Merge

There's been a lot of life in my life of late, and a lot less writing. The life's been great, mostly, but I've missed the writing. It had reached the point where I was dreaming about my fingers hitting keys.

Also, I was at a loss for a weekly update on this blog, unless I was going to write something about writing withdrawal symptoms.

Then, this morning, I had a revelation about a story with which I'd been wrestling for a few years. Recently, I'd completed a third and quite different draft of the story which had addressed issues I'd had with the previous two, also quite different, drafts. I'd tried writing it from different perspectives. I'd tried three different settings, three different tones, and three different character sets yet no one version had fixed everything. The story I'd wanted to tell had continued to elude me.

In the dawn between slumber and waking it occurred to me that I had been doing a baby and bathwater bit on myself. So, when life gave me a break today, I took those three drafts and merged them into one draft. While it's a bumpy read at the moment, I can see the potential. I'm pleased with the tonal shifts, and the characters change or grow throughout their history in the tale.

This, my friends, is why writers never throw anything away.

Another merge happened when I got out of bed and took a peek at my FaceBarf feed. Good old CN had posted a link from The Guardian which gave me some needed insight into one of my characters and her motivations. Everything seems to be coming together like a zipper.

Now, if I can find the time to merge it further into a smooth narrative, it'll be ready for my beta readers.