Unexpected journeys

I'm struggling. Not with the writing so much though - that seems to be flowing just fine. No, the problem I'm having is, actually driving my story. Characters keep doing things I wasn't intending, and meeting people I didn't know existed. And I'm finding it hard to reign them in and get them to the place they need to be. 12 chapters into the book, it's still only 5 or 6 days into my characters' lives. I thought I'd be well away from here by now.

Last night, I decided that I didn't need to figure out a way to bridge a gap of 3 months which I thought I had to do. One of my characters had a hysterical meltdown that wasn't planned for her (in fact, this was supposed to happen to my other protag, much later on) and that changed the landscape to a degree. So now things I thought were going to happen much later in the book, can happen now. But before that can go ahead, these damn characters need to stop going on tangents with their diving coaches or their best friends. Are you listening Tony and Lucy?

Do any of you have trouble with wayward characters? Do they keep sending you off on unexpected paths?

Discomfort...

A while ago I posted about a book I'd read that was written in the third person present tense and mentioned how wrong it felt. I also said I'd have to try writing something in that style to see how it felt to write. I used to have first person present tense until I tried writing it and now I'm completely comfortable with it. In fact, my new book is entirely first person present tense....

But I digress.

So I wrote a short story, just a 2K quickie, in third person present tense. I don't love it, and have to say I struggled with how to do it, but I finished. I'll have to leave it for a while now, and go back to it, see if reading it later makes me feel any better about it. It seems awkward, and I found myself groping for how to refer to the protagonist.

While it's definitely not something I plan to do often, I like the idea of stretching myself out of my comfort zone.

What do you do to stretch yourself as a writer?

Something I haven't done in a while...

It has been several months since I last submitted a story to a publication. I had four out at various competitions, and last week they announced the winners and I was not among them. So my stories were freed up to be submitted elsewhere. I spent a few hours last week trawling Duotrope for likely venues, and today I submitted all four stories to a variety of different places. My submission tracker didn't know what hit it! The three pieces that are still languishing there, waiting for responses from the respective publications perked up and noticed they had company.

It felt good to do that. Hopeful. I've managed to publish almost a story a month this year, so hope to have an even better success rate next year. Although, I'm not sure how much time I'll have for short fiction with three novels in various stages of completion and revision. I'm going to work my butt off to get at least two of them polished and ready to go after Christmas. Then I'll be able to focus my attentions on polishing (hopefully not finishing) the book I'm now close to 30K into.

And how is that going, you ask? Well, I'm not sure. I haven't been going back to read what I've written because I know if I do, the temptation to start editing will be overwhelming. So I can't say whether it's a spectacular pile of poo, or something with some literary merit. I'm just plowing onward, hoping that at some point I'll crash into my ending... An appropriate analogy, given my book is about a car wreck!

Has anyone else made any submissions recently? Any responses yet?

Halfway!

About an hour ago I hit 25K on my NaNo novel. That's halfway to the required 50K to be a winner. And it's only 10 days in. Phew! I hoped to get to this point, and I managed. I'm rewarding myself by coloring my hair. It's been this awful washed out shade of pink for about a month now, but in about, oh... 20 minutes, it will be back to the shiny, bright, bright red it usually is.

I'm not going to rest on my laurels though. I knew before I started that this book would be closer to 60K than 50 when finished, so I'm actually aiming for that. But there is a very good possibility I won't finish the book in the month. I felt like I was plodding through it, so rather than get bogged down, I went ahead and wrote a pivotal section that will come toward the end of the book today. And it happened for me. I wrote about 6K today, maybe a little more. I need to come to terms with the fact writing in sequence just doesn't work for me.

I think it's because I work in film. I'm used to scenes, and tend to write scenes, focusing on the pivotal, big emotional or action packed ones first. Only once I have a series of these scenes, do I feel ready to try and link them. In a way, I guess it's like an outline, although I've never thought of it in those terms. And I often like to write the ending early on, almost like a goalpost to aim at. I haven't done that here, mainly because there are three different directions the ending might go, and until I figure out which one works, I'm not going to write it. But I think I know which one it's going to be. As long as neither of my protagonists screws it up for me.

Does anyone else work this way? Care to share your own weird and wonderful writing methods? I'm sure everyone attacks a story a different way.

Excerpt

I gave in and re-started my NaNo novel and things are progressing much better now. I feel in control of my story and having done all that noodling in the first three days, I have some good background material to use for flashbacks, or just as character notes for myself. I'm at 18K and feeling pretty good. Hoping to hit 25k by Wednesday night, which should be do-able - so long as I don't oversleep like I did this morning. Lost my whole per-breakfast writing hour.

