When your characters suddenly go rogue and take on a life of their own. This of course means a couple of things when you sit back and think about it.
Firstly, congratulate yourself because you made characters real enough that they can surprise even you! Note: keep telling yourself you're perfectly sane, despite the fact there's voices in your head that have taken on a mind of their own... I won't judge you. I would advise you don't go telling people who don't write that this is what you're experiencing...
Secondly, you're probably feeling something like this:
Everything is just back asswards. Depending on the severity of the change, you might be able to write it out, things might shift a bit but overall the integrity of your story should stay intact. This is where I am right now, not derailing but shifting the track a little.
You could also be sitting in front of your screen going 'noooooooo!' because you have to change everything now. Suddenly your character is from another part of the world and has an accent or suddenly they're not a pirate, but a part of the royal navy. So in story world, your character just crated anarchy on a dime.
How I've got through both the easier and the harder situations brought on by rogue characters:
1. If you fall under group one, where your character has only gone a little off there's a couple things you can do. If you've planned your story then you can try and guide your character back into the master plan. If that fails, assess the plan and not the character. Find out if there's another way to reach the end goal you desired. There's a lot more space between the mid-way point and the end of your story than you thought. In many cases, you'll still be able to do this if you still want things to turn out the way your originally planned.
For example:
You planned that your MC (lets call her Sally) would be kidnapped, taken half way around the world and your second MC (we'll call him John) would find her in Italy in the end. The lovers would be reunited and the bad guys turned over to the feds. But SURPRISE! Half-way through your story, you learn that Sally is a fighter. This changes things doesn't it? So we go back and look at the plan. The main goal I'm looking for is that the lovers are reunited and the bad-guys are gone. So I decide that Sally escapes once they arrive in Italy. Meanwhile, John is hot on their trail. With Sally being a fighter, I decide they pair fight off the bad guys and escape with their lives. Lovers reunited? Check! Bad-guys gone? Check!
Of course if you're a pantser, you might just take this type of rogue and run with it. See where they're trying to go. It's always an interesting way to explore, just beware of pointless adventures your characters may want to run you around on. Try and gain some idea of where they should be headed, to avoid this and stay on task.
2. If you've got yourself a wild one you're probably feeling very frustrated about now and you fall in group two. This is obviously the more difficult of the two because no matter how much you try to turn focus on the plan and tweek it, you know that you're more than likely going to have to throw the whole thing away. Some things are easier to fix than others and mostly it's going to come down to editing. Unfortunately there's a lot less you can do in this case. If you are writing for fun and not for something with a deadline you can make your big changes now. If your character has an accent now, go make it so. If your character is actually sailing with the navy, make those character adjustments now. Of course, if you're writing for fun you can also scrap it entirely and start over but that's not very encouraging.
If you are on a timeline your best bet is to make the changes now and keep going. If you're participating in something like Nanowrimo where your word count is everything do not scrap and do not re-haul. I know that going back and editing was one of my tips, but something this big will eat up way to much time and you'll be deleting way too much. If the change is vital and will drastically change your story you may edit. Not like my MC was a pirate and is now a royal navy officer chasing the pirates where you're just switching the perspectives. Heck you can keep most of the characters and change their dress and you're good to go. Though it's annoying, keep writing you've got time to edit later! I'm talking about like my MC decided he's a she and is going to be saved by the pirates. Go back and edit what's necessary because that's going to be completely different as that character is likely going to spend a chunk of the story nowhere near a pirate ship, or a ship of any sort. Scavenge what scenes you can, if you've got a drunken party on deck one night, have your character forced into the middle of it. Use what you can and don't just think 'I can re-write this anyways.'.
If your pirate decides he's a pop star I've got nothing. I don't know why the hell you thought he was a pirate, so you better scrap that and go re-think your choices.
Showing posts with label tips. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tips. Show all posts
Sunday, 19 April 2015
Tuesday, 7 April 2015
Camp Nanowrimo: Day 07
Day seven is here, marking the end to week one of this crazy writing thing. Already beginning to experience the ups and downs of the month's work I'm ready for it to be done with. I was worried that yesterday was going to mark a descent into another failure, yet another Nano I didn't complete, but I woke today and sat at the computer ready to write.
