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Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Help, My Characters are Stalking Me!

During the last go-round of rewriting Reset, a new character knocked on my door. Really loudly. I mean, hammered. Now, she and her ever growing entourage refuse to leave me alone!

I am 30K (ish) words in to Rewind, a prequel to Reset, and I hate to admit, but I've hit The Wall.

It sucks, the story's weak, the plot confusing...The ever growing list of negative feed into my brain makes me want to quit, and these new characters, who fit nowhere into my plans, are urging me, pressuring me, threatening me to pay attention to THEM!

They're all there when I wake up in the morning, they follow me on my morning hike with my dogs, they sit down at the computer with me, whispering and scratching in my head...They come to bed with me, keeping me awake with their constant chatter.
I'm beginning to feel like the Verizon guy..."Can you hear me now?"


But, I need to keep on track! Finish what I've started....

Right?

Even as I type this post, I find myself scribbling scenes for these characters on the backs of my old business cards (hey, they are good for something). I discover that their story is NOT to be ignored. It feels too powerful somehow.

Am I up for it? Do I even have the skills, newbie that I am, to bring it to life?

Am I a failure for not finishing my WIP?

Will this be the story of my writing life: begin a novel, hit The Wall, give up and let myself be bullied and coerced into starting a new one?

I can't think of the answers right now, I have to research names, build a world, create a language...

Uh, oh, sounds suspiciously like Sci-fi, a 180 degree turn from the Paranormal Romance that Reset became as I revisited themes and 'What Matters' during my (many) rewrites.

Yikes. What the hell am I getting myself into now?

4 comments:

  1. I've had those days. I end up writing it all down in one setting as much as I can get out and I try to tell myself that it doesn't matter if it's not really cohesive as long as they're just out of my brain. For some reason once I see it all down they quiet down and I can focus again on how to weave all of their lives into the plot in a reasonably way. Maybe doing something like that would help :)

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  2. I think I'd rather finish it poorly than give up. Keep going!

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  3. It sucks, the story's weak, the plot confusing

    Here's your book: Write about characters who truly stalk the author!

    Orrrrrrr.... start a plot that gives you the power to stalk your characters, just to see what they're really made of.

    Okay. That's all I've got.

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  4. Great advice people! Just to banish any confusion, the characters who are stalking me are part of an entirely different world - so an entirely new WIP! I've begun researching and world-building...BUT I'm also SO CLOSE to figuring out how to fix Reset...So no ditching that one yet :) I'm getting pretty good at spending time with both casts of characters actually; asking them questions, observing what they might do or say in any given situation... Such fun!

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