"It's the dedicated writer who analyzes their work along the way and says, "Yeah, this isn't working" and either goes back and revises because they see the story has potential or moves on to something different because they've made a step forward in their writing and can see that the previous story doesn't have potential."
So, on NaNo Day 14, I didn't write. Instead, I took a big step back and considered the big picture. I had a lot of things to do around the house, including yard work that needed to get done while the weather was clear. I used the time, while I was involved in tasks that didn't take a lot of brain power, to just think about what was and wasn't working in the story.
Some of the questions I asked myself were: Did the story still have the kind of potential to make me want to continue writing? Were the characters right for the plot? Was the plot the right one? If I changed the plot around and/or replaced characters, what aspects of the concept did I want to keep? Should I admit that this was just the wrong story, chuck it and start from scratch?
I concluded that the underlying idea of the multiverse was a good one. I'm keeping that as the backdrop for the story I think I wanted to tell all along, but just couldn't recognize it. The new plot doesn't fit the current main characters. They'll have to go. Who knows, maybe they'll show up in a different story one day. I think it's telling that once I came to this decision it only took me a day to flesh out the new Hero and Heroine--something that it took me weeks to do for the old H/H.
NaNo is working for me in ways that I'd hoped, but was skeptical, deep down, would actually occur. I'll keep the word count, because, well, I did write them. Even better, I've learned from having written them.
NaNo Day 14 Words: 0
Total NaNo Words: 9741
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment