Yōsei and Glossaries

~ crossovercreativechaos

Beware plotbunnies.

I feel like I can’t emphasize this enough. Plotbunnies are like the ancient Greek concept of the Muses; the original concept, not the lovely ladies flitting around in sheer silks the Romantics liked to paint. The Muses that drive a creative to exhaustion and madness, hounding them mercilessly until the Work is finished.

Yeah. Plotbunnies be like that.

Especially when they’re handing you an idea you don’t honestly think you can pull off. Elven ninjas. Why.

Greg Weisman could scatter gargoyles across the world in his cartoon, even in Japan, because all the cultures he involved had traditions of some kind of guardian statues. But elves? In Japan? Elves, not youkai? Augh.

Unfortunately frustrated plotbunnies will interfere with edits like nothing else. And I am trying to fill in gaps in the draft of Colors already written. So I engaged in some stray poking at lore of elves and fairies in tales I was more familiar with, to see if that might at least drive the stake of Does Not Fit Folklore through the plotbunny’s black heart.

Well.

If the organized Land of Faerie was a medieval European invention, as some researchers suggest, then before that were not Kings and Queens of Faerie, but local elves. As in, magical creatures who do have a civilization of their own, instead of being solitary monsters like kelpies and redcaps. Solitary monsters like youkai.

There is, in fact, a Japanese supernatural that does live in civilized groups instead of lone monsters. They’re called yōsei. Unfortunately I don’t know any more about them than what’s on the Wikipedia page. Yet.

But it’s a bone I can throw to the plotbunnies to gnaw on instead of me, while I get more work done. It’ll pan out for ninja elves, or not. If it does, it’ll probably be one of several words that I’ll put in a glossary.

Which leads me to an odd question. I’m going to toss it at all of you, in case you have any insights. Lately I’ve run across a few book samples that had their glossaries in the front, before the story. Granted, they were short word lists, but it was still jarring. Samples are short enough bits of story already!

I’ve heard that some writers are doing this because there were complaints that readers skipping to the glossary in the back made it count as an extra read of the book. Has anyone heard anything about that? Because honestly, the glossary in Colors is going to run a few pages and I do not plan to put them in the front of the book!

Anyone hear if people are really making a fuss about this, or is it a tempest in the e-reader teapot?

25 thoughts on “Yōsei and Glossaries”

  1. I haven’t heard anything about that – I usually read the glossary last, particularly if the story or book explains the words ahead of time. Having the glossary in front is, to be frank, annoying. I’d prefer to have it at the back of the book.

    :looks up yosei: Oh! They can be tree sprites? I wonder if those are the same ones as seen in Princess Monoke (though those appear to be called Kodannas…): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIMNe_HPdCs

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    1. Ditto on the glossary, but nowadays anytime I hear about some people complaining, I just chalk it up to whatever nonsense is going around these days. An author should be free to include, or not, a glossary and put it anywhere in the book. (If an author wanted to be really spiteful, I could see it be put in the middle like some books do with pictures, but I doubt it would actually happen.)

      On the yosei, I remember years ago looking up to see if Japan had the equivalent of fairies (though yokai are technically considered of the fae even if most are solitary.) Yosei, if I remember right, are considered the closest to what we consider fairy (though whether it is the European or the Celtic kind I haven’t figured that out.)

      And on elven ninja, we have so many stories about people ending up in the strangest of places, so it wouldn’t be a stretch that a group of elves ended up in Japan and adapted to the local customs.

      Oh! They could even be the reason for the stories about the mythical powers of ninja!

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      1. I’m hearing “Naruto characters are elves”. :D

        Although the idea kinda plays — dimensionally-displaced persons with small numbers but “exotic “super” abilities decide to “fort up” in “hidden villages” against being attacked/absorbed by the locals. Eventually become part of the cultural landscape, “exotic” but no longer “alien”. 

        Heck, the background lore of the Wichter series is basically an inversion of this, where the elves forted up against the invasive tide of humans.

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      2. There is a lot of Japan that is impassible mountains and skinny little valleys, so there could be people living in Japan who never even heard of the modern world.

        I mean, probably not, but there is room for it.

        Also hidden Christians, people who fled serfdom, peasant democracy rebels, and so on.

