Tag: FQD

KISS

I have been working on the Flower Queen’s Daughter story. I decided I needed to dig deeper and figure out the heroine’s storyline and what her own journey looks like. So far, I detailed conflicts and beats for the first four scenes. My real issue is with keeping things simple and preventing them from becoming overcomplicated.

Anthea is a bit of a tomboy, filling the role of the son her parents never had. She’s horse-mad and her mother is not pleased. Our heroine promised her father on his deathbed to oversee the family stables and continue his work on the breeding line.

Her mother wishes her daughter settled in a comfortable marriage, not dirty and smelling of horse. She doesn’t know about the promise and tries to forbid Anthea from spending her time in the stable.

While working with the steward, Anthea discovers one of their mares was pregnant when she was sold and this foal turns out to be a key part of the breeding program and must be recovered if her father’s goals are to be achieved.

Her mother is overjoyed by Anthea’s invitation to the Dragon Family’s House Party. Anthea agrees to go, but for much different reasons, she tracked the sale of the pregnant mare to them. However, neither realizes why Dragon Mother extended the invite.

Unfortunately, that’s as far as I’ve gotten. This week’s plan is to sit down and hammer on the heroine’s storyline some more. The general idea of where I want to take her exists, but I need to weave it into the original hero’s story.

I think my new mantra needs to be K.I.S.S. Keep it simple, stupid. Everything keeps getting tangled up and I end up chasing down rabbit holes after complications that are in most cases unnecessary. I rarely attempt to write short and don’t think I would be able to do so without problems. I read a couple articles on the topic, but my brain doesn’t understand the difference between dilemma and major conflict.

The ability to estimate word counts is currently beyond me. If someone asks how long a story will be, you got me. Not a clue. If I consider my difficulties in finishing what I start, this shouldn’t come as a surprise.

So here’s what I have for the heroine’s story so far:

Flora wants her daughter, Anthea, to be more ladylike because she knows a hoyden won’t land a suitable husband. However, on his deathbed, Anthea promised her father to carry on his breeding program at the family stables.

Anthea and the steward discover Dragon family stole foal when they bought a mare last season. She realizes this foal holds the key to her father’s breeding plan and vows to get it back.

Anthea wants to make her mother happy but can’t seem to do it when her mother asks for her promise not to search out the stolen foal and to think about her future.

She receives invitation to Dragon’s house party and sees it as a way to keep promise to both parents. Little does Anthea realize, she has been invited because the Dragon Mother wants to compromise her into marrying her eldest son.

Shouldn’t I be writing?

So, I got an reply email from DH after I sent him to let him know I fixed a couple things on his website:

“Shouldn’t you be writing? ;)”

Doh. Caught procrastinating again. He knows how I get when a puzzle is put in front of me.

To be honest, I have been running a lot of things through my head and discarding a lot of them immediately after. I know one of my problems with working on turning this folktale into a story is not having a clear idea of the characters it’s about. I have the sequence of events that need to happen, but very little idea of who they need to happen to except in the most general of terms. So, that brings me to the idea of prewriting.

Prewriting Activities

Along with the cycle of studying craft, reflecting upon new concepts, and a reading spree to recharge, I also realized stories come faster and less painfully when I sit and think about the characters and their situations. I don’t mean only in terms of plotting or character sketches, but that and more.

I wanted to explore a couple new ways to get the old imagination running beyond the normal ones I seem to rely on: brainstorming and freewriting. Brainstorming is collecting a bunch of ideas without censorship regarding their ability to fit with what you want to write. Not quite how I’ve been doing, but close enough. In my journal entries, I tend to do Freewriting. I sit and write everything coming through my head for a set period of time or until I get past some arbitrary word count.

Both those methods are useful, but I wanted to dig a bit deeper for something to help me regain the sense of urgency – the need to get the story onto the page before the details evaporate.

Pretend and Play

Let your imagination run wild. No rolling around on the floor with the kids and constructing a castle out of couch cushions is necessary, but what would it hurt?

Look, Imagine, Think

Building upon the previous one, take some time to stop and smell the roses. Become more aware of the world and people around you and make up stories using your observations. What causes the mundane to be interesting? How about the person you pass every day but don’t know – what is their story?

Another way to accomplish these last two is by daydreaming. I think this is what those people who appear to be napping are doing when they claim they’re plotting. 😉

Add Sound and Music

Try different styles to match the mood you’re trying to capture. I find instrumental music with distinct rhythms much better to write to than popular songs. I discovered I distract myself by singing along to the lyrics, even though I used to do my homework with the most raucous music possible playing.

Doodle in the Margins

There’s something to be said for scribbling down notes with a pen on paper. For some reason, I always get a better grasp of what I’m trying to do when I write longhand. Somehow, I can sense how the pieces don’t fit together as neatly by writing the words out instead of assuming the neat, little lines of text are where they all belong.

I took a printed copy of this post with me when I went to pick the kids up from school and scribbled all over it. I also realized that block of time is one of my most productive for idea generating and distilling. Provided I don’t have a paperback in my hand. It’s only 15 minutes or so, but what an opportunity to focus while I’m a captive audience to my imagination.

Look at Lists

Lists can be fun to make and to peruse for ideas. After brainstorming and coming up with all those related things, then you can tackle the task of rejecting what doesn’t work for your story. Or, search through various lists for eye-catching entries.

As always, the real trick becomes knowing when to stop and just go write.

So, what do you do when you first get to know your characters and your story?

Blah…

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

I didn’t get much of anything done this past weekend. Real life intruded, but mostly in the form of sleeping in and watching sappy chick-flick movies on tv instead of anything else. I did trade a couple emails with Winter about directions I could take with the Flower Queen’s Daughter, but didn’t get very far with that. I spent this morning dealing with food plans and the grocery store, so not much today either. Maybe tomorrow will be better.

BTW, running an iPod Shuffle through the washer isn’t the best way to treat it. They get cranky and so does your son when he realizes it was his that you’re talking about. It’s charging again, so it seems to be drying out. Looks like it completely lost its charge, so I’ll see how it does when I get back from picking up the kids. The headphones were fine this morning when I tried them in my shuffle.

Frustrated

Ok, so I had this great aha! moment and now trying to work with it, I keep running into a brick wall.

I spent a good chunk of time today taking the writing exercises at end of Chapter Five on Conflict in Leigh Michael’s book On Writing Romance. I got a bit closer to figuring out how the conflict might work in Revealed. I think the one with the Duke and Duchess from that story actually works best and I was even able to do a little brainstorming on how to make the Food Critic one work better. However, the one that’s frustrating me is this Flower Queen’s Daughter story.

On one hand, it feels like I’m trying to start the story WAY too early for a romance. On the other hand, it’s just way too hero-centric for a romance. It’s possible I picked a horrible story to try to do this with, but I’m stubborn (if you haven’t figured that out by now). I will make this work.

Brainstorming conflicts that met the criteria Michaels sets forth for workable conflict (related short-term and long-term problems combined with a force that keeps them from walking away in frustration), I came up with the idea that he feels obligated to rescue her or afraid the gypsy will curse him, but perhaps the heroine wasn’t entirely upset by “being kidnapped” in the first place? Maybe she thinks she’s just been invited to stay at their country house for a while? The long-term problems are even fuzzier. Why would these two make the worst match possible on first impression?

It makes so much more sense when I’m looking at this from the outside.

Fitting Pieces Back Together

This is still really rough, but I spent a large chunk of today working on turning my worksheet of scenes with their info and list of beats to be hit into a genuine stab at a blurb and synopsis. I realize that it’s still needs a lot of work and many of the details have either not floated to the surface of my brain or not made it to the page. I’m not particularly tied to the names for the Hero and Heroine, but there is a reason for them.

This step pretty much correlates to writing out all the steps for the big quest in the area or zone if I were designing a game area.

Questions, comments, and critiques all welcome.

The Blurb

When an accommodating miller’s son stops to help a gypsy woman shunned by the rest of his village, he learns the daughter of one noble family has been kidnapped by another and must decide if he can give up the potential riches to be gained by working in the second household to steal away with his newfound love.

The Synopsis

Alex Miller can’t seem to help himself. He always lends a helping hand to those in need around him but his father refuses to see how his son’s altruism will be an advantage when Alex won’t ask for assistance he so readily gives to others.

Returning from the village to replace a broken gear for the mill, Alex comes across a wagon stuck in the ditch. An old Gypsy woman complains no one has bothered to stop all day and rewards Alex’s kindness with news of Anthea’s kidnapping and gives him a magic bell she claims will aid his rescue of this beautiful young debutante. He remains unconvinced of the bell’s usefulness, but unwilling to insult her, he tucks it away before heading home.

His father is furious with how long it has taken Alex to travel to the village, pick up the part and return. They argue over why it matters if Alex takes the time to help others when working the mill is a sure-fire way to get no where fast. His father proclaims he will never amount to much and Alex storms upstairs to pack his bag. He’s got a noblewoman to rescue.

Alex is anxious to complete his quest, but he is unable to ignore the pleas of three young men of consequence when his help and ingenuity is required to get them out of their predicaments. When the four stop for the night at an unsavory tavern, they overhear rumors of a woman being held prisoner on a nearby estate by a wealthy and powerful family. In the morning, Alex slips away, but finds his friends have followed him for lack of better entertainment.

His hopes for proving his worthiness, and the worth of helping others, to his father die when the butler slams the door in their face. They return to the tavern to plot a way into the household in order to rescue Anthea.

One of his friends uses his influence to convince the Matriarch of the family, a nasty, old dragon of a woman to hire Alex as a groom. She is flattered by their false praises for her lost beauty and agrees, placing Alex personally in charge of her eldest son’s prized mare.

The horse proves fractious and escapes from Alex. In desperation, he pulls out the small bell given to him by the gypsy and sounds it. The animal is found by one of his friends and Alex’s position is safe. He denies having any problems and the Matriarch rewards him with new copper-colored finery and invites him to join the family for dinner.

At the ball, he meets the kidnapped noblewoman and learns of her unhappiness. The Matriarch is holding her captive until her eldest son returns from wherever the hell he is hiding. He promises to find a way to rescue her.

The next time he is sent to exercise the mare, she once again escapes. He searches where she was found before to no avail. He gives in and rings the bell. Another of his friends locates and returns the horse, saving Alex’s hide. His reward is silver-colored finery and an invitation to an intimate dinner party hosted by the Matriarch, who then treats him more as a guest than a servant.

One evening, he finds Anthea alone in the garden and she confesses her wish to marry for love not duty, nor political or financial gain. He relates the plans for escape that he and his friends have devised, but she advises him to ask the Matriarch for a useful reward such the mare’s foal instead of accepting cast-off clothing and ignoring how the family laughs at him behind his back.

The next day, he’s sent to exercise the prize mare and he relaxes his guard when she behaves for him. She slips away while he daydreams. He searches the locations in which she was previously found but resorts to ringing the bell in desperation. He returns to the stables only to meet his third friend returning from the river where the mare had been grazing. The Matriarch is impressed he has done so well given the horse’s mischievous streak. Alex boldly requests ownership of the mare’s foal before she can offer him more clothing. She laughs and pleased by his confidence, she gifts him with a splendid outfit of golden finery and invites him to a ball that night as well.

Instead, Alex and the noblewoman sneak off to the stables where she locates the foal – a finely grown gelding. They hide when a groom doing his final round surprises the couple and then flee on horseback to meet up with his trio of allies at the tavern.

Their escape is soon noticed and the family’s younger sons, sent to retrieve the bride the Matriarch had picked out for her eldest son, pursue them across the fields. The brothers’ relentless pursuit means Alex and his friends must rely on the noblewoman’s knowledge of the area and trust her judgment.

After a harrowing night, Anthea guides everyone safely to her mother’s house where Alex’s worth is questioned and she defends his actions and decisions. He admits he requires assistance to defeat the Matriarch’s younger sons and guarantee Anthea’s safety. A few favors are called in and the enemy is routed for good.

Her mother wants to ensure her daughter’s happiness and can’t imagine she’ll be happy as a miller’s son living so far away. Alex assures her that he won’t be continuing in the family business and intends to build a home of his own. Anthea declares she will never love another but they can visit every year during the winter holidays. His father is summoned for the wedding.

Logic Puzzles

I hate the ones like on the SAT where they’re not much more than busy work.

You know. Lots of irrelevant information thrown at you about what the weather was like when Mrs. So-n-So’s 3rd grade class went to this specific zoo and saw a group of monkeys, so many males and so many females all eating fruit with even more irrelevant details thrown in. Then you’re supposed to figure out which monkey’s name, their favorite fruit and where they liked to eat it by the set of clues about their likes and dislikes.

