Category: Thoughts

All the Claudia things

When the Age Matches the Face

| Claudia Victoria

When The Age Matches the Face

YA fans are pretty damn weird.

I mean, I would know since I’m one of those weird people. Hell, I love being weird. I own it. We own it. Damn fine too, if I say so myself.

I have accepted the weirdness (and the fantasticness) of the bookish community with everything I’ve got, loving the strange-as-hell conversations we randomly have to the mildly-threatening-but-still-loving ways we push our favourite books onto our friends. It’s what makes the book community amazing. Like, full-of-life amazing. Like, chocolate-cheese-cake-amazing.

But what I’m always perplexed about? The love interests we so dearly support.

Now, back up a bit. I’m not going to point fingers saying ohmigodheissogross or ohmigodwhyHIM? to any of the love interest options out there, but I’m just trying to point something out.

Let me list you some love interests:

  • the Darkling from The Grisha
  • Edward Cullen from Twilight
  • Prince Ash from The Iron Fey
  • Rowan Whitethorn from Throne of Glass
  • Magnus Bane from The Mortal Instruments and The Infernal Devices
  • Tamlin from A Court of Thorns and Roses
  • Raffe from Penryn & the End of Days

Notice anything? Aside from their massive (or at least large) fanbase made up of screaming fans that support them like hell, they’re also like a billion years old.

These love interests that have so many people swooning, fanning, and just plain loving them are probably five times older than their counterpart love interest. (Also, I’m sorry there aren’t any girls up there. I’m trying to think of immortal/female characters with super longevity, but there doesn’t seem to be many that I can think of.) And almost nobody bats an eye.

I mean, don’t you think that’s sort of odd? I do, and I support half of them on this list.

So what? you say, coming to defend your babies. They’re a hundred years, whatever. They’re still uber dreamy and soooooooo amazing.

Sure. But that’s when they’re looking like they walked out of GQ and haven’t aged a day past seventeen. What if they looked their age?

Let’s take Edward Cullen from Twilight. This dude is like a hundred years old. One fucking century. And he’s falling in love with someone who is basically a child compared to him.

Holy shit, anyone?

Sure, it’s super romantic. Of course it is. A lonely soul, never having found love his entire life until her. Our main character. Someone who is special enough to capture their heart and make them fall into love. Oh sweet, sweet, perilous love.

But again: if they looked their age?

I mean, I guess nobody bats an eye with this whole by-the-way-im-older-than-your-grandpa thing since they all look like teenagers, so who the fuck cares? I certainly didn’t when I loved Prince Ash and Tamlin. They look like they’re teenagers, so whatever, yeah?

That’s why I think it’s really weird. Because I’m really sure that if they looked like their age without all that Immortality4You moisturizer that they all use to look seventeen, and they fell in love with their love interests, I’m quite sure that we’d be a bit uncomfortable. Someone older than my grandpa and looks the part falling in love with a teenage girl? So totally gross! But if you look like you’re seventeen despite your clearly-not-seventeen age number? Ohmigod hawt.

I’m totally not hating against those love interest or their fans. Honestly, some of my faves are up on that list. But I’m just trying to voice out what I’ve been thinking for a while. This isn’t an attack on anyone, it’s just something that’s been swirling around in my brain. And I want to hear what other people think.

so tell me. what do you think of all this? does it not matter to you? would it change your perspective on the love interest if they didn’t look as young as they’ve been written, and instead looked like what they’d naturally look like (or at least what an ordinary person would look like)?

It’s All About The Villains

| Claudia Victoria

Its All About the Villains

You’ve got Voldemort, Snow, Kronos, this whole line of evil villains hellbent on doing something incredibly evil, or the driving force behind the hero’s pain. They stand as the opposite of everything our hero believes in, a dark shadow in their world. We hate them. It’s only natural.

Or do we?

Sure, there are villains out there we just despise with ever fiber of our being (think Umbridge, the witch.), but honestly? I rather like villains.

Villains carry so much weight in the story. They are one of the many pillars a good story stands on, and if you make them weak, the whole book goes crashing down. Who wants to read a book where the villain is essentially a wallflower who cowers behind a curtain?

They can make the story so much more interesting for the readers. I love complex villains because sometimes they make you fall in love with them, and you have to struggle not to justify every evil deed they do. Think of the Darkling. I love the guy. He has a charm around him that I love, and he’s not truly evil. He thinks he’s doing something for the greater good, even though his methods are less than stellar. He’s also, well, the Darkling. And even though he’s evil, I was still rooting for him and Alina till the end, evilness be damned. Of course I know he’s a bad guy, he kills people, which makes it a lot more interesting for me as a reader because I have to tell myself “bad Claudia. He will kill you. Baad.”

Villains can also add so many layers to the story. They help provide the conflict, serving as the Big Bad whom the hero must destroy. They challenge our hero every step of the way, helping him grow and change from start to finish. Sometimes the villain isn’t always 100% bad, and that adds the question: is he really the bad guy? Should our hero really be going against him?

There also wouldn’t be much of a story without a villain, an antagonist blocking our hero from their dreams. Why bother read a story where you know the hero’s going to win with nothing in his path to stop them? When a villain throws the hero in a bit of a loop, making his path a twisty-turny one instead of a simple line from Point A to Point B, it keeps the anticipation high because who knows what’ll happen next.

I know some people just don’t like villains, but I personally enjoy them. Some of them just have that charm that allows them to plant themselves in our hearts, and others are just so damn fun to hate, satisfaction flooding you when they get the sticking they deserve.

Villains, heroes, sidekicks, flunkies. They all bring balance to a story. Without them, there wouldn’t be a story.

What do you guys think about villains? Love them? Hate them? Don’t care for ’em? What are some of your favourite villains to love and your favourite villains to hate?

Defining Strong

| Claudia Victoria

Defining Strong

Let’s take a moment and define strong, shall we?

In Google, the first thing it brings up are these two definitions:

strong
adjective
1. Having the power to move heavy weights or perform other physically demanding tasks.
“she cut through the water with her strong arms”
synonyms: powerful, muscular, brawny, powerfully built, strapping, sturdy, burly, heavily built, meaty, robust, athletic, tough, rugged, lusty, strong as an ox/horse

 

2. Able to withstand great force or pressure.
“cotton is strong, hard-wearing, and easy to handle”
synonyms: secure, well built, indestructible, well fortified, well protected, impregnable, solid

… and those are definitely good meanings. Pretty spot-on. And this is evident when we say “strong heroes & heroines” we conjure up the image of fierce warriors, strong and brave in battle. But I want to talk a bit about a different kind of strong.

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