Concept to Creation

I’m going through my long-neglected stack of “follow up on” stuff today, and I came across a note from a friend of mine, in reference to a proposed presentation:

“I’d like to hear about how you take your story from concept to plot.”

Yes, well, that one didn’t get used for the presentation in question; but I saved it for a later blog post. And here I am. So. How do I take a story from concept to plot?

Uh… I’m suddenly remembering why I never used this as a blog post topic before… I’m just not one of those folks who remembers where it all began. And none of my notes are dated, of course… I don’t know what came first, except that the older stuff is almost always in green or blue, because I was perpetually out of black ink back then…

…but pushing on regardless, let me turn to my notebooks and freewriting files to see what I find by way of clues. Let’s see. Well, the forerunner to the Children of the Desert series was a book I titled Kingdom of Salt, based on the conceit of a religious faction whose fortunes rested largely on a salt mine, a woman finding her way as a freewarrior (mercenary) in a male-dominated world, and the guy she fell in love with along the way. The girl has a stern and angry father, a little sister who worships her, and a mother who tries to keep the peace.

The major criticism from my readers was that it felt like a stereotypical “white-euro-medieval world” and that there really wasn’t anything interesting about the setting.

Well, that’s a challenge, innit? I took it up. I developed a historical timeline. Much of it has shifted or changed since then; a few of the early entries:

Humanity settles in the fertile, lush southlands, where several rivers run to make a lovely valley area. Tribal, nomadic structure, no permanent living arrangements, climate mild and temperate.

Yes, well, that’s very standard. I do remember using that part very deliberately, because I saw no point in reinventing the wheel.

Humanity starts migrating north; the Deep Desert is rapidly becoming uninhabitable…tribal structure falters, old customs and lore are altered or lost.

Still not very unusual.

Tribal leaders give way to single, strong leaders who begin battling for control of larger areas. Bright Bay established. King Ayrq combines warring factions and towns by brute conquest. Not a pleasant man, but effective.

Right. So, at this point I was still very much in the “normal routine”. The rest of this set of notes read the same way; a simplified version of our own history. There is not a single mention of anything truly supernatural going on. I have lots of notes about political structure in “current day”, noble titles, taxation, and trade–but not a word of the ha’reye or the ha’ra’hain. Where the heck did those come from?

Ah. Here we go. In a set of notes on the flora and fauna and geography of the area, I see this note:

Jungle: Found to the extreme south, past the Great Desert. When the drought of almost two thousand years ago caused the Split, most tribes moved north; a few went to the south and entered the jungle. …the jungle has become forbidden territory for reasons long since lost. There is some indication that the tribes moving to the jungle may have held an unusual ability to master their bodies, and possibly denied the existance of any gods at all…

Hmmm. That looks like the beginning of the ha’reye concept. Another set of notes, referencing “the rough map I sketched out”, says:

People had to leave the deep desert area … there remain seven huge fortresses, built of enormous blocks of a strange stone that is only found in the mountains to the east. … On Kingdom maps, the area below the desert is marked as “demon lands” … according to the old legends, the fortresses were erected to guard against the dangers of the far southlands, and the desert area dried up because the demons were trying to gain the land for themselves and wanted the humans to leave. Or maybe to weaken humans and make them easier prey. Or maybe because they like dry desert land and wanted to make themselves a place to live. …some legends say there is something tremendously valuable in the middle of the deep desert … a secret fortress guards this item against demons and humans alike.

Then it goes into a discussion of the southern and northern gods, which has stayed pretty much the same throughout the subsequent drafts. But there’s still nothing specific about the ha’reye and ha’ra’hain. It’s all legends of demons and myths of evil, divisions of politics and details of religion.

Ah–here’s an exercise where I decided to describe various areas of the “world” through all the senses, and the Jungles were about what you’d expect, except towards the end:

Taste: Sharp. Stinging. Humid. Fetid. Don’t eat anything here…unless you know what you’re doing, which nobody but the inhabitants do…and they don’t teach outsiders.

Spirit: It’s hot, it’s oppressive, but everything else about this place could be borne if not for that horrible sense of being watched. Not by the animals or insects … but by something invisible. …only madmen venture into this rainforest, and they are never seen again–although a pile of stripped bones are often found neatly stacked at the outer verge of the forest some time later.

Ah. There we go. Something afoul in the Jungles, is there? And what about those stone fortresses? How the hell are they getting water and supplies? There are still people living there, yes? So how are they surviving, let alone maintaining any political power at all? By that time I was working on what would become Secrets of the Sands, and I had to ask, also: just what is so special about a desert lord, anyway?

