There, I said it. It’s official.
This time I plan (at least at first) to do things completely differently.
Whereas last time I did NaNoWriMo, and wrote pretty much “by the seat of my pants” (though, to be honest I had the structure of the original tale to keep me on track), this time I’m attempting to plan before I write.
Jay bought me the Snowflake software when it was $20, so I’m experimenting with that. I’m finding it’s hard for me to flesh out my characters before I’ve seen them in action, but I’m chipping away at it, wanting to give this method an honest go.
Seeing the issues I’m having with the Lindorm novel that’s currently wrapping up, I want to learn if I have fewer of those with more rigorous planning. I’m also riding a bit closer to the original model (the folktale) than I thought I might.
Mainly because it’s easier to identify conflict and motivation when it’s less subtle. Those girls, at least as far as I’ve painted/pegged them so far, are beyond my ken.
And I hope this story will be less complex then Lindorm. But we’ll see.
I have the three brothers pegged in a very traditional manner, and I hope they will still be interesting for all that.
The princess is not your witty She-Ra that populate so many fantasies. I suppose I am prosaic enough that I don’t trust the portrayal of women who are set forth as anomalies despite the fact that that world produced them.
*pah* Foolishness.
This is not the popular heroine, if I may use my own awareness of popular heroines as a guide. I thoroughly dislike “strong” women who are strong primarily in contrariness, rather than in contribution. But I suppose this will come out in anything I write, whether my heroine is contrary or not.
What a writer is intellectually, morally, spiritually, emotionally will radiate through the work, like light on an overcast day in which there is no visible sun, so that all things appear illuminated equally.
–Joyce Carol Oates, from her essay Reading as a Writer
At this moment this feels like a very comforting surety.
I’m not sure if this is a true quote or something from my own mind, but If we must be hanged, let us be hanged for the truth is how I feel now. I don’t know how it will be taken, this Water novel, or the Lindorm one. But they will be true, as a story can be true, and I feel quietly comfortable in that.
Stepping off the cliff again.
It really is quite exciting to me, and I welcome your prayers.
They will be with you.
How does the Lindorm?
Is this next another story based on a fairy tale?
This is a three-sons adventure based on Grimm’s The Water of Life.
The Lindorm is coming back from a (paid) editor soon, and per my dear husband’s guidance I’ll be sending it to my “open door” editor once I’ve made the necessary corrections.
Necessary as in, I’ll not attempt to correct everything that’s un-perfect about it. That’s too overwhelming, and there’s too many ways to look at it.
I’m just going to clean it up, submit it straight to editor with my “get out of slush free” pass I got from a writers’ conference some years ago, then put the thing “under my bed.”
At this point I feel I’ve done as much with it as I can for my maturity level. Both my husband and my editor-friend feel that I’ve begun to over-think the whole thing, and I’m telling myself I’m ready to move on.
Because, if this is really what God wants me to do, there will always be a next novel.
Very exciting! I am curious to see how the planning affects the rest of the process.