I posted earlier in the week about bringing my current working story to the front of my mind.
It’s still there. I got an unexpected week off the pay job and I’ve been devoting A LOT of time to getting this book together. Yesterday, I printed research and went through it with a highlighter–notebook at my side–I MISS MY LAPTOP– as always, I found more and more ways to tie things together through research.
I LOVE THIS PART!
When the characters and plot, vague and a bit shapeless before, take on solid mass and emotions. When the hair on the back of your neck stands up when you hit something seriously cool. When you realize you instinctively knew something big at a deeper level and had already laid out the basic structure just right.
For instance names. Usually the names of characters pop up and take root instantly. My heroine’s name is pretty cool, but when I was researching the hero, I found that he had ties to the very meaning of her name.
This part of the writing process is soooo important because once I have all the players and setting in place, the story just flies and I look forward to every moment spent on it. I’m walking around in a daze, getting to know these people and their world, starting to love them already.
The only bad thing about this process is my inability to pull out of the fog easily. I burn stuff if I cook, walk into the occasional wall… yesterday, I watered the pot of weeds next to my pot of tomato plant…
And my kids have learned that they can sneak up on me because I don’t hear them until they’re right in my face. So, I’ve been jumpy, distracted and feeling this burning knot of excitement low in my gut.
It’s there because I snagged a good idea. I know it.