Playing God

Listening to: It's all in my mind, Beck

I'm toying/struggling with the idea of killing off a character. It's a tough decision, in some ways I think the character has run his course and death is a tidy way of removing him from the remainder of the story also, his demise will show the power the antagonist wields. But on the other hand there's only three characters and this one has become the comedy relief; I'm worried readers would be put off by his untimely departure.

Nick Daws (see previous post) has some tips on working through issues such as these. Basically by asking myself questions about the subject I can develop the story according to my answers... and my answers lean to death for the poor fellow.

If that's the route I take I will then need to work out how to do it. One thing's for sure I won't be bringing my story to life like an aspiring Mexican Horror writer has done. Police came to his apartment looking for his missing girlfriend and found some of her body parts in the fridge... he had even cooked some of it. Full story here.

Meanwhile, on a much lighter tone, I have updated the look of this blog (and the linked samples), taking advantage of the improved templates Blogger have on offer. Also, the Progressometer has been brought up to date by upping the desired total word count of the finished product by 10,000 to 50,000 words. The current count is 21,770.


Steve

Seeking Guidance

Listening to: 5-8-6, New Order

I mentioned before that I was having trouble moving my story past a certain point which I named The Writer's Chasm. Well I wasn't getting any closer to traversing this chasm so when I discovered Nick Daws, Write Any Book in 28 Days... or Less course I thought, what the hell, I'm not getting anywhere on my own.

I must admit I was sceptical (as is my nature) and the tacky website was a bit off putting but there were also some things that appealed to me and the price (US$49) and the 100% Satisfaction Guarantee helped make up my mind.

In the first hour of the course (which arrived within a week of placing my order) Nick discusses Freewriting and then sets an exercise to come up with three random, unrelated words and spend 5 minutes writing whatever comes to your mind. In 5 minutes, to my surprise, I had written a 200+ word story of a man who finds his teenage daughters dairy.

The next surprise came the other day, in the second module of the course, where Nick explains a "secret formula" used by Hollywood scriptwriters, I found that what I have written so far fits into this formula.

George Lucas used this methodology to write Star Wars but I'm not saying that this formula will guarantee my book will be a huge successt but it is nice to know I can at least lay out a story in an acceptable fashion.

So that's what's been keeping me busy of late.

Ciao,
Steve