[writing|process] More work on Original Destiny, Manifest Sin

[jaylake]

I really need to come up with an online icon for this book.

Spent a bit of time yesterday mapping the timeline and structure of Original Destiny, Manifest Sin. I've realized I'm going to have to approach this book differently from any of the other 20+ first draft novels I've ever written. With the partial exception of Madness of Flowers, I have

Comments

[joycemocha]

Hmm. Trying to remember if it was Franz Boas or Ruth Benedict who really first articulated the Apollonian-Dionysian duology.

It's interesting because I'm contemplating a similar process with Netwalk's Children. How do you represent the thought processes of a child exposed to outside personalities in utero? I don't want to take Frank Herbert's Dune tangent and have my character swing toward evil, as he did with Alia. I think that was a rather misogynistic copout in some ways. But--Bess isn't going to think in the same way as most people. So--yeah. I don't think that book is going to be very linear at all in the writing.

[voidampersand]

On the Original Destiny side: Brigham Young and Henry David Thoreau.

On the Manifest Sin side: Samuel Clemens, steamboater, miner and journalist. William H. Brewer, scientist and explorer. Abraham Lincoln, railroad lawyer. John Wesley Powell, farmer, soldier, geologist and explorer.

[danjite]

FWIW, I am pointing others to this as I find your discussions of process fascinating.

[jaylake]

IS all good with me.

[klwilliams]

No female perspective for Manifest Destiny? I think you're missing a good opportunity if not.

[jaylake]

Yeah, I think you are right. Who, though?

Re:

[klwilliams]

Annie Oakley wouldn't be a good enough contrast. Sacajawea may be a good choice. For a left field choice, someone like Mary Hallock Foote (Wallace Stegner plagiarized a lot of "Angle of Repose" from her).