...or misplaced it. But it turns out it's just the killer combination of two jobs, full-time re-training, three kids and not enough sleep/too much angst. Because I seem to remember having the beginning of this thought back during the last quarter break.
I finished the beginning!!
Not a huge accomplishment, but...it was missing. I never write beginnings until I'm halfway through because I can't see where to start until I'm almost there, and that probably doesn't make sense.
The winter quarter starts soon, but I've been pushing hard enough to carry myself over the hump. This is the damnedest rs. Once I let go of plotting I discovered I actually do have enough for a single h/h set of arcs.
When I first started writing I liked Suzanne Brockmann's multiple-arc structure because my writing "ran" too fast and I like secondaries. Not that I regret Fallon and Corlis. But I couldn't figure out how to get from "short" to long, and I don't mean in a 20 vs. 60k way, but a 60 vs. 90k way. In other words, I wanted to go from barely (minus Fallon and Corlis) having enough for a Harlequin RS, to single title and it was driving me nuts.
Not that this is a structure post, but more...I dunno, a confidence post? I kept looking at my favorite writers--Bujold in particular. There's a beginning and an end, and a middle that sort of grows with no clear points you can actually "look" at and say, "there--that's what's going on", and it makes perfect sense, but so much of it is up in your head emotional the action is just a framework. When Mirror Dance came out Bujold said it was the inside of Mark's head.
Sometimes you have to look back on stuff you already know to realize the answer was there all along.
5 comments:
My confidence has needed boosting, as I try and make decisions about an essay, and this is helpful. Thank you. Finding the right beginning is a pain, or in my case, I need to allow the one I like best to be the right one...anyway, thanks again. :o)
lol, Deanna. Sometimes I wonder if I make sense to anyone. :) It's good to know I do.
Your writing, btw, is beautiful. Like a Pulitzer waiting to happen. I wish I could write like that, but I can't. Too much pulp fiction growing up. *sigh*
I'm amazed you get any writing done at all with a schedule like that! I'm impressed.
What you said about finding the beginning makes perfect sense to me.
The beginning of any story is almost always the last thing I write. I have to know where I end up before I know how I got there. :)
I like the way you think, Hailey. :)
One of the hardest writing lessons for me was the understanding that even the most hard core science fiction had to have an emotional basis. It's no surprise that Bujold should have a seamless quality that relies on the readers emotions to work.
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