Friday, June 15, 2007

Ack

When I stopped last night I had 32k, this morning 24k and had come to the realization that I suck at writing suspense/mystery.

Maybe I'll be able to write it with another book, but the direction I'd taken Accidentally Were? in was not, n. o. t. not working. Oh I'm sure If I'd kept plugging along I would have made it work, eventually. But my plans for the secondary characters in this book were slowly flickering and dying a dull death as I mired myself down in a storyline I had no idea how I was going to finish, let alone be able to carry on in the plans I'd jotted down for a second book.

Folks who've been reading this blog for a while will know I've only been writing for since Jan 06, and I've not studied literature/writing/English studies etc etc -- by trade I was a Dispensing Optician until I came to the US, so the only thing that has in common with writing is making sure you can see what your doing with the pencil -- so I've not had a lot of time to find 'my style' or my genre. Though I think, after spending a long time thinking about it as I lay awake, tossing and turning because last night my legs would not stop and let me fall asleep (yeah, this morning, don't get on my bad side, your likely to loose a limb), that I've figured out (and those folks that have read my books are probably going to go, ahh, duh! Of course you do) that I'm best at writing storylines that are character driven.

Now because I've no clue as to what all the different catch phrases mean, and saying character driven no doubt means something else, this is what I mean : I write stories about the journey of two (or three or four) people as they figure out that they are pretty damn good together. Emotional journeys, not got to join together and fight the big bad evil dudes, or flights of fantasy save the world/galaxy/universe, or find the mystery killer who's hunting me because I saw something I shouldn't stories. Thats not to say that I don't think I can create say a science fiction setting to set my story in, just that it wouldn't be the next Star Wars, more like the next Blue Alien and the Yellow S'mort'snerks next door and why being sooo good together is so bad.

ROFL, I've just had a thought, I'd write a killer category romance. Guess I should really write something for Harlequin Spice or Blaze huh? *makes a note on her mile long list of places to write and submit a story to*

But I digress, but then again, this post is nothing but a verbal diarrhea digression because hubby doesn't really give that much of a rats arse, and he was mostly asleep last night when I was burbling this anyway, and I really needed a space to figure out what the hell it is that I'm doing.

What am I doing again?

Oh thats right, trashing about 10k, editing out the references to said 10k in the previous parts of the story and going back to what I'd originally planned -- A funny as hell story thats much to close to real life about a woman who gets magically knocked up and turned into a Were Bear, and now has to tell her daddy -- the Judge -- that she's a single, unwed, about to be mother only dating the guy who shagged her.

See, I couldn't even get the storyline I'd been working on last night down to that succinct of a sentence (and yes I know thats one giant, rambling run on of a sentence, but it's still a hell of a lot shorter than what I'd come up with for the other idea). Despite the fact it was pretty depressing waking up knowing I'd be deleting this big hunk of work (and there will be some things salvageable out of it), I've now got it figured out. Damn you guys are good!

How much do these sessions cost, btw? And is there any chance you're getting a new couch anytime soon, cause let me tell you this is the lumpiest psychiatrists couch I've ever sat in!

2 comments:

Susan Helene Gottfried said...

It's better to realize this when you only have 10k words to trash than to wake up when the book's done and wail, "I have to junk it! Two year's of work and it's all garbage!"

And besides, it sounds like there's a lot TO save in there.

You're doing the right thing. Follow your gut.

Anne D said...

Thats what I decided. Up to the point where I tried to merge in the 'intrigue' portion of the story it was kickin' butt, so its better to realise there was a problem this early on, and get on with more of the funny stuff!