Delay

I meant to post something last week, but Blogger decided to switch me to the new system, and I had to create a new account and everything. So to save a little work, I'm going to cross-post some stuff I posted to an on-line writer's group I belong to.

Last Monday, I posted this:

So I've been fighting this idea for a while, but I think its time has come. I started a novel featuring Digger, the main character from my first published story, in Nov. 2005. I finished the first draft in May of last year, and I'm currently stalled, stumbling blindly through the last half of the second act. Although I thought I put some good stuff in it, I've been very uncomfortable with the book on several levels.

I think the book's problems are fixable, but I'm not sure at this point that it's worth fixing, at least not right now. Basically, the book just does not feel like the Digger short stories. It's darker, not as much fun. It's not as if there's a big pre-sold audience of Digger fans from the two short stories sold so far, but obviously I did something right with those stories. Any novel I write should try to emulate the qualities of the stories that got them sold in the first place, and I just don't think that this is the one.

In the last couple of days, I've started playing with an idea that feels big enough to be a better fit for a Digger first novel, with the current book maybe being the second in the series, assuming the first one sells. I don't want to abandon what I've done so far, but I'm tired of floundering around with this revision, and I want this to be fun again.

So for now, the current draft of Hero Go Home goes on the shelf, and I start outlining (tentatively) The Hero's Junket.

And then on Friday, I posted this:

Brains are stupid, stupid, stupid things. I've been horribly blocked on Hero Go Home for months, feeling a deep dissatisfaction not only with certain plot details, but with the heart of the book's storyline as well. It just seemed like a misfire from start to finish.

Hence my statement on Monday that I was shelving Hero Go Home in favor of a book that promised to be more fun to write. So what has happened since then?

I've rewritten two scenes of Hero Go Home that I was stuck on. Because once I no longer cared whether I finished it, my mind suddenly let itself start addressing the problems it was afraid to face before.

To quote one of the great philosophers of our time: "You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! STUPID!"

I'm still outlining the other one, though. Writing is starting to get fun again.

So you can see that I'm stuck in a sort of "six of one, half-dozen of the other," situation right now. City of Heroes isn't helping. I'm having a blast with it, but it consumes far too much of my free time.