Progress Report: 2/16/09--2/22/09
Starvation
Word Count: 18,662
Page Count: 92
I accomplished THE GOAL for chapter nine, which was an odd little chapter to write and not one I think I'm entirely happy with, but hey, that's what first drafts are for, right? And then, it was time to write chapter ten. I started a draft of it and I wrote, and I wrote, and I wrote and I had close to 1800 words and I didn't wasn't done. I told myself that I'd end the chapter at a certain point, and I was ALMOST to that point, but I kept getting bored with the whole thing.
So I slept on it. Then slept on it some more, and realized I had a really big problem.
Starvation has evolved from some pseudo romantic-suspense-thriller idea I had back in sixth grade. That's right, SIXTH GRADE. I worked on it, of course, filling up thick notebooks as only sixth-graders can do, but I never finished a draft and I always started over. That's because I was in SIXTH GRADE. I shelved the whole thing during high school, thinking I'd get back to it one day in the future when I was grown up and could actually write it properly. Then I discovered the SF/Fantasy genre, and it looked like these characters would NEVER see the light of day.
But I got the idea for an urban fantasy, so I took these characters and their situation off the shelf and figured out what could translate. After the first translation, I had a fantastic idea that would really shape my heroine, so the whole thing got translated again. Through all these translations, there is one character who never changed, despite the very prominent and IMPORTANT story I had for him in the book.
The problem with chapter ten was this: this character who is my heroine's lover and a major function of the plot had not been introduced yet. I was almost 100 pages into what's likely going to be a 350 page book and the reader wasn't going to meet him until chapter TEN.
See the problem?
What happened was this: when I came up with my fantastic idea for the heroine, the love interest really didn't fit neatly into her world any more and I was having to bend backwards to incorporate him into the story, even though ultimately, the story is all about him. He absolutely needs to be in the book from the start. It's essential for so many reasons, and I had no idea how to put him in there. Until, of course, I applied the same formula to him that I did my heroine. It seemed like a great idea on the way to Domino's to pick up dinner, but I ran it by digitalclone for a sanity check, and she helped me refine it.
In the revised version of this draft in my head, I know how the love interest will effect the chapters I've already written. With that in mind, I proceeded to write chapter ten, and got it out fairly quickly. It's not perfect, and it's really messy, but that's the relationship these two characters have. Really fucked up and messy. Which has sort of put my brain into a tailspin, because from this point on, the story has to be tight with very focused and definitive goals for my characters, and I may need to outline this a bit just so I have a road map. I'm afraid it'll be too easy to just rush right into the climax and conclusion, and it's way too early for that. So I need to sit down, take a deep breath, and figure out what I want my chapters to do and what kind of psychological state of mind I want my characters in as the book progresses. The good thing is this, I just finished reading Kit Whitfield's Benighted, and it's really a great example of urban fantasy that doesn't follow the usual formula and does a lot of things I'd like to do in terms of quiet conflict and psychology. Maybe not to the same extreme levels, but this isn't your typical urban fantasy, and I'd like to think that my own novel-in-progress isn't your typical urban fantasy either. Maybe I'm kidding myself. :)
Anyway, that's enough for this week. Be proud that I resisted the temptation to DROP EVERYTHING and rewrite over half of my chapters in order to incorporate my new translation of the love interest. Though, all that willpower may be for naught if I do TNEO this year and join the novel group. But that's another post for another time.
Word Count: 18,662
Page Count: 92
I accomplished THE GOAL for chapter nine, which was an odd little chapter to write and not one I think I'm entirely happy with, but hey, that's what first drafts are for, right? And then, it was time to write chapter ten. I started a draft of it and I wrote, and I wrote, and I wrote and I had close to 1800 words and I didn't wasn't done. I told myself that I'd end the chapter at a certain point, and I was ALMOST to that point, but I kept getting bored with the whole thing.
So I slept on it. Then slept on it some more, and realized I had a really big problem.
Starvation has evolved from some pseudo romantic-suspense-thriller idea I had back in sixth grade. That's right, SIXTH GRADE. I worked on it, of course, filling up thick notebooks as only sixth-graders can do, but I never finished a draft and I always started over. That's because I was in SIXTH GRADE. I shelved the whole thing during high school, thinking I'd get back to it one day in the future when I was grown up and could actually write it properly. Then I discovered the SF/Fantasy genre, and it looked like these characters would NEVER see the light of day.
But I got the idea for an urban fantasy, so I took these characters and their situation off the shelf and figured out what could translate. After the first translation, I had a fantastic idea that would really shape my heroine, so the whole thing got translated again. Through all these translations, there is one character who never changed, despite the very prominent and IMPORTANT story I had for him in the book.
The problem with chapter ten was this: this character who is my heroine's lover and a major function of the plot had not been introduced yet. I was almost 100 pages into what's likely going to be a 350 page book and the reader wasn't going to meet him until chapter TEN.
See the problem?
What happened was this: when I came up with my fantastic idea for the heroine, the love interest really didn't fit neatly into her world any more and I was having to bend backwards to incorporate him into the story, even though ultimately, the story is all about him. He absolutely needs to be in the book from the start. It's essential for so many reasons, and I had no idea how to put him in there. Until, of course, I applied the same formula to him that I did my heroine. It seemed like a great idea on the way to Domino's to pick up dinner, but I ran it by digitalclone for a sanity check, and she helped me refine it.
In the revised version of this draft in my head, I know how the love interest will effect the chapters I've already written. With that in mind, I proceeded to write chapter ten, and got it out fairly quickly. It's not perfect, and it's really messy, but that's the relationship these two characters have. Really fucked up and messy. Which has sort of put my brain into a tailspin, because from this point on, the story has to be tight with very focused and definitive goals for my characters, and I may need to outline this a bit just so I have a road map. I'm afraid it'll be too easy to just rush right into the climax and conclusion, and it's way too early for that. So I need to sit down, take a deep breath, and figure out what I want my chapters to do and what kind of psychological state of mind I want my characters in as the book progresses. The good thing is this, I just finished reading Kit Whitfield's Benighted, and it's really a great example of urban fantasy that doesn't follow the usual formula and does a lot of things I'd like to do in terms of quiet conflict and psychology. Maybe not to the same extreme levels, but this isn't your typical urban fantasy, and I'd like to think that my own novel-in-progress isn't your typical urban fantasy either. Maybe I'm kidding myself. :)
Anyway, that's enough for this week. Be proud that I resisted the temptation to DROP EVERYTHING and rewrite over half of my chapters in order to incorporate my new translation of the love interest. Though, all that willpower may be for naught if I do TNEO this year and join the novel group. But that's another post for another time.