Just Forget It

I came back, after a relatively long break, to working on my novel, A Barber of Great Renown, today. I read through the final chapter, to get back into Larkin's voice (it's all first-person, near past) and then wrote for a solid few hours. I walked away feeling fairly well pleased.

Then I realized that I had let one of my supporting characters progress the plot in such a way that several--and we're talking major--scenes were actually superfluous. I could cut plotlines, I mean we're talking a major elision, all because I forgot not what I planned to have happen, but rather how I planned to get my character on his way to Point C.

Now what do I do? Is it better that things be shorter? My husband would probably say yes. I've been told I go on; it's been said...

Or do I go back and chop off the final few sentences I wrote, so that I can add the few plotpoints I meant to put in?

...I pace around in a low blood-sugar huff. That's what I do. Twice-bedamned novel, as Larkin would say.

Tagline Update

It came. Bounced it off the hubbers and it stuck. Drum roll, please...

Tightrope's tagline is:

If you're gonna fall, fall slow.

Slow Cooker

About a week ago, I got the go-ahead from Nick to get my hopes up about a project I've been cooking since August. We're planning to start layout and armatures in May, so I've got until then to get it written and polished up.

Working title: Tightrope, with The Illusion of Height in close contention
Length: Either one two-part book or two small books, 300 pages total

"What's it about?" they chirped eagerly.

Okay, here's were things get messy. I'm on a roll with the writing, but I don't have my nuggets ready to go.  I'm struggling to come up with a boildown and a tagline.

I spend a lot of my professional time doing copy writing of this kind, so I'm feeling doubly-stumped; not wanting to devote the energy and surprised at how much energy these little piece seem to want to take up. Sometimes it's hard to remember that the marketing aspects of a piece require inspiration, too. It'll come, it'll come.

I'm not letting it stop me, though. I finished the first draft of the first act last night and act two's on the block this evening.

Never Ever

I just finished reading a webcomic (I'll save which and my feelings thereon for a review post) wherein the male lead risked getting shot in the head. It made a lot of sense, as far as I could tell as a first-time reader: It would have solved a lot of problems, in most of the characters' minds, and would have certainly punched up the action a bit.

Of course, he was the male lead, so as I read along and saw his defenseless head cradled in the female lead's arms, I knew that he was not going to be shot. There was, I assumed, going to be a twist where shooting him in the head no longer became a reasonable solution and lo, I witness swathes of exposition that explained this twist and made everything okay for the leads to have their lives and get married and all that. Happy ending.

Don't mistake me: I didn't really want him to get shot in the head. I thought the character was well-written and I was feeling girly enough that I was hoping for some more romance (although watching this particular illustrator stretch her wings and draw some gore--clearly something that doesn't interest her--would have been nice). I don't like twists for the sake of twists. And some of my stories have happy endings. I find tragedy interesting, but not, again, for its own sake.

But just so we're all clear, if I had been writing this story, I would have very seriously considered having my male lead get his brains blown everywhere. It's not like there wasn't a twist coming anyway, but predictability is beside the point. I wouldn't do it for shock value, or because it runs against what's expected (reactionism is just as deadly to the creative impulse as plot armour). I would do it because the man holding the gun believed it necessary.

My characters are never, ever safe. Not from each other, and certainly not from me.

If it makes the most sense in the story for something horrible to happen, for one of my characters to be cruel or cowardly or simply snuffed out while they're crossing the street, then it happens.

Yes, I put the gun in his hand, but then I asked him what he wanted to do with it. If he answers "Shoot that dandy in the head," I only have two options: Go back and find a way to take the gun out of his hand--make him a different man, in essence--or let him pull the trigger.

Pretty It Ain't

The biggest misconception about blogs is that they actually enable laypersons (such as myself) to become webdesigners. I started out with the best of intentions: "I just need a web presence where I can categorize my writing for public display. I don't care how it looks." That went the way of the dodo in about a minute, and now look.

Blogs aren't magic websites. In fact, like most "you don't know what you're doing but that's okay" interfaces, a lot of design function gets limited/bulky as stupid user assistance gets priority. Which is fine, as long as you align your expectations accordingly. Remember, all these pretty tools are there to make you think you're a webdesigner. But you still aren't. Real designers don't use or need these interfaces--frequently the objects of scorn and frustration--because they have real skills. But you don't. I don't. So my site is blue, and after work, I'll have to pester my husband to drop in some HTML for me.

Hello World

It doesn't have to be perfect... but by God, it had better be good.