One major plot point to go, and about a week and a half to do it in. I got lucky on the deadline – my editor is on vacation, and while he will be back June 1, he’ll be spending his first few days catching up. So as long as I get the ms. to him by the end of that week, I’m good. This is an enormous relief, as I have to spend Memorial Day weekend helping clear out the lake place that Dad is selling, which means I’ll lose a minimum of two days’ writing time…and just now, that’s HUGE. Having those extra couple of days means I get that time back.
I still have a fair bit of tidying up to do with the already-written part of the ms. – there are a lot more blanks than usual where I need a name for a settlement or spear-carrier type, and just kept going rather than stopping to make it up. These are people and places that don’t actually appear on-stage, but I still need or want a reference; mostly they’re of the “We stopped at X to water the horses and went through Y three days later, before we arrived at St. Jaques du Fleuve…” type of thing, and unfortunately I can’t just pull random names out of a hat, or use most of the existing real-life place names, for a variety of story-related worldbuilding reasons including differences in who’s doing the naming of the settlements, their ethnic make-up, and so on. At some point, I’m going to have to sit down and generate a bunch of different likely settlement names from a variety of different backgrounds, so that I have them ready to hand when I need another one. Not this week, though.
This week is for the transition into the final major plot point, followed by getting a good big start on it. I may possibly cheat, which I normally can’t do. The Frontier Magic books, being a sort of memoir style, have a lot more narrative summary than I usually use, so I may end up summarizing a couple of the scenes I have planned and then fleshing them out later when I have the first draft turned in. I mean, my editor is sure to want changes, and it’ll take him a while to read the ms. and get back to me, so I might as well use that time to my advantage. (Don’t tell him I said that!)
What’s driving me crazy at the moment are the specific details. I’ve known since forever that a spell blew up here, but exactly which spell? Doing what sort of damage? To whom? I know that they’re heading back out into the settlements, but not along the same route, so I need some more settlement names…was this part settled by Prussians, Iberians, Gauls/Acadians, Scandians, or by “put together” groups that mixed all sorts of backgrounds? Because the settlement names, and the names of any settlers they run across, need to reflect that. Who else is going along on this trip – I know there are more people involved than just my main characters!
This is where “what happens next” becomes the most completely useless question in the universe. Because I know what happens: they talk about X, decide to do Y, discover Z on their way to do Y and head off to investigate, have problems A and B while investigating Z, extrapolate and implement Q, which mostly works, such that they head back with C and lots of motivation to do what I want them to do in Book 3. (And yes, I know what X, Y, Z, A, B, etc. are; I’m just trying really hard not to spoil things). It’s the details of exactly what they say about X, who and how they decide to do why, what the weather’s like on the way to Y and Z, what all those settlements are named…that kind of stuff that’s the problem.
Well. A week and a bit to go. Onward…
Yay Progress!
This is where “what happens next” becomes the most completely useless question in the universe.
I hear ya.
I am *finally* unstuck. Only took me three months. The vital piece of information – after going through everything over and over again – was to realise that one of the characters was in the wrong place. He went and swapped with someone who had to be there for plot reasons in the _first part of the scene_. Then he did something underhanded and unexpected, another character reacted to it, and all the things I knew would happen or would partly be explained *and which made no sense* are falling into place like a giant jigsaw.
And I knew that my protagonist had come to a certain conclusion which will set up a future scene etc… but I hadn’t known *why* – which meant that basically my protag would have encountered a problem, stood there, thought deep thinky thoughts, and come up with the perfect solution.
She’s still thinking too much and in my next draft I want to anchor her development more in actual plot, but for the time being, I can live with this.
Good luck on getting it done!
I have a similar timeframe on a very different project – I need to complete a literature review about a plant subfamily, and complete a set of six GIS maps that sort of go with it before 4pm this Friday in order to graduate from college. Yipes!
Yay for extended deadlines, and there’s nothing wrong with cheating if you’re the one making the rules. Since it’s your MS. that means it’s your rules to break. Good luck with the final week and a bit!! 😀
Oh, good luck! I hope you get everything sorted. 🙂
I don’t know whether reading that you, a career novelist, are having this problem is encouraging to the rest of us or not… 😉
Good luck! We’re all routing for you nonetheless!
Just wanted to let you know my eleven year old daughter is jumping around in excitement to know that the book is getting close to finished. Good luck!
Everybody – Thanks for the good wishes! I’m in much better shape today than I was 24 hours ago; we’ll see if it lasts.
Alex – Everybody is allowed to complain about their job; it’s in the Bill of Rights somewhere, I’m sure of it! (Actually, think of it as a cautionary tale. Life happens, and it’s much too easy for even the most experienced writer to get a little too distracted and end up in a crunch situation.)
Glad to hear you’re in better shape! And yes, I’d decided to take it as encouragement. 😉
Echoing the ‘good luck on the book’ chant! It’s fun to read your plot outline, and thanks for not spoiling the book. I can’t wait to find out what C is 🙂
I love that you are blogging your program, and definitely appreciate you taking time out of your day to update us! 🙂 I would totally be the same way with deadlines – they kill me as it is, and I can’t imagine having the dedication and fortitude that you do to buckle down and get it all done! I’m excited to hear your first draft deadline is coming up so soon for purely selfish reasons – the sooner the first draft is in, the sooner the second draft can be done, and so on. For your sake though, I will say, “Stupid June 1st, coming too soon!”
Rachel – Thanks, but I do take time out of my day to do quite a lot of things. Laundry and dishes feature prominently… Seriously, there are very few writers who can sustain an “all day, every day” work style. My brain burns out after a couple of hours, and I need to go knit or pet cats or walk around the lake or something before I can get back to it.
Oh, I figured that. I am most appreciative of you taking time away from cat-petting and the like. To be honest, since I work all day on a computer, whenever I am at home and not-working, I dread having to get on a computer, even for fun stuff. For me, I would imagine that writing about writing would be almost too much after actually writing, whether it was for an hour stretch or 8. But that is why I am not a writer, I suppose. 🙂 I have neither the dedication nor talent.
Good luck on your deadlines! It’s too bad, though, that you’re so good at not giving away your plot; I have barely got the faintest idea what it’s about! 🙂