        So yousei “fairies,” sure.

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  2. I don’t think I read enough e-books that have glossaries, never mind see if there’s a new trend in putting them in front. However for fanfic I’ve seen both; though if there’s a LOT of words that need defining, the glossary always seems to be at the end. Typically, in the stories I read, the “glossary at the front” is usually “I am defining these 5-6 words/phrases here because they are going to be Really Important for context in the fic itself”.

    In an e-book, I’d say glossary at the back, and maybe a few of the super important words/phrases in the front, for important context. Such as “in this book terms such as a, b, x, and y are going to be used a lot and here’s what they mean”. Context clues are good but sometimes you just need to know the definition first!

    Also, tree spirits! Yosei sound very interesting, from the very scant information in Wikipedia.

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      1. The one I really hated was the book that peppered a few Scottish terms NOT because there was not an English equivalent but because it was set in Scotland. Except that it falsifies the speech — the Scots did not regard their own language as something strange, to be looked up in a glossary.

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  3. I’m going to have to dig into Yosei. I WI see if they might help underpin the mythology part of the w(n)ip.

    The thing I’m not sure I understand is what is the underlying goal of mythology? I should probably read up on that as well.

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  4. Mercedes Lackey puts her glossaries in the back of the book, and depending on the story she also includes the full songs that you might only read a stanza of in the story itself.

    It’s early and I barely remember what I once read about Yosei but I think they were vaguely Celtic flavor fairy in behavior? Not necessarily actively malicious or even trying to catch you in some fashion, it just happened sometimes.

    I’m aware that using the term flavor is a little strange but:

    Nixies, a German folklore bit that falls under Fairy, but they like to drown and eat humans.

    Russian Fairies actively and maliciously mean you harm.

    The Nordlands have Fairies that are more or less just there and rarely mean harm.

    Celtic Fairies ran the entire gambit of I’m just here, to I think I’ll play a few pranks on you, to my pranks have caused you indirect harm and I didn’t mean to/haven’t noticed (i.e. draining the farmers cows of milk and riding the horses into a frothing lather), to I absolutely mean you harm but it isn’t personal (say hi to the Kelpie), and I think that there were a few of the Fae that might have meant deliberate personal harm and knowingly did it.

    At the very best if I plumb the depths of my memory I read a book of Japanese folktales— in junior high, and there might have been a yosei in one of the stories? Something about a young lady (a minor noble or maybe a samurai’s daughter) who falls in love with a beautiful man she sees in a courtyard amongst trees. She keeps going back to admire this man and when she decides that she’s going to approach him she thinks a tree branch is a suitable gift given that she only sees him at the trees. He was a tree spirit and I think the branch she cut off was from his tree specifically. He immediately disappears into thin air and she never sees him again.

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  5. It’s been a while since I’ve looked at it, but I think the October Daye books by Seanan McGuire had a glossary at the front for the different types of fae. I remember it being fairly short with a pronunciation guide and maybe a sentence or two describing general traits.

    And note to self – add Yosei to the list of topics to looks up. *grin* And just when I got back from raiding my local library’s folklore section. Fingers crossed, I hoping that between the books on werewolves and their bibliographies I can find a starting point for researching rougarou.

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  6. I’d say glossary in the back. It’s less jarring, I can jot over that way if it gets too annoying, and if you stick a bibliography behind those than that will probably keep you from running into too many issues. Though I, don’t understand the nature of the complaint?

    Also if you have an explanation in story, the glossary is more of a quick reference guide, possibly pronunciation guide. And it also gives you a chance to expand it further in sequels if you need to.

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  7. Every glossary I’ve run into has been in the back of the book. But I don’t see why that would be a complaint?

    I’m at least smart enough to deduce what a word likely means from the context on the page.

    Anyone who can’t should be reading at an easier reading level.

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    1. One author that I’ve been following on ao3 says his muse is like a half feral house cat that he chases around with a broom. Either leaving a mess of ideas all over the place or trying to get it to go in one direction.

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  9. My view is that the things that might ‘justify’ an explanation of special words up front is for fiction a style that is not very marketable.

    If there is a preface, and skipping it makes the narrative impossible to follow, then maybe the narrative should have been written in a different way.

