Conversations continued, or why pantsing is never as simple as you think...
Sometimes I feel like I have a lot of nothing to start with. With my latest book I knew exactly two things at first. I knew my heroine was moving across the country, and I knew that she'd rediscover her vacation romance. I also knew I wanted to somehow include my recent trip to Israel in the story, but I wasn't sure how I'd do that, when the story itself takes place in Seattle. Since I write contemporary, I don't have to worry so much about historical accuracy, but I do have to worry about not making everything TOO coincidental.I had a lot of trouble getting going, as I'm used to talking out some of my plotting points before hand. After a long coffee with Dona, I was able to pinpoint some of the more important details like what kind of business she's in. Important, since that's why she's moving. I also found out why her brothers are so overly concerned, and what really happened on that trip to Israel. What I came out with was about 2 small pages of handwritten notes that I keep forgetting to look at! But the story bud itself is good to go. Devora convinces her brothers to let her open up a branch of the family PR business in Seattle, 2000 miles away from their home office. Since her father died, they've taken the "watch over your sister" a little too seriously. Before the move she goes on a mission to Israel, and has a brief affair with Seth. The first spontaneous things she's ever done in her life. But it's safe, right, since she's leaving and will never see him again. Except of course that when she arrives in Seattle, she finds herself up against Seth in a bid for a large account, one that could either make or break her career. Somewhere in there I need to get the sparks flying again, and I need to insert the secondary storyline about her best friend's marriage.
I did something a little different with What Happens in Israel, Stays in Israel, and sent the first 50 pages to Serena, to get an honest opinion about what was working and what wasn't. Usually I save all the revisions until the end, since it's my least favorite thing to do. But I also figured that since I'm conciously trying to write a bigger book, I wanted it to start off with a bang, and give me somewhere to go. She sent me back fantastic feedback about the overall story, and specifically what needed to be beefed up, moved around and what was missing. Like my hero's motivation in all of this. Which was of course missing, since I didn't really understand him that well. I ended up "interviewing" him during an acupuncture session, to try to find out what makes this guy tick. Of course, now I have to remember it all.
Of course, even armed with all this information, I still have to figure out what to do with it all. That's part of the adventure, in my opinion, when you're not a full-on plotter. You have all these bits and pieces to weave together, but no pattern to work from.
Make sure to come back tomorrow for the next installment which brings us a misunderstanding, and begins to answer the question, "What is funny?"
Labels: writers aren't crazy, writing
posted by Erin @ 3:42 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home