How to get un-stuck, edition 295
Friday, July 27th, 2018 10:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lizvogelI swear, driving around while listening to a play-list is second only to the shower for idea generation.
I've been struggling to get any focus on the final scenes of Falling From Ground, and I finally figured out (aside from the laptop and other issues) why. I've known all along that I wanted to have a twist at the very end. But, much like the what's-going-on that held up my plot for so long, I haven't known what that twist would be. And here I am at the end, and I still don't. So once again I'm trying to write toward something, but I don't know what it is. And it's hard to hit the target if you don't know where to aim.
The twist needs to be something that the MC remembers, but that the reader knows isn't true. It needs to be something unrelated to the main plot, because I don't want to undermine the resolution of that for the reader. But it needs to be something more important than what his friend had for breakfast that morning. It can't distort any of the character relationships or send the reader haring off in the wrong direction, but if I do it right, it should make the bottom drop out of the reader's stomach.
I tried "follow the smell" again, which got me something I'll probably use for the setting but no leads. And then I tried driving around listening to only tangentially-related music. These two things in combination solved the major plot problem... and lo, I've got an idea for my twist! I don't have the exact details, but I know what incident it pertains to and the general sort of thing it is.
Amusingly, it's also something that I considered putting into the novel, but decided against. (Taking 3C along instead of stuffing him in a box.)
I'm really rather proud of myself for (a) figuring out what the hold-up was, (b) applying methods that have worked before, and (c) getting enough of a solution to be going on with in a day, rather than weeks or months. I know better than to tempt Murphy by saying I'm getting this writing thing figured out (ha!), but it is nice to demonstrate learning from experience once in a while.
I've been struggling to get any focus on the final scenes of Falling From Ground, and I finally figured out (aside from the laptop and other issues) why. I've known all along that I wanted to have a twist at the very end. But, much like the what's-going-on that held up my plot for so long, I haven't known what that twist would be. And here I am at the end, and I still don't. So once again I'm trying to write toward something, but I don't know what it is. And it's hard to hit the target if you don't know where to aim.
The twist needs to be something that the MC remembers, but that the reader knows isn't true. It needs to be something unrelated to the main plot, because I don't want to undermine the resolution of that for the reader. But it needs to be something more important than what his friend had for breakfast that morning. It can't distort any of the character relationships or send the reader haring off in the wrong direction, but if I do it right, it should make the bottom drop out of the reader's stomach.
I tried "follow the smell" again, which got me something I'll probably use for the setting but no leads. And then I tried driving around listening to only tangentially-related music. These two things in combination solved the major plot problem... and lo, I've got an idea for my twist! I don't have the exact details, but I know what incident it pertains to and the general sort of thing it is.
Amusingly, it's also something that I considered putting into the novel, but decided against. (Taking 3C along instead of stuffing him in a box.)
I'm really rather proud of myself for (a) figuring out what the hold-up was, (b) applying methods that have worked before, and (c) getting enough of a solution to be going on with in a day, rather than weeks or months. I know better than to tempt Murphy by saying I'm getting this writing thing figured out (ha!), but it is nice to demonstrate learning from experience once in a while.