And the answers all began to connect… and the answers provided plot points to string into stories. For example, if there’s a conflict between various of the desert Families, and another between the Families and the northern kingdom, there’s inevitably going to be one person designated (willingly or not) as the target for mutual displeasure, or who is targeted as the “opponent” of one of the other side. And if that person is an arrogant, broody, pissy young man who seems to have a gift for irritating people… who has the perfectly legitimate gripe of being the lone survivor of a horribly murdered Family… all sorts of interesting things start to happen around him. But because he’s too self-absorbed in his pissy mood to see those things, it takes a sidekick PoV to let the reader see them… and since this guy is a loner, the circumstances under which he’d take on a sidekick would have to be pretty strange. As would the sidekick.

That’s one possibility for how it happened, anyway. I can’t say for sure. Tomorrow I may unearth a set of notes that completely contradicts this theory. But then, I’m a writer, not a self-archaeologist! 

I hope this amused you, at the least, and gave you the confidence to keep working with your notes, adding layers and seeing potential in even the blandest euro-medieval story. It’s in there. Just keep digging at it.

 

The Slutty Writer

“To write a book you have to have a weird maddening mix of impossibly high standards and slutty low, low standards. At the same time. The whole time you are writing.” –Heather Sellers, Chapter After Chapter

I just turned in my third book. More precisely, the complete-overhaul-revision of the third book. Which makes the third time I’ve turned this particular storyline in to this particular publisher.

The first time, I was told that the novel had too much going on (I agreed) and to split it into two separate books (I did). Alyea, Deiq, and Eredion’s POV sequences were published in March 2011 as “Guardians of the Desert”. I sorted out the other POVs, tidied them up and gave them a facelift, and resubmitted them as book three.

The story of that version is here. (Go ahead, refresh your memory, I’ll wait.)

So this version, this third version, this third run past editorial eyes…I tore it completely down to the ground and built it up again from scratch. It’s the same story, if you look at the bones of the plot; the same basic things happen. But how they happen has changed. There’s a small example of what I’m talking about here. There’s a lot more depth, a lot more complexity, a lot more intentional braiding and minor thread storylines worked throughout.

(And unintentional braiding. One of my test readers, looking at the index card timeline chart I have spread out all over the dining room wall at the moment, told me I really needed to publish the series timeline as an appendix in this book, because the overlap of how things are happening in different areas at the same time fascinated her. And I agree–because there are coincidences of timing that I had no intention of setting up, but which are truly neat nonetheless.)

I’m very proud of this version. I’m very confident of it. I’ve cried and laughed while writing it. I’ve made my test readers laugh–and cry–with it. I think I done pretty durn good on this one.

Is it perfect? Not a chance. Not a bleepity bleepity chance. But it’s good enough–as opposed to the previous version, which I told myself was good enough–but wasn’t. Quite.

Another quote, from the same chapter as the above quote:

“You can’t call it Good Enough until you have stretched yourself, dug deep, pushed yourself, and really truly … given the book everything you have. You haven’t pretended to be dumber, lazier, simpler, busier, faster, smarter than you are … When you give it everything, everything, there are still going to be flaws. And that’s when you say, at the very end of the day, Good Enough. Good Enough isn’t settling. It’s celebrating the truth.”

I know without a doubt that my editor will find at least one glaring, ohmygodstupid mistake and a host of other tinier ones. I know without a doubt that when the book is finally published, there will be a dozen tiny typos that myself and the editor both missed and will be very embarrassed over. I know without a doubt that when people start reading the book, some will love it and some won’t “get” it and some will hate it.

But I didn’t go safe on this one, which was the main flaw of my “older” writing style (from five years plus ago). I stretched and I dug and I pushed way harder and deeper than I’ve ever tried to do before. I hope it will be an amazingly, mind-blowingly great book to some readers. It will absolutely fall flatter than a lead pancake for others. But I gave it everything I had, and I totally believe, minor (and normal) glitches aside, that it’s solid. I did my best. I did what I could. And at the end of today–that’s Good Enough.

Tomorrow … well, tomorrow’s another day…

(Oh, and if you’re curious, Heather Seller’s web site is here. She’s a freaking genius. Go read Chapter After Chapter. Invest in a copy. My copy has a permanent home on my bedside table when I’m deep in a project.)

And if you’re struggling with doubt as to whether your writing is good enough: it is. JUST KEEP GOING.  :)

 

Guts Everywhere, Or, A Revision in Progress

Most of you know by now that I’ve been frantically revising my third book, tentatively titled Bells of the Kingdom. (If you don’t know that, then check out the post about it here.) And I’ve had to slow down a bit on it, since “frantic” doesn’t work when Life comes to visit with a sledgehammer and the Guns-and-Roses album “Appetite For Destruction” as a soundtrack…

So…

I’m still working through the revisions. I am very, very close to the end–but I’m not done yet. Which irritates the hell out of me, because I wanted this done by Thanksgiving. Or at least Christmas. Or maybe New Year’s. But then there’s that sledgehammer still whacking at me…

(As a side note: Facebook’s got nuthin’ on pneumonia as a massive time-sink.)

Anyway. I decided that the least I can do for my patiently waiting readers is offer a leetle taste of what’s going on behind the scenes here at Book Three Revision World. Therefore, thusly, and so: a bit of Prologue.