They always involve setting up a table and filling in the blanks given the information in the clues. I hate when the kids bring these types of problems home because they refuse to see the pattern and get stuck in the irrelevant details. It’s all about focus, pattern matching and sifting through the information given to find the useful nuggets.

I feel like I’ve been working on a giant one of these this week. I’ve got a list of 22 scenes (so far) with various columns regarding what should be happening in each one. I’m not sure I have it slimmed down to the relevant info yet, but it’s coming along and seems to flow from one to the next.

The trickiest part has been stepping back and looking at each scene as a collection of beats like in a screenplay and making sure the final action leads to the next scene while at the same time making sure the scenes also progress through a story arc and also allow the hero and heroine to make their romance work. I suspect this one might fall under “with romantic elements” but I think that can be shifted a bit more to the 75% romance instead of 67% that it’s currently at.

Did I mention that I have trouble thinking short and simple?

I have all but the last 5 scenes sketched out. I think I still need to go back and look through them for how the characters are feeling at these points in the story, but once the timeline and what needs to happen is set out, I can get down to the business of writing this thing down.

I’ve tried to stick with a plotline that would be similar to the type I’d done for the game, and it’s interesting to see the parallels as well as where the way I think about it has to diverge from tried and true patterns. I actually have to go through the process of “playing through the quest” and figuring out what makes it interesting to watch from the outside instead of just experience on a personal level. Screw-ups are only interesting if they teach the hero something useful about himself that will eventually affect his overall success.

I still have doubts about the saleability of this idea, but I’m not going to worry about that for now. First, I have to get the first draft down.

I did find an interesting article over on Michelle Willingham’s site about how someone can go from hate to love in 11 steps. Definitely something I’ve seen repeatedly in my reading, but never really thought about as outline points.

So, what do you compare your writing process to? What have you experienced “Aha!” moments over?

Puzzling It Out

So, I’ve been fiddling with a new idea to go with this game-like approach I’ve been thinking about (I haven’t forgotten, Jodi!) while being offline most of last week to spend time with my mom, her friend, and the kids who were out of school.

I found a great resource Folktexts where they have collected a ton of Folklore and Mythology Electronic Texts. I spent a lot of time looking at folktales Wikipedia as well. The English Wiz site also has a very cool section on The Etymology of First Names.

So… I decided I wanted to try to write something around “The Flower Queen’s Daughter”. I don’t know how it’ll turn out, but it’ll be an interesting excercise. DH said it sounded long, but that was probably just my mangling of telling him too many details along the way.

So, yesterday while the kids were in martial arts class, I sat down with my clipboard and started planning. I’ve gone over the story several times to get a feel for what all needs to be included, but beyond the plot sequence, I hadn’t done much else with it yet.

If I was truly going to turn this into a section for a game, I’d need to go into much more detail in mapping out where all the different settings were located and deciding what connected them together that could be interesting or at the least useful. Instead, I came up with 8 locations that can be used and reused during the story.

The Flower Queen’s House
The Hero’s House (more likely his father’s)
The Ditch along the Road
The Road where he’s searching (generalized location here)
The Dragon’s House
Salon/Receiving room
Ball Room
Stables
Meadow
Garden

The characters required seems a large and unwieldy list just now. And they’re not going to be literal representations of how they’re referred to in the book. I was thinking of having the animals/flowers/etc represented in their coats of arms/crests and let it be more metaphorical.

Hero – Alexander
Heroine – Anthea
The Flower Queen/Gyspy — Flora, I’m conflating these two characters
The Dragon Mother — Rosalind
King of Eagles — Arnold
King of Foxes — Todd
King of Fishes — Dylan, Marvin, Morgan, or Meredith
The Dragon’s brothers —
The Dragon — Drake
Hero’s Father —

There are also some items that play roles in the story that will need to be mentioned: a bell, a mare and her foal, and three cloaks (copper, silver, and golden).

I’ve already worked out which characters/items/locations are needed for which of the 16 plot points I pulled directly from the synopsis so far. My next plan is to take those note cards and write Dunne’s Story points on the reverse. I think I’ll also need a few more scenes so that this isn’t completely in the hero’s POV. The heroine needs some reason why she’s just going to waltz off with a man she barely knows instead of staying in what appears to be a cushy place.

So my next step is to lay out the plot points on my handy plot diagram and see where they fall and where I still need answers and ideas.