    I’ve been reading a lot of textbooks recently. The logic for organizing those can very much not hold for novels.

    Forex, I may deliberately read the preface because I am curious how the author thought the material might be organized for a class, or for what sort of class he thinks the book is appropriate for.

    For certain applied math texts, I am very happy to have a table up front explaining what Rho or Sigma mean in /this/ book. Or an involved explanation of the notation, and lower case versus upper case. I will happily deal with a ‘chapter one: mathematical preliminaries’, or ‘you probably already learned this, but if not, have some appendices’ over trying to pick up exact meaning from context from a few clues.

    For fiction, I care about pace more, and am willing to have directness and clarity sacrificed for that.

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  11. I will note, philosophically, that I have read a book about yokai and two of the story were “The Wolf And The Seven Kids” and “Hop O’ My Thumb.” Into the folk-stream, to be sure. Hop O’ My Thumb was now the oldest and not the small one — but the seven-league boots gave it away.

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  12. This reminds me of an AU Naruto plotbunny that never got off the ground. Short summary: Akatsuki does a ritual at that meeting place with all the hands(Keep in mind this was early on) It turns out that back in Iga/Koka days that they had petitioned Tsukiyomi for a Grand Spell. They would have a free land, filled with al the space they could live in. Some trusted Lords would be taken too. The price: They would never know lasting peace, and they would not have the “safety catch”, as our hostess describes it so well in Blades of Blood. The Akatsuki just busted the ritual site, and within 5 year, Earth is going to have eight continents.

    Naruto and Hinata are the only ninja who have any semblance of what people would call modern morals, but they would shank anyone daring to threaten family. Then some people with sticks try to kill people at the united briefing, and suddenly the Ninja have a target. Also Harry suddenly gets a call from Howe, Dewey and Screwem about a possible cousin found while he, Hibiki and Natsumi are fishing off Nagazora just before heading to Hogwarts for the first time…

    Where it got stuck was figuring out how to keep Hinata, Haku and Naruto in the same house. Also figuring out why the ninja aren’t using dirty tactics(Read a Naruto story where Hinata was going to be a honeytrap for Draco, of all people, up to marriage, which was binding in the Wizard world.

    Meh, PLOTBUNNY for Sale! Only needs a good home!

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  13. I’ve heard that having a glossary in the back makes it so the book doesn’t count as completely read unless folks page through it– this was given in the context of “don’t put the list of your other books in the very end, put it before the free sample of your next book so people will read through them both.”

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    2. <i>Oh.</i>

      *makes note to flip through previews if I liked the book, even if they’re not my thing/I’m about to go read the next one anyway/the book <i>inexplicably flipped me out to the review page before I could read the afterword</i>*

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  14. First comment, but I’ve been a lurker for quite some time! Really enjoy your work, so thanks for all of that 😀

    I know your books are in KU and I think that’s where the issue stems from. This article has a nice explanation of the 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0 iterations of the program for context:

    https://www.hiddengemsbooks.com/history-kindle-unlimited/

    An “extra read” doesn’t mean anything these days in KU 3.0. Let’s say a book is 400 pages in KENPC. If a reader goes from location 1 in the ebook to the glossary at the back, it will count as having read all 400 pages because of how reflowable text works.

    But then going back to location 1, reading to location 150, and going back to the glossary again does nothing. You will get paid for the 400 KENPC, or however far into the book a reader goes, only once. You don’t get paid in KU for re-reads by the same person, just like you wouldn’t if they bought the book outright and read it again.

    Will also add that Amazon absolutely kicks readers to the “review this book/go get a new book” pop-up after the text is finished for ebooks and often before any of the back matter is seen by a reader.

    Their goal is to get the person back to their platform to buy something new, and Amazon doesn’t care if it’s another one of your books or someone else’s (or not a book at all, since those are basically loss leaders for Amazon).

    One way to address this is to use a scene break in the ebook after “The End” that has a little spiel about your next book, or newsletter, or whatever else you want the reader to see. Using a scene break as opposed to a full page break means the reader will still see that content. Or, as you’ve seen, put the info at the front.

    I think it’s fine to have the glossary at the back like normal 🙂

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