My character's weren't putting up a fight, they just needed a beak and they sure as hell weren't having it when I thought about starting to read another book. They were ready and raring to go.
(What my character's must have been thinking this morning as I contemplated the fact that I'm still ahead and reading wouldn't hurt.)
I admit I spent most of the day editing, trying to think through where the story was going to go. But with a little bit of writing, maybe 600 words or so, the other 1000 I've wrote so far today being all editing (see, like I said, go back and edit, flush the scenes out more you know your characters now, they're opening up to you). I'm feeling pretty good.
I feel like now is a good time to go back and touch on some tips I wrote before the beginning of Nanowrimo. So we can see if I'm following my own advice and where it's got me, what's working and what's not.
1. The first goal I had mentioned in my Tips to Slay 50K post was planning. I fell a little lax on this, this round. I knew my basics and just went in feet first and hoped to come out running. I did some mild planning, I knew who everyone was and how they connected together, I knew the basics of what I would have liked to happen and I knew what real life people, places and things I wanted to reference in my story. However, what was actually going to happen was nothing more than a shell, I didn't know which guy would end up being the love interest or who would fall for who. There were no chapters or actual rise and falls planned out, I just went in and so far I guess I'm running.
2. I had also said I like to edit as I go and most people don't. A point proven today with more than 1000 words coming from going back and flushing scenes out more. I haven't even got to the point that I'm currently writing. If you are at a point where you're stuck, the end of the week is always a good place to go back to the top. The week is a good marker, you could do it sooner, but things are still going to be really fresh in your mind. I find that by this point I've forgotten a lot of the smaller details I wrote seven days earlier, it's now new all over again as I read through. I do like to comb through the chapters frequently editing them over and over a bit every time I find myself stuck, generally by the end of three reads I'll leave a chapter be.
Don't get me wrong, I erase some things when I go back days later NEVER when I'm writing the scene. You may find that you read it now and go, 'oh I didn't explain that very well' or, 'hmm, this might be better with this extra bit of dialogue in here.' I always feel like you don't know your characters well when you start, after a week of spending every day with them, I feel like I can go back and make their personalities a little deeper. It's also a great way to get you back into your story if you're stuck. Reading over all of that and adjusting gives you a rest from just driving forward at full force in hopes of reaching that 50K.
3. I have explored this a little bit this year and found that the best way I write is by starting early in the morning and working until around 3. I also find that I'm better if I just browse the internet between breaks (or write here). Also, it's the first time I've allowed myself to just go with what pours out and I think I now have fallen in love with a head hopping style I hope makes sense when I come back to edit in a month or so.
4. This tip has saved me! Writing more than I have to has kept me a cozy two days ahead of schedule sometimes more, which means the days that I'm in a slump are covered and I'm not way behind and trying to force words out for the day's count. Also I find myself feeling so refreshed and wanting to write after I'm able to take a break every few days and maybe write a couple hundred words instead of a couple thousand. If you are able to do this, I highly suggest it.
5. This hasn't really come into play yet as I headed the advice of tip 4.
6. I still work day by day, I just push myself to reach a day extra to keep myself ahead. As of now, tip 4 has put me in the place that I haven't had to utilize this yet.
8. (This is a fail because I forgot 7!)
7. (8) Forums and cabins are the perfect break from writing to me. Check out what everyone else is up to, gather some motivation from some other people. I have utilized this to my advantage when I started to wonder if my head hopping style was a little too much. There is support for everyone, for everything in the forums!
8.(9) I haven't done any word sprints yet. I'm not trying to force out words this time around (yet) so I haven't found the need to. You never know though, it's still really early in the game.
9.(10) I am certainly having fun. I'm making sure I'm taking a day or two here and there and I'm not beating myself up about it. This is an awesome round of Nanowrimo.
I'm not going to break down the goals too far today but here's where I stand:
Day Seven Goals
- Word count of 16666 by the end of the day. [might yet happen as I am very close to 16,000 now]
- Reach a word count of 15,000 by the end of the morning. [done]
- Ideally break the 17,000 mark before sleep happens [not likely to happen today, got busier than expected.]
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