For the last several weeks I've been working on Dragon's Eye. Before the funny business with Silver I had started and completed 17k but had to put it aside to work on something else for a different publisher until the business with Silver straightened up or I got my manuscripts back. In the meantime, the details of the book in my head was going around and around. Ideas were considered, some were kept and others thrown away.
When I started working on the story again, I had decided that the story needed more than Tristans's POV, there was just too much that needed to get wrapped up and he couldn't be everywhere and I didn't want to "tell" what happened. So I decided to use Ushna's and Nikita's (Brian) POVs. I didn't think that would change the story too much but be able to go to places that Tristan couldn't.
The story starts out with Ushna's POV but where I wanted to start it kept giving me problems because I kept "telling" how Ushna arrived at his current situation. I scrapped the first chapters three times trying to find the place to start that felt right. I know it's right because the story flows, going forward instead of looking back and when I finall found it I could have wept.
So I began truly writing again, tacking on to my growing word count the 17k that had gathered dust on my hard drive. Only, when I finished Ushna's portion and delved into what I had written before, I discovered the two didn't match up. I had completely forgotten some details that I had original used. I picked through what was there, salvaging what I could, which really wasn't much. Five of the seventeen thousand words swallowed and gone because it no longer had a place in the story. Of the remaining 10k I removed another four thousnad words and what was kept worked really well.
Then Tristan's portion came to an end rather suddenly. I say 'suddenly' because in my mind there was still another chapter that I recall vividly that wasn't there. I search the electronic folders for other docs that could be holding the wayward chapters and found nothing. But I remembered writing the scene and I was looking forward to rereading what was there. The only thing that came to mind was that I didn't type it up when I finished. So I searched through my notebooks, which was a feat because there were several unfinshed projects but found it last night.
This morning I sat down to read it, and man, what a let down. I am not impressed. What had been sticking in my mind was very different. I don't know if I can use most of this because it doesn't jive with what now comes before. I'lll probably salvage a couple of sentences here and there but what happened in my head is way cooler and I'm going to use it instead.
I should've expected it. I'm a pantser. I have a list of things that need to be resolved but I don't plot. Getting from one scene to another is an unknown. When I introduced another's POV, it changed the course of the ball game. Plus I've had over a year to consider the different paths and the outcomes of follwing a certain route. I looked at the big white board that has held Dragon's Eye list of things that needed to be resolved and while reading throught it I had this moment of "what did I mean by that" or "no, that's not going to happen any longer" and then I erased it all.
I had this moment this morning where I wanted to stamp my foot in anger because of the 20k of the original manuscript, I only kept 7k. Sure the story will be better than if I had completed it a year ago. But that story I started writing a year ago is much different than the Dragon's Eye I'm writing today. Well, at least I hope so. :-)
Thank You for stopping by and reading!!
No comments:
Post a Comment