Do What Needs to Be Done

Today I finally had some sort of breakthrough with writing. I have been pushing myself against every gut feeling and passion to continue redrafting knowing that it will soon become easier. It was excruciatingly similar to having a day job you just hate doing. It was that bad. Whatever happened to having fun when writing or writing with a passion. Well, I knew intellectually that redrafting is not the same as writing. With writing you let yourself go and set out into the world of the imaginary, essentially being master and commander of your creative seas. Redrafting is a different game. It's revisiting lands you're wildly drawn up before and snipping and pruning them to make it consistent. Writing is storming forward without looking back. Redrafting is continuously going back and forth interrupting reading a familiar story to let it flow better.

And because I don't like this process of editing (Damn it Jim, I'm a creator, not a word doctor) I kept on seeking out excuses not to have to do it. But Internet was down most of the week (hence also the few blog entries) so I couldn't seek out distractions online and I have already expended most of my creative energies painting a Klimt adaptation for Nancy's birthday and a World of Warcraft scene for my friend Tim - something I promised him more than a year ago. So I was stuck with redrafting. I felt depressed again and that's not a good frame of mind when working on your first novel. But like I said: I had a breakthrough.

I realized I need to listen to my instincts. And if I don't feel like redrafting, it doesn't mean I can't work on making the first book a better read. Huh? How does that work, you might ask. Well, redrafting is only one way of looking at the story. But I am also author of the plot and then the series plot. And if theirs something I love doing it's plotting (Mwua ha ha..says the evil mastermind). And by going over the plot, refreshing the top-down view of what the story of book 1 is supposed to be about and where it fits within the five book series as a whole, I get a better idea of the larger building blocks of the story. So I took a look at the monomyth of Joseph Campbell and rematched my chapters against each element. Because I'm running on 600+ pages and adding new chapters to accommodate different viewpoints I need to cut non-essential chapters. And by looking at where the book fits within the series I can decide to cut explanations about concepts, which I can then save for the following novels.

Here's an example. I originally had Simon following the kidnappers of his baby sister Sally through the outskirts of a fairy tale domain, meeting three new friends along the way and getting into trouble. Simon is holding an important magical artifact, which also is of emotional value to him and the bad guys are out to get. So I thought originally, why not have this item stolen and then found again, while showing off the magical powers of his friends and adding some danger of pursuit to the story. Well, as it is this takes in 4-5 chapters and as the fairy tale city, where they hope to find Sally is where the main action takes place, this lead-up is too long. It's gonna get cut. I knew this for sure today when I saw that of the 17 steps of the monomyth, this part of the story falls between the 3rd and 4th step, but is not essential to the growth of the character or strengthening of the plot. Better to just get him to the city, meet all the new friends he needs there and get to the 4th step. And the magic and danger: there's more than enough within the city walls. This saves me a lot of adjusting at a word level simply by editing at a chapter level. Like any good doctor though I do need to make sure I sew up the patient connecting arteries (character development) and leave all vital organs (story crucial moments) intact.

But now I'm happy to edit again. I've learned to spend my writing energies wisely by paying attention to the bigger picture, not just the smaller one.

*The monomyth involves the hero receiving a "call to adventure" – to leave the ordinary world which he has psychologically or spiritually outgrown. After passing "threshold guardians" (often with the aid of a wise mentor or spirit guide) the hero enters a dreamlike world – generally a dark forest, a desert, an underworld or a mysterious island. After a series of trials in which the hero eventually surpasses his mentor, the hero achieves the object of his quest (often an atonement with the father, a sacred marriage or an apotheosis) before returning to his homeland, bringing with him a spiritual boon.(more info)