Pessimists, Optimists, and Everything In Between

I've been doing a lot of reading about writing (I mean a LOT*) and I have had a shattering, yet freeing epiphany about my main character. She is a scarred, self-pitying, doom-and-gloom control freak who refuses to love anyone yet has anxiety about never being loved herself.

That said, would you want to get in her head? Let alone read an entire 300 page novel about her?

I thought not.

This realization is frightening because of the amount of work it entails, but it's exciting because I've discovered the obvious problem for why my story arc has been falling flat lately. I find myself avoiding writing scenes about her as I would avoid a troubled relative at a family function. When her presence is required in a given scene, I would wonder what it was about her that made me cringe. She's human, she's complex, and she's driven. All of these were things in my favor, so I thought, so what was the problem?

Yes. This complexly driven human was not enough to carry even the writer happily through pages and pages of conflict and events. Ultimately, the reader has to, in some space of the imagination, LIKE the main character. At least a little bit. Even if they like how mean and nasty they are (in the case of a good villain).

Not that she should be a Rosie Sunshine, but no one likes a poor-me attitude. And it's especially unflattering on paper.

So, armed with this revelation, Alex's new list of priorities for second draft revisions starts now. And making Dinara (main character) more sympathetic is #1 on the list.


Notes on my manuscript progress...227 pages!! My goal is to finish this first draft in the next 27 days (as suggested by my one-year fantasy writing cohort), so as to spend the last 100 days on revisions and perfections.


*Mostly Writing your Breakout Novel by Donald Maas. A must-read for any novelist-to-be.