Kurt R.A. Giambastiani

Progress on my book has been slow—not stopped, just slow—but I choose to view this as a good thing.

After years of thrashing about and achieving zero forward movement, I’m finally getting words on paper (yes, literally; I’m a longhand writer). Last night I finished the second scene, and now that it’s all keyed in and backed up, I decided to reflect a bit and see if I could identify the reasons why I’m having such a tough time building momentum.

It didn’t take long to find several culprits, including a slew of bad habits that I’ve developed during the fallow years. While I certainly have to deal with those bad habits, they’re specific to me and my life, and thus irrelevant to writing, per se, so I’ll skip discussing them here. Two issues, however, I think are worth discussing, as other writers may experience something similar.

Problem One: The Newness Factor

This book is a departure from my previous work. It’s similar in that it’s set within a historical context, and I’m no stranger to historical context, but that’s about as far as the Venn diagram of this book and my comfort zone overlap.

While all my previous books have been plot-driven, this book is definitely character-driven, and that’s a huge shift.

To define my terms, a plot-driven story is one in which events and actions drive what happens to the main character, whereas in a character-driven story the events are driven by the character’s decisions, feelings, etc. You might think that’s an overly subtle distinction, and in some cases you’d be right, but in practice it’s the difference between Die-Hard and Hamlet. Both have main characters affected by events (the takeover of Nakatomi Plaza, the murder of Hamlet’s dad), but for John McClane, despite his best efforts, he runs into one hurdle, one heap of bad luck after another (“Schieß dem Fenster!”), each causing grief upon grief, while in Hamlet’s case, his feelings and his decisions (“What’s that behind the arras?”) are what furthers the action.

Writing a plot-driven novel, once I’ve outlined it, moves along briskly (for me). I know what’s happens, I know how my characters will react, and I know where we’re going next.

This character-driven novel, though, is different. I’ve outlined the action, but that’s just what happens next; the real work comes in writing about how the characters feel and why they decide to take us to the next plot point. As a result, there’s a lot more internalization, and a lot less pure action. I mean, when George’s dirigible crashed in The Year the Cloud Fell, I didn’t have to worry too much about how he felt about it beforehand. He reacted, and reactions are a lot easier to write than motivations.

So, writing this sort of novel has me spooked.

Problem Two: Writing Close to the Bone

Though the particulars of this issue are specific to me, the problem still has a universal aspect that may apply to others, to wit, my characters are going through an unpleasantness that I recently experienced myself. I didn’t like going through it then, and I surely don’t like reliving it now. Moreover, I’m not just reliving it; I’m getting down in the mud with it and wrassling, no holds barred, anything goes, struggling to pin it down so I can waterboard it until it tells me exactly how everyone felt while it was on its rampage. Writing this requires a lot of introspection, a lot of shining X-File type flashlights into very dark corners, and it is No. Fun. At. All.

It’s not cathartic. It’s not empowering. It provides no closure.

It’s miserable and depressing, and while half of the time I feel like everyone’s whining, the other half I feel like it’s just a melodramatic Penny Dreadful.

And yet, this is the story I want to tell. Despite these difficulties, I still think it’s an interesting story, and even though nothing blows up and there aren’t any battles or palace intrigue, I still think it can be made compelling enough to pull readers through.

But, can I make it compelling enough?

I know that all first drafts are crap, and this one will be no exception.

I’m just used to a different type of crap, is all.

k