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osprey_archerI have been toying with the idea of trying to write a novel, again, because apparently I am a glutton for punishment and didn’t learn any lessons at all from the last four I tried to write. And I ought to add a fifth in there: Sage also, my magnum opus of last spring, collapsed in an ashen heap.
My kingdom for a plot!
Supposedly if you just keep writing a plot will appear unto you from the ether, and presumably this does in fact happen for a lot of people, but this has not ever worked out for me.
I wrote ~70,000 words last year in the novel about Sage, and I love Sage and her friends and their small town, the problem is that the story never exactly moves forward. It just kept expanding outward, in a sense: it became a melange of subplots, Sage and Her Relationships with Lots and Lots of People, Chiefly Her Friends But Also Her Parents, Her Sister, Her Favorite Teacher Who Doesn’t Like Her, Her Least Favorite Teacher, the Boy She Has a Hopeless Crush On, the Editor of the School Newspaper, and Sundry Others.
This is not a story. There is no way to bring this sort of thing to a satisfactory conclusion. I must become mistress of my subplots.
***
Fun fact: I have yet another idea for a fantasy novel about empire and colonialism and culture clashes and possibly theocracy, although no slavery this time, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition. And by yet another I mean like “ten more,” because apparently all my fantasy novels are about this. including the one about the princess imprisoned in the tower who brings to life an origami bird that eats a frickin’ forest and then, grown to monstrous size, comes back to break her out. Presumably it will eat the shingles off the roof, thus obviating the “So why is she imprisoned in a tower with a window large enough to jump through?” problem.
And then...and then what? I have the first scene written (why yes, this is a tragic plea for a reader); but I know from experience that if I don’t know where I’m going, I won’t get anywhere; and I don’t know where to go. I don’t want to plot a “And then Princess Arenyay bel Nessanen takes vengeance, VENGEANCE on her enemies” story.
My kingdom for a plot!
Supposedly if you just keep writing a plot will appear unto you from the ether, and presumably this does in fact happen for a lot of people, but this has not ever worked out for me.
I wrote ~70,000 words last year in the novel about Sage, and I love Sage and her friends and their small town, the problem is that the story never exactly moves forward. It just kept expanding outward, in a sense: it became a melange of subplots, Sage and Her Relationships with Lots and Lots of People, Chiefly Her Friends But Also Her Parents, Her Sister, Her Favorite Teacher Who Doesn’t Like Her, Her Least Favorite Teacher, the Boy She Has a Hopeless Crush On, the Editor of the School Newspaper, and Sundry Others.
This is not a story. There is no way to bring this sort of thing to a satisfactory conclusion. I must become mistress of my subplots.
***
Fun fact: I have yet another idea for a fantasy novel about empire and colonialism and culture clashes and possibly theocracy, although no slavery this time, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition. And by yet another I mean like “ten more,” because apparently all my fantasy novels are about this. including the one about the princess imprisoned in the tower who brings to life an origami bird that eats a frickin’ forest and then, grown to monstrous size, comes back to break her out. Presumably it will eat the shingles off the roof, thus obviating the “So why is she imprisoned in a tower with a window large enough to jump through?” problem.
And then...and then what? I have the first scene written (why yes, this is a tragic plea for a reader); but I know from experience that if I don’t know where I’m going, I won’t get anywhere; and I don’t know where to go. I don’t want to plot a “And then Princess Arenyay bel Nessanen takes vengeance, VENGEANCE on her enemies” story.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-02 11:26 pm (UTC)ME, TOO. Well, except for the again part. I just want to get the story I have done. I've got about 40,000 words of crap that I started years (I can't remember how many) ago, and I just want to actually turn it into something. I think this will involve mostly rewriting it as I go, because I'm 90% sure there's nothing salvageable in there except the general outline.
I don't have a lot of story ideas, just one or two, and I'd like to get one of those into something that resembles and actual book. But I've been thinking about it a lot lately, and thinking about the themes that I like writing about in fanfic, and what I'm good at writing, and they all fit this book, even though I didn't know it at the time I started writing it.
no subject
Date: 2013-02-03 05:03 pm (UTC)(Completely OT, but have I mentioned how much I love your default icon? Just seeing the lovely light on her hair adds a little jolt of happiness to my day.)
no subject
Date: 2013-02-03 05:12 pm (UTC)