Growth

I’m finally at the end of a draft 2 rewrite of one of my books, and something that’s come up a lot has been growth. My main character is a supervillain who’s slowly going to reform over the course of several books, so the little signs of her growth arc at the end of book 1 has been fun to poke at. Coupled with a book that has a lot of really good character arcs, and a few shows that also show interesting change in characters, this is something I want to spend a bit more time thinking about.

Read more: Growth

“Growth” in a character can mean a lot of different things, and it’s not always a positive. Sometimes characters grow by learning to be worse versions of themselves. I personally like a positive change arc, but villain arcs are also a lot of fun. Watching the villain steadily give in to their worse impulses more and more can be really compelling.

From what I’ve seen recently, in my own work and elsewhere, one of the most important parts of a growth arc is the ending. You can sprinkle in a lot of details rather piecemeal, have things progress slowly or quickly, and generally get away with a lot of variation. Not that you want to be disjointed or write a character’s arc at anything less than your best, but there’s a lot of leeway in there.

The ending needs more care. Everything has to culminate or all the attention the reader spent was wasted. Everything that’s been hinted at and used thematically has to come together in the final moments or it’s lame. More accurately, it’s pointless. If nothing happens, you come away from the story feeling dissatisfied. Having a character arc come to fruition is fantastic, even if the results are not what you wanted or entirely expected.

This brings the book Oathbringer (by Brandon Sanderson) to mind. One of the characters in that book has an arc that’s wonderful to read even as he ultimately fails in his journey. The whole book sets up for him to finally take a specific step, and then in the clutch moment, with everything riding on it, he just can’t. But it works, for two reasons. First, his failing is set up throughout. Emotionally he’s not ready yet and the reader knows this. Fortunately, it’s a series and we know he can figure it out in the future, but in this moment he’s not there yet. Second, someone else’s arc is set up to have a major breakthrough at the same time, so the day is still saved and we still get that satisfying moment. It all comes together feeling natural and epic without everyone winning all the time.

I…somewhat lost the plot about this blog post and forgot how I wanted it to go. Which seems directly counter to what I was trying to say, and I find that amusing, so this is how I’m going to end the post.

The Hate-Watch

I have a long list of shows that I want to watch. Some of them are on the list so that I can finish them because I tapered off at some point and never picked it back up. Some of these it was a lack of access. Others, it was more about the fact that I got bored or thought they were outright bad. Now I have picked one of them up and am finally finishing off the last half season that I didn’t bother with. Why? Because I’m a completionist. And because I’m curious.

I’m glad I’m in my thirties

I wasn’t happy when I hit thirty. It was a rather grumpy realization that I wasn’t anywhere near where I wanted to be, and the world sucked, and now that I was out of the prime zone that was meant to be my twenties it felt like I had nothing left to look forward to other than the long slog towards death. So to speak.

The Curse of the Reboot

We are cursed to exist in an era of sequels and reboots and live-action remakes. I’m not going to be saying anything new. This is a well-worn topic, and we all have lists of things that have been ruined by the adapting. I feel like complaining in particular this week.

Story Sticks #7: Hats

I have a box of writing prompt doodads, and I plan to go through them and see what ideas they spark.

Today’s post comes as an idea from the Box of Prompts. I plan to use these to jumpstart creativity and stretch myself a bit. Today I’m using three sticks with sentences on them, chosen randomly. The prompt is:

First sentence: “I like hats.” That’s what Donald said the day before he killed Sally.

On a Reread

In preparation for the release of Stormlight Archive book 5 at the end of this year, I’m rereading the other 4 books, which is a major endeavor since they’re all huge books. Therefore, since I’m spending a bunch of time reading, this post is going to be brief in contrast.

I Have Some Complaints: Fanfic

I read a fair amount of fan fiction for the various shows and books that I enjoy. Less than I used to, but still a lot, and I’ve gotten fairly good at finding the types of stories I’ll enjoy. There’s one that I read recently that bugged me. On a technical level, it was well written, but the story bothered me. It bugged me a lot, actually, and yet it was still enough of the thing I came there to read that I did finish it. I think the writer did a bad job, but as is the pitfall of such things, there’s not many fanfics of this type for this particular story so it was this or nothing.

