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Saturday, December 6, 2008

Winds of Change

This week has been one of change. Unexpected events, some good some bad, have pushed me to do things I normally would never consider. For example, the Canadian political drama pushed me to e-mail my first politician. I was angry, frustrated but man that e-mail felt good! Other events, personal challenges, have spiraled around that bigger drama and resulted in the overall feeling that Monday just crashed into Saturday. And here we are, the end of the week, with no idea what might have happened to those days in the middle.

And the winds of change are still brewing.

Earlier this week I had a suggestion from my agent to provide three good chapters and a synopsis for proposal before completing the full story. Good idea except after that conversation I realized that that changes my entire way of writing. I'm a seat of the pants writer. And despite what I have said in the past about the muse and its existence or lack there of, it messes with the muse darn it!

So while wrestling with the winds of change I caused a five day spell where little writing occurred. By Friday I was out of sorts because a writer has to write and this writer wasn't doing anything at all.

So today I went to my cubby downstairs, formally known as the office, and began to write. Thank goodness for Jon. My current hero is very organized, unlike his creator, and he took charge of that pen and began to dash off some thoughts of his own. Pretty soon that first chapter was clean, now to chapter two. And while this story is rough draft finished, I'm feeling pretty confident that the next story in line really can start out as a synopsis and three chapters. Still, ugh synopsis - I'm hoping synopsis is Jon's forte as well. If so, I'll keep him around for awhile. But for now, I'm diving back into the mess I've created for Jon in Burma.

What do you do when the winds of change threaten to blow you away?

Ryshia
www.ryshiakennie.com
at

4 comments:

  1. AnonymousDecember 13, 2008 at 9:42 AM

    Scream, kick, rant, and rave. :-) Then once I'm over my tiff, I accept it and move on.

    Writing a synopsis isn't my forte either. If I have to write one, I prefer doing it either at the end of the first draft or at the same time I'm working on my manuscript. To do one on demand, is like asking for me to crack the center of the earth. Ugh. Thank goodness when I had to do one for my editor, I had about 80% of the story done.

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  2. AnonymousDecember 13, 2008 at 12:03 PM

    Love that phrase, "Monday crashed into Saturday". I've had weeks like that, though it's usually more like Friday crashes into Monday!

    Good luck with your proposal. I tend to do some plotting ahead of time, but it's by no means enough for a synopsis. That would be tough.

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  3. Ryshia KennieDecember 13, 2008 at 3:01 PM

    Well my rantings done, no screaming this time... And maybe I won't crack the center of the earth and write a whole synopsis to an unwritten story but I may find a middle ground on this little stumbling block.

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  4. Ryshia KennieDecember 13, 2008 at 3:04 PM

    Thanks Caryn. I'm going to baby step this thing, some plotting, scaled down synopsis and if the characters hurl a road block in mid story and there's a few minor or major detours from the proposal - well that's fiction.

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