I finished my book Embraced by Darkness… something like a year and a half ago. If you see the stats over there on the right, it’s massive. It is an epic, that’s easy enough to say I guess. I had decided after reading through it a few months ago that the entire book was worthy of nothing less then to being soaked in kerosene (in my back yard) and set on fire. I would then quietly sit beside my monster and watch it burn. It would be freeing. But I started to get the feeling, after a few of my closest friends had read the book, that maybe “freeing” wasn’t the right word. Instead, my wonderful boyfriend told me that of all the writing he had read of mine (and in my opinion writing a hell of a lot better then Embraced by Darkness) he said that my monster book made him want to read the sequel. With this unyielding encouragement over many months no matter how many times I screamed “It’s shit! Why can’t you see that?” I considered yesterday that maybe I was over reacting a little bit.
Maybe.
Maybe not.
But having tried to sit down to a blank page number one and trying to start the full and complete re-write of this massive thing time and time again, I am wearing down. No not “Wearing” I have been “Wore” down, and I have opened my mind to keeping the heart of my monster.
This is one of the most freeing, frustrating, wonderful, saddening, frightening decisions I have ever made about my writing life. I have spent more time writing the finished Embraced by Darkness then I have spent with anything else in my life even more time then I have spent in my six year relationship with Joseph.
It does shame me to say I wanted to burn it, wanted to step away and never go back. Essentially giving up, though with every intention of re-writing (oh god yes) there was always the intention of re-writing. This brings back to mind the eternal blank fucking page number one and how many times have I tried to re-write this thing? Too many to count. I will write a blog post someday about how the beginnings of things haunt me so completely. I hate writing beginnings, but because I believe the beginning pages are what keep you to the end of a book. I hold beginnings up as being the absolute decision maker on whether a book is worth reading or not. This is probably why they haunt me so. If there has ever been black, endless doubt it has always been about the beginning for me.
I am shamed to say that I have not decided to keep my monster (or salvage it might be a better term) because I think it’s good or because I think there is something there worth keeping. I am salvaging my monster because I simply do not have it in me to try to do this again. Two hundred thousand words is not much to some writers but the way I write (I am a cutter) it averages to about three times that of actual words that I have written though ultimately deleted. The task of filling up that first number one page yet again with a beginning that I will no doubt scrap is just too daunting.
So the decision has been made.
I will salvage my monster, I will attack it, I will make it work.
So where the fuck do I start? That’s easy. I open up the ancient file of my monster… if it were there. Oh No.
Turns out I had so completely been certain that the book had nothing in it worth salvaging that my file for Embraced by Darkness is gone. On all of my desktops and my laptop. GONE. At this point I have been reduced to a whimpering little brat, talking to my computer with, “No, it can’t be gone!” “How could I have lost it?” “This… this just can’t be!” Turns out maybe I value my time a little more then I thought and maybe, just maybe, my threatening to burn it all up was more show then I had thought. Thank God I remember lulu before I really panic. It seems the only digital file left of my monster in existence is a pdf on lulu.com.
So I do have my book now and the endless thing is before me. I have got to do something to make this a less daunting task. No longer a single blank page sure but what about seven hundred and thirty six pages of text? Okay, let us not be completely stupid. These are MY words dammit! Have some fucking dignity and suck it up. This will be better then the blank page number one if it kills me.
So, I have three main characters (I said it was an epic didn’t I?) and their chapters weave, usually in a pattern, one to Osondrous, one to Karalay, one to Jezaline, sometimes a few here and there etc. In the beginning of the book it was one to O, one to K, one to J as the book gets on it it becomes more like three-four to O then on down the line etc. Nearing the end it reduces back to one each, back and forth etc. Not rocket science, I let the book dictate me when I wrote it the first time, I never said any of it was a good idea did I? In fact I remember threatening to kerosene it in the back yard so let’s not say I’m proud of it, kay?
So, I need to make this attackable. At my elbow are three hand written notebooks full of my endless, only understandable to me, notes that I wrote after I read the book the last time. basically I have my hand written outline beside me. This outline alone took my a very long time, I wrote it on the idea that those notes, that outline, would be my only guide when I re-wrote this monster (you know that blank page again). It is beginning to occur to me that this work, these notes, this outline, is basically not going to do much for me now. What I need now is to get back to it, there is TOO much of this thing for me to be able to absorb it all, no matter how good my notes are anyway. This is an epic, there is so much information that I need to be in the book and working on it in my heart and head before I can touch it at all.
So, I need to make this attackable. My notes will not help me. I have decided to split it all up. I am taking out all of my chapters for Osondrous and putting them in consecutive order by themselves in a new document as well as the same for Jezaline and Karalay. Well, now I have three much smaller books before me and I simply work on each story from start to finish individually. Will this work forever? No. However, it will work for the majority of the job. Each story must stand alone anyway and though they do affect each other there is a major mistake I made when writing this thing the first time: I tried to write the book from start to finish.
Funny huh?
Seems obvious, wouldn’t you always write the book from start to finish?
I just can’t do that here. So often I would write five chapters devoted to one character then have to untangle myself from her and reintegrate myself into the other characters story, essentially losing my rhythm time and time again. From now on, I am going to write one story at a time, when they need to be put together is when I will begin the next arduous task of this book; weaving the characters/chapters together to create tension.
This begins with what must go. Two hundred thousand words is way too much, remember the kerosene idea? It’s not like it was a bad one. But let’s not talk about it again… I will try to refrain even though right now it was brilliant. let’s face it, I am a CUTTER. No, stop it. I am a writer, damn it. I’m a writer first and this is about words. Every single one of that monster’ words are mine. Isn’t that something?
So it begins. What to keep, what to throw. I’m starting with Jezaline, her story is the shortest right now. But I’m distracted… Can’t help it. I’m thinking about someone else. I’m thinking about Constace.
Who is Constance? Well, she’s a fourth “main” character who appeared from nowhere and made herself a very small niche somewhere in the heart of my monster. I want her to die. No, that would require words, I want her to evaporate. It’s the first cut I’m really considering. It would be a twenty thousand word save. She’s not a real main character though she gets some chapters of her own. I am trying to evaporate her… But I can’t. Damnit! My first big decision, the first good idea I thought I had. I can’t do it. Maybe this is the truly shitty writer in me pouting and saying “but… but… but…” and I hate all of that.
But, in the end, I have good reasons to keep her.
Constance stays because she is the humanity in my book. She is the only unpowerful main character that I’ve got. She is the one person the reader can truly relate to. She goes through a change and she proves that no matter who we are we are capable of standing up and doing what needs to be done; even if it means giving up. She was created for my book to be a main character in a sequel. She was destined to one day be very important. But I didn’t think she was important now. She is.
Constance gets to live and I will do my best to truly give her life along with all of the rest of it.
I found a than!