Drawing from the Well
Queries Sent: 1
Total Queries: 14
Scenes Arranged: 0
Total Scenes: 227
Dammit if I can’t get a scene written. I’m REALLY going to try today. I did get a query sent and researched another agent, though Query Manager is showing he doesn’t accept my genre right now which contradicts the website. I’ve got a question into him. We’ll see what happens there.
Filling the Well
Elegy: Page 76 of 89
1984: 18%
Yeah, I didn’t get any real reading done yesterday. But I’ve got a really good reason:
Polishing the Well
We did it. We saw it. I laughed, I cried, I cheered, I jeered, I gasped, I smiled. This movie was everything I wanted it to be. That’s all I feel like I can say without spoiling anything so just go see it. Even if you only have a passing interest or enjoyment of Marvel movies, this one is for the books.
Well Chat
When Your Story is Built on Sand
This is where it starts to get scary. Foundational doubt is that sinking feeling you get that something is wrong at the heart of your work. Your premise is off. One or more characters don’t work. It’s just wrong. It takes a hard look at your work to even realize that the doubt has set in this deeply, but once you see it, you can’t ignore it.
This happened to me after Draft 2. I did some reading about the craft of writing and learned A LOT (much of which I’ve discussed in this blog already). But even when I finished the draft, something felt off, something with Meibor. See, before I started writing the novel in earnest, I wrote short stories from three characters’ perspectives to get a feel for who they are (I intend to do the same with future stories). One of those was Meibor and he was a badass. But the Meibor I had written in Draft 2 was (and this is looking at the writing retrospectively NOW, not then; I’m harder on myself now) a compromising, toothless murderer. He acted like a child. That was not the character I had written in his short story and it wasn’t the character I wanted him to be or even who he was in my head.
So I went back to the drawing board. That’s what you have to do with Foundational Doubt: set aside what you’ve already done and reimagine things. Instead of considering earlier drafts as history, consider them as practice. Think about who the characters are inside you, who they are meant to be, and, frankly, who they want to be. Put yourself in their shoes and think about what they would be doing at the beginning of your story and throughout. Each time they have to make a decision, what decision would they make? Why? Let those questions and answers inform the character’s…well, character to create a real person.
As for foundational plot issues, again, go back to scratch. Don’t think about the events that you’ve written, think about the events you’d LIKE to write. You probably know some key events like the climax and maybe the midpoint and dark hour of the soul. Use those. Start figuring out how to connect to them from earlier or later points in the story. FEEL the story instead of guiding it. The right plot will come to you and it will be informed by your characters’ choices.
To fix the foundation you have to WORK on the foundation. So if you doubt is this deep and unsettling, roll up your sleeves and get to work.
May the tide carry you to safer shores.
BSG