The Original

Start with the bells. There were always the bells.

Kolan thought that sounded like a good way to begin his memoir. He didn’t plan to write it for another twenty years, but the line flowed well; and surely by that time he’d have something interesting to write about.

More interesting than the life he was supposed to be illustrating, at any rate. There was nothing very worthy about Tenedal, Head Priest of the Arason Church fifty years ago, in Kolan’s considered opinion. Nothing exciting had ever happened to him. The book about Tenedal’s life held more verses from the Holy Books and genealogy tables than anything else.

Kolan knew his own life would be far more memorable. Readers of his story–or, well, listeners, as surely a bard would memorize the tale one day–would be captivated, right from that beginning line about the bells.

Problem With The Original

I really liked this beginning, and it was awfully hard for me to let go of it. In the original version of this scene, Kolan hears a commotion outside and looks out the window to see what’s going on. Turns out there’s a guard contingent out there, sent by King Ninnic to investigate rumors of witches in the Arason area. Kolan hangs out the window to watch and gets caught by grumpy old novice-master Dernhain. Kolan winds up in trouble for leaving his work. And so on.

I liked it. There were all sorts of funny bits, like the lines introducing the Head Priest:

Head Priest Hagair stood as tall as the captain and rather wider. His thinning grey hair, heavily wrinkled face, sun-spots, and perpetually sunburnt skin gave him the appearance of a diseased tomato.

At the moment he appeared to be a very angry diseased tomato.

But…it was also really long. Over four thousand words, just for Kolan’s part of the Prologue. The entire Prologue was closer to nine thousand words. That was way too long for a Prologue–the point of which was to deliver some vital backstory information before the main current-day story gets rolling.

My publisher (oh so gently) suggested a fresh approach with the revision as a whole: Try writing it from scratch, she said. See what happens. So I reread the entire prologue, thinking about what I wanted to accomplish–i.e., what’s the point here? –and I came up with the following (which is still draft, mind you, although a fairly polished draft; I make no commitment that this is exactly what will be in the final published book!):

The New

Start with the bells. There were always the bells.

Late summer air, heat-hazed, thick, and sticky, clung to Kolan’s skin. Through the wide, arched window he could see the Arason Church gardens spread out in shades of green, white, and gold: there a row of midseason peas, over further lines of summerbeans; another, taller section was corn tasselling into a frayed, delicious mess.

His mouth watered, just looking out at that last item.

Reluctantly, he brought his attention back to the parchment in front of him. An accounting of the life of Tenedal, it read. Head Priest of the Arason branch of the Northern Church, 1090-1111. He studied the graceful writing without enthusiasm, then reached for the quill.

With delicate care, he copied the line, his writing stark and clumsy compared to the sample above it. A large blot marked every other letter. He sighed, set the quill aside again, and looked out at the pale blue sky. A large horsefly rattled by, circling, searching for a place to settle; Kolan sent it spinning back out the window with a well-aimed slap and a silent apology to the Four.

Improvements

Now the scene has moved from “telling” to evocative description and action; there’s a strong sense of setting (in Arason) and time (late summer, sometime after the year 1111); there’s a definite sense of character (Kolan is a young man trying his best to be obedient and devout). I bring up one of the underlying themes of the book, as Kolan broods over whether harming a life form as insigificant as a bug is really a sin against the holy dictate to “harm no living creature”:

What purpose a horsefly or tick had [in the eyes of the gods], Kolan couldn’t begin to guess.

And when that commotion arises in the courtyard, Kolan wavers–but stays put. He was told to copy that line until he produced a flawless version, and “right behavior”, if I may use the term, demands that he shut out the distractions of the outside world and concentrate on the work at hand. His dedication is rewarded–sort of–but then that reward gets him into a heap of really bad trouble.

So now we know that his faith is important to him, however senseless or boring the task may seem: and that ties in with his later actions in the current-day story. There’s a clear sense of the Arason Church as a beneficial and semi-autonomous organization, very unlike the main group, led by Rosin Weatherweaver in Bright Bay during the same time period. After reading this Prologue, readers should be able to understand why some northern characters (such as Halla, in Secrets of the Sands) are totally baffled by the hostility of southerners towards the Northern Church as a whole. It’s an important conflict to set up and it’s one that informs the book and the series.

The revised Prologue is just under four thousand words total, of which about 2,600 involve Kolan’s direct POV. It’s more active, punchy, and paced much faster, without all the infodump I had in the original version. While I’m a little uneasy about including a Prologue in this book, since I didn’t have one in the first two books, I do feel, strongly, that this brief flashback is the only way to give the reader vital information about stuff that happens in the main story.

We’ll see what my editor says… In the meanwhile, what do you say? Which version did you like better? Why? Have you ever tried the “start from scratch” approach like this, and how did it work for you? I’d love to hear about it….

Until next time, namaste–and keep writing!  8)