about this book, exactly?

Hop over to Wither by Lauren Destefano, first book in The Chemical Garden Trilogy. In Wither (and its sequel, Fever), the government doesn’t really show up in the storyline. You see the president on television maybe once or twice. You hear about riots and rebel attacks and all that.

But no policemen or government workers ever attack the main character or anyone she knows. The bad guys don't have government authority behind them. The government is actually pretty much an ineffective mess sludging around in the background, not doing anything. The tyrannical evil entity is the father-in-law of the main character, Rhine—and he's the villain of the novels, as well. In fact, his creepy attitude and scary dictatorship reminds me more of less-violent and overtly-psychotic Annie from Stephen King's Misery than President Snow from The Hunger Games.

I'm currently reading a so-called dystopian novel called Inhuman by Kat Falls, where the government has a fairly iron-fisted grip on the country. But that's because about twenty years prior in the storyline, a virulent and so-far incurable form of fast-mutating super-rabies swept through the country and martial law was basically put into place to try and stop it before everyone keeled over dead. The virus is still incurable, and outbreaks still happen.

Imagine if zombie plague popped up in the real world. How would the US government handle it? Exactly the way they do in Inhuman. That's not dystopian. The government's not corrupt. No one's rights are being unfairly squashed or whatever. It's a public safety issue, like the cops forcing you to stay in your homes while they try to apprehend a terrorist running around out on the streets.

I could go on for days about this, actually. Novels like Divergent by Veronica Roth, Dearly, Departed by Lia Habel, Rot and Ruin by Jonathon Mabry, The Loners by Lex Thomas, Shatter Me by Tahareh Mafi, Insignia by SJ Kincaid, or Gone by Michael Grant aren't actually dystopian novels. Most (though not all) of these actually fall more under post-apocalyptic, which isn't the same thing—though I fear it may be melting into the blanket-label of dystopian.

Am I being too picky about this? Maybe. But I actually know people who hold the dystopian classification in contempt, and those people aren't buying a lot of the books I mentioned above which are being incorrectly labeled.

What's my point? Authors, editors, agents, publishers, reviewers—be specific. Just because it looks like a duck and walks like a duck, doesn't mean it's a duck. It might actually say "cock-a-doodle-doo" instead of "quack," which probably means it's not a duck. Actually, if it looks like a duck but crows like a rooster, it's probably a parrot in disguise. And maybe readers shouldn’t judge a book by cover or classification, but you know they do. So please, advertise accurately.

Stay tuned for reviews for Shatter Me, Inhuman, The Loners, and Rot and Ruin coming soon!

— LA Knight

Show Your Face? (Sometimes a Pose Is Just a Pose Part 1)

So I came across an interesting article about book cover trends a little while back and read through it, and one of the points sort of surprised and actually disturbed me.

Now, one of the first things that attracts someone to a book usually is the cover. Does the cover look interesting? And of course we have a lot of covers with pictures of people on them. The Once Upon a Time YA novel series from Simon and Schuster actually revamped their covers from illustrated to photographic, rereleasing every book in the series so far except two (Scarlet Moon and Spirited) and I actually like these covers a lot better. They're beautiful. I'm a big fan of photographic covers.

But the point that was made by this article was that a certain trend in photographic covers is having a negative impact on feminine identity among teens. This trend is the image of a girl whose face is hidden in some way from the camera. You see this in the Matched Trilogy by Ally Condie (Cassia is always looking away from the reader), in The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer (you see Cinder's foot, Scarlet's arm and part of her upper body but no face, Cress's back and her hair), The Mortal Instruments (hard to see any faces), and in a lot of other books. Then there are the books where only part of the face is revealed (Kiera Cass's The Selection, where part of America Singer's face is hidden by her arm).

According to this article, the trend of hiding a girl's face from view somehow takes away from her strength, from the strength of her identity as a strong character, and from her ability to be viewed as a role model by the reader. I find this interesting, since a lot of novels with strong female leads (The Hunger Games, Divergent, etc.) don't even have images of their stars on the cover at all.

This reminds me of something my sister once told me. Now, I'm biracial. My father is African-American, my mother is Caucasian. When I was little, I had this idea (not because of my parents) that I couldn’t do anything that a biracial person hadn’t done before. As an example, I would play A Little Princess with a friend of mine from down the street, and I was always Sara and she was always Becky, because I had lighter skin than she did and I thought that was how it was supposed to be (in the 1993 film, Sara is white and Becky is black). It wasn’t until I got older (say, eight or nine instead of four or five) that I realized that wasn’t necessarily the way things had to be, and I learned it was acceptable to put myself in the shoes of a character who didn’t necessarily look like me.

What does this have to do with this book cover trend?

A lot of readers will take in the text description of the main character when they first come across it, but then they'll push it aside and put themselves in the situation instead. It's one of the fun things about reading. This lack of facial imagery on the cover is actually rather conducive to doing that, since the reader isn't stuck with a fully realized image of what the main character is supposed to look like.

I know that when I'm reading a really good book, I have a hard time slowing down enough to visualize everything, so if I don't have an established picture in my head, the MC looks like me, even if she's black or Greek or blond or red-headed or a green Martian with no hair. It's just easier to insert yourself into that character because the physical characteristics are less prominent. Which is probably one of the reasons the publishing companies do it so often.

The other reason? It looks pretty. One of the most beautiful trio of book covers I've seen is for the Matched Trilogy and what the poses tell us about the state of mind of the main character. They're gorgeous. Sometimes a pose is just a pose. Sometimes it's purely aesthetic.

But I doubt the industry is trying to weaken the feminine identity of the female teen masses. At least not most of them. I'm not worried, and I hope that when I'm published, I can have a cover as beautiful as the ones I've listed here.

- LA Knight