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May. 3rd, 2014 05:13 pm
Work In Progress: I See The Castle
I find myself posting this update in an effort to rekindle my enthusiasm, or possibly just to try and convince myself that I am getting somewhere.
I have as of this grey and dreary afternoon completed Act II of my current novel, I See The Castle. That is, Chapter Twenty, because this is a young adult novel and designed to come in at around 70,000 words. So far, I'm on track, maybe a bit over. It's taken me a lot longer to get this far than I anticipated, but what else is new?
Why I'm making such heavy weather of this, is presumably to do with the fact that it's a rewrite. A comprehensive and total reworking of a manuscript that spent nine months at Penguin Australia in the mid noughties before being rejected. This time, I know which story I'm actually telling. This time, the book will end properly. This time, there won't be a plot hole you could stage a cavalry charge through. But the fact remains: I have trod this path before. To make matters worse, it's based upon my experiences in high school. This makes it a very dark urban fantasy with philosophical pretensions, and, oh yes: sixteen year olds.
I didn't enjoy being a teenager: I don't enjoy writing about it. Sixteen year olds have a very limited scope of action. Contrary to what appears to be the current literary vogue, I don't believe that being young grants you an appreciation of what's wrong with the world and how it can be fixed, any purity of purpose or emotion, nor any especial facility with the martial arts. A person with any real talent at that age is confused, miserable and gratuitous. All that granting them power is going to achieve, is to make the damage a bit more... obvious, say.
I have as of this grey and dreary afternoon completed Act II of my current novel, I See The Castle. That is, Chapter Twenty, because this is a young adult novel and designed to come in at around 70,000 words. So far, I'm on track, maybe a bit over. It's taken me a lot longer to get this far than I anticipated, but what else is new?
Why I'm making such heavy weather of this, is presumably to do with the fact that it's a rewrite. A comprehensive and total reworking of a manuscript that spent nine months at Penguin Australia in the mid noughties before being rejected. This time, I know which story I'm actually telling. This time, the book will end properly. This time, there won't be a plot hole you could stage a cavalry charge through. But the fact remains: I have trod this path before. To make matters worse, it's based upon my experiences in high school. This