When is it Enough?

Writing projects can go on forever. Actually, that’s pretty much any kind of creative endeavor, but writing is more pertinent to me at the moment so that’s what we’re discussing today. You start a project, it’s rough, and then you edit. Then some issue pops up, and you fix that. And then you tweak something else. Then more editing. Then you put it aside in a drawer for a while, then come back and realize you can do so much better so it’s a full round of edits again.

And so on and so forth. But when is enough enough?

Read more: When is it Enough?

The answer is, who knows? Every project is different, and every author is different. There are a few subtle signs that I’ve noticed in one of my more polished books lately that make me think it’s time to send it out into the world.

When your latest editing pass doesn’t include any major issues. No more chapters disappearing entirely, no more reorganizing the third act, no more characters getting combined. And so on and so forth. You’re still tweaking stuff, but the adjustments can be finished with a sentence added or switching a word around. At that point, you’re risking the dreaded flip-flop edits, where you switch something in one draft only to change it straight back in the next.

When someone else looks at it, they don’t have editing notes so much as responses, and they’re the right responses. Having people read your book with the viewpoint of a reader instead of an editor can be invaluable. When the book is almost done, they’ll be asking questions and making responses that will hopefully mostly fit with where you want to lead your reader, or even better that they’re spotting nuances that you put in subconsciously.

When you understand that it will never feel completely done but it’s been long enough. You’ve done so many drafts and you feel like you’re going in a circle, you’ve been working on the book for so long. It’s time to either push the book into the world or else shove it in a drawer for a very long time.

The book I’m working on at present is at this stage. Either I do something with it, or I put it aside, and I really want to get this one published. It’s a lovely book and I think it’s turned out pretty well. So now I have to decide what to do with it. Anyone else with a project they feel is almost done? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

Story Sticks: Cats

I have a box of writing prompt doodads, and I plan to go through them and see what ideas they spark.

Today’s post comes as an idea from the Box of Prompts. I plan to use these to jumpstart creativity and stretch myself a bit. Today I’m using three sticks with sentences on them, chosen randomly. The prompt is:

First sentence: “There were 17 cats living in Larry’s basement.”

Nonsequitur sentence: “Margaret had this habit of spitting. It began to get on my nerves.”

Last sentence: “the thing he does with the newspaper.”

There were 17 cats living in Larry’s basement. Not all of us wanted to be there, but there were hounds outside that made leaving difficult. Larry occasionally managed to offload one of us on an unsuspecting friend of his. Presumably they were alive, simply because they were too softhearted to be eating feline meat.

I had been there the longest of any of them, and presided over all. It was difficult work, and those little ingrates never allowed me to rest on my laurels. Whatever favors Larry might have given me for my seniority and my aid were usually stolen by the others. Even the attentions that might have been mine were stolen by those forward enough to climb on his lap outright.

Still, I knew my duty. The others didn’t make it easy, though. For example, Margaret had this habit of spitting. It began to get on my nerves. So did a lot of other things about my whole living situation. Sharing a bed with five others is all well and good when it’s cold, but sometimes one wishes to have one’s own space. When I tried to enforce this, the others got fussy and Larry didn’t seem to realize how much they were taking advantage of me, because he had the audacity to nudge me aside for the others.

When the indignity grew too great, I began to plot my escape. It wouldn’t be hard. The door to the outside opened at regular intervals, and it was no challenge to dash outside while Larry was ambling his way out. I’d miss him and his gentle pets, of course, but after a point it’s simply too much pain to be borne.

I was on the verge of carrying out my scheme when, at long last, dinner arrived. Miraculously, my own bowl was untouched by the others, and Larry scratched my head once I was full. He knows better than to distract me while I’m eating. I let the details of my scheme fade to the back of my mind. No need to leave, with my needs satiated. Now, we’ll just have to see if he’ll stop the thing he does with the newspaper.

November Results

Hello! So I did intend to write a blog post in the middle of the month but that intention failed in the wake of a very busy month, and besides this is mainly for me anyway. Lots to report on for this post, and hopefully for next post I’ll have my prompts back so I can do a short story.