Hello! M here.
I have a little story/update for you:
Until a few days ago, the revisions of my novel were coming along smoothly. Sometimes, I could revise a whole chapter every day! Each scene, including the end of the book, was clearly planned out in my head - all I had to do was write it. Now, one hundred pages in, I have come to a novel writing crossroads.
Before I met with this challenge, I had already planned out that one of my main characters was going to die at the very end of the book. I clearly understood all the relationships between my characters, and how they were going to change leading up to, and after this death.
Now, another idea, one that could (maybe) create a brilliant (or at least pretty good) outcome to my novel, has burst into my head. The only problem is, it changes the dynamics of all the relationships in my novel and the outcome leaves room for a second book, which I'm not sure I want to write.
The reason this situation demands a second book, is because it leaves the state of the romantic relationships between my characters uncertain. I've been working on this novel for over two years, and I'd really like to work on a new project sometime soon. But, I do love my characters, so a sequel is something I might want to think about in coming years. Basically, the change is that instead of one character dying, it's another character who is not as close to my main character.
So, here they are, the pitfalls of my supposed brilliance now that I am in the late stages of working on this manuscript:
1. Because I've already written the end of the book (when I wrote the first draft), and I really like it, I don't know if I want to make this switch which could affect the enitre manuscript.
2. As said before, another book might be needed.
3. I don't have time to work through things, and wait until the end to decide who's going to die - if I change the ending, I have to start changing the relationships between my characters at this point in revising.
4. I don't want to cause a bout of writer's block at this point in my story, and my indecision about what to do at the end of my book could put a block in my way.
5. The new idea leaves me not understanding the relationships between my characters, especially the romantic relationships.
I think I need to expand on pitfall #1 a bit:
I looove the way my book ends currently. I wrote most of the ending in one day - almost in one sitting! The ending nearly brought me to tears to write, because of the death, and I don't want to lose that emotion by making a different character die. Because of this death, the end of the book is a funeral. If the character who dies is changed, much of what happens at the funeral will need to change as well, and the last scenes will need to examine the dynamics of the relationships between my main characters at the end of the book, rather than how they're coping with the death. That right there is the biggest challenge, because I don't know how I want things to end for my characters.
What got me into this situation is something you may have heard writers talk about before: when characters have minds of their own. When I created these characters, the things that I wrote about them doing, such as the way they reacted to situations, and the way they intereacted with eachother, often came naturally. One character started to fall in love with another character, which lead me to the idea of the different ending. I know this sounds odd, but when you work with characters for a long period of time, they become so real that you can't ignore what they're trying to do for themselves, which may not be the same thing you intended for them to do.
Last, how I'm going to fix this:
The honest answer to the question of how I'm going to fix this is, I have no idea. I have a few options, but I think the option I may have to go with is the dangerous one - to pay attention to the characters entirely, and don't plan ahead to much. I'll let the relationships that want to expand, expand, and, in the end, when the time comes, I'll see who I think should die. Of course, one of the major things I will be doing to figure out a plan, is having long conversations with the other group members about this problem, to try and talk it out. Sometimes, when you have other people ask questions about your work in progress, it helps you sort out some things in your brain.
Whew, that was a long post. I know it took a while, but I think it's something I needed to talk about, mostly to explain my own experiences and how I got into my current situation, but also to get our blog readers thinking about problems in their own manuscripts, and how to solve them.
I'd love to hear advice from you about how to solve this problem, or about problems you've had with your writing, and how you fixed them.
Thanks for reading,
-M
I have a little story/update for you:
Until a few days ago, the revisions of my novel were coming along smoothly. Sometimes, I could revise a whole chapter every day! Each scene, including the end of the book, was clearly planned out in my head - all I had to do was write it. Now, one hundred pages in, I have come to a novel writing crossroads.
Before I met with this challenge, I had already planned out that one of my main characters was going to die at the very end of the book. I clearly understood all the relationships between my characters, and how they were going to change leading up to, and after this death.
Now, another idea, one that could (maybe) create a brilliant (or at least pretty good) outcome to my novel, has burst into my head. The only problem is, it changes the dynamics of all the relationships in my novel and the outcome leaves room for a second book, which I'm not sure I want to write.
The reason this situation demands a second book, is because it leaves the state of the romantic relationships between my characters uncertain. I've been working on this novel for over two years, and I'd really like to work on a new project sometime soon. But, I do love my characters, so a sequel is something I might want to think about in coming years. Basically, the change is that instead of one character dying, it's another character who is not as close to my main character.
So, here they are, the pitfalls of my supposed brilliance now that I am in the late stages of working on this manuscript:
1. Because I've already written the end of the book (when I wrote the first draft), and I really like it, I don't know if I want to make this switch which could affect the enitre manuscript.
2. As said before, another book might be needed.
3. I don't have time to work through things, and wait until the end to decide who's going to die - if I change the ending, I have to start changing the relationships between my characters at this point in revising.
4. I don't want to cause a bout of writer's block at this point in my story, and my indecision about what to do at the end of my book could put a block in my way.
5. The new idea leaves me not understanding the relationships between my characters, especially the romantic relationships.
I think I need to expand on pitfall #1 a bit:
I looove the way my book ends currently. I wrote most of the ending in one day - almost in one sitting! The ending nearly brought me to tears to write, because of the death, and I don't want to lose that emotion by making a different character die. Because of this death, the end of the book is a funeral. If the character who dies is changed, much of what happens at the funeral will need to change as well, and the last scenes will need to examine the dynamics of the relationships between my main characters at the end of the book, rather than how they're coping with the death. That right there is the biggest challenge, because I don't know how I want things to end for my characters.
What got me into this situation is something you may have heard writers talk about before: when characters have minds of their own. When I created these characters, the things that I wrote about them doing, such as the way they reacted to situations, and the way they intereacted with eachother, often came naturally. One character started to fall in love with another character, which lead me to the idea of the different ending. I know this sounds odd, but when you work with characters for a long period of time, they become so real that you can't ignore what they're trying to do for themselves, which may not be the same thing you intended for them to do.
Last, how I'm going to fix this:
The honest answer to the question of how I'm going to fix this is, I have no idea. I have a few options, but I think the option I may have to go with is the dangerous one - to pay attention to the characters entirely, and don't plan ahead to much. I'll let the relationships that want to expand, expand, and, in the end, when the time comes, I'll see who I think should die. Of course, one of the major things I will be doing to figure out a plan, is having long conversations with the other group members about this problem, to try and talk it out. Sometimes, when you have other people ask questions about your work in progress, it helps you sort out some things in your brain.
Whew, that was a long post. I know it took a while, but I think it's something I needed to talk about, mostly to explain my own experiences and how I got into my current situation, but also to get our blog readers thinking about problems in their own manuscripts, and how to solve them.
I'd love to hear advice from you about how to solve this problem, or about problems you've had with your writing, and how you fixed them.
Thanks for reading,
-M
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