So, since I don't have much to blog about (nose to grindstone and all)I thought I'd share a tantalizing little bite of the new WIP...

So far it's called 'Untitled YA Project' but I'm working on a more permanent title along the lines of 'Following the Taillights'.

Please bear in mind this is a very early draft, and I'm only giving you a couple of pages here...

CHAPTER 1
Lucy

The darkness is absolute. For a moment I’m not sure if my eyes are open or closed. I strain to push the lids up, but they are already wide. It’s dark. Not a pinpoint of light penetrates the space I’m in. Something covers my mouth and nose, making breathing difficult. My lungs burn for air, but I can only suck tiny mouthfuls through whatever smothers my face.

I turn my head, crying out as a magnificent bolt of pain shoots through it. I waver on the edge of consciousness for a moment, wavy gray lines wafting across my vision. I struggle to keep my wits, what’s left of them, about me, fighting the darkness that threatens to crash over me. When I’m certain I won’t pass out, I reach out my left hand, trying to find something to hold onto. My fingers play over some small objects, pebbles perhaps, that skitter away beneath my touch. I reach further, wrapping my fingers around them. Prickles of pain course through my fingertips. Not pebbles. Glass. Small, sharp shards of glass. Safety glass, perhaps.

Using my scored fingertips, I drag myself forward, an inch, maybe two. A huge weight behind me pins my legs to the ground. I can’t move them, can’t even feel them. I raise my head and see light. Not a lot of light, but light. Red light, bright at one end, dull at the other. I know what this is. I do. I can hear my heart thumping in the side of my head, can almost hear the gears of my brain creaking as they try to make sense of this weird red light.

A taillight. I let my throbbing head drop as a reward, a surge relief passing through me at this small achievement. It is a taillight. But why is it up there? What is up there? And if that’s up there, where am I? The questions whirl dizzyingly around my skull. What day is it? I struggle to remember. What did I have for breakfast? My eyes fix on the taillight, broken I realize, staring at it as if hypnotized. That’s why it’s brighter at one end.

More light. White this time, sweeping in an arc across me. I blink, dazzled by the brightness flooding over me. All around me I see fragments glinting in the new light, tiny jewels strewn across what I can now see is a road. The yellow line is inches from my nose. Why am I lying in the middle of the road? I try to drag my other arm forward, wanting to raise myself on my elbows for a better perspective on the world. It won’t move. Pain rocks through my shoulder, my chest and courses up my neck into my still aching head. The heavy metallic scent of blood hangs over me. When I glance back down at the road, I see the yellow line is smeared with red.


So, what do you think?

Finding the story

So I'm over 10K into the NaNo novel, but I haven't hit my story yet. I think this is the problem with writing in sequence for me. If I'd stuck with my usual writing style, I probably would have written the scene where Tony hears the news of the crash first. Then worked from there. With writing in sequence, I've written almost 6 chapters now, and gotten nowhere near the crash. Hell, we haven't even heard about the wedding yet!

I know this probably sounds really confusing because you don't know my story, but it doesn't matter. I'm just ranting to try and clear my head. I have to try and get this book on track. I'm pretty sure about 90% of what I've written so far is a waste of time and has done nothing for the book (except maybe helped me find my voices).

The question is, do I scrap it now, and start from somewhere else, or just keep going and hope I drive right into the story soon?

Progress report...

I promise I won't do this right through NaNo, but I'm incredibly proud to have gotten over 5K written so far. It's not as impressive as some of my buddies, but they're not wrangling full time work and two little boys. I have the day off tomorrow and sincerely hope I can top 10K by the end of the day. Then I'll be able to relax a little.

So is what I've written any good? I don't know. I feel kind of like my first two chapters were feeler chapters, a way of finding each character's voices. Neither went the way I had planned in my head, but I was prepared for that. Writing in chapters is strange in a way. I feel like I have to write and resolve a conflict in each chapter, then set up a new goal for the character before the end. And it's not always easy. But I think I've found both Lucy and Tony's individual voices and am looking forward to seeing how they react when I dramatically change the worlds they are currently comfortable in. But first I have to write through some scenes showing their relationship prior to that change. Probably 3 chapters away from the big INCIDENT. I'm afraid that's too far into the book, but imagine I'll be trimming a lot and changing a lot in revision.

The way I usually write, I'd start with the INCIDENT then work both ways to write a beginning to lead up to it and a way toward the ending. By writing in sequence, I'm kind of aiming for the INCIDENT, and haven't thought out the aftermath much. I'm assuming by then I'll be so intimate with my characters, they'll show me the way.

Does this sound promising? Or a hopeless mess? How's your NaNo experience going - if you're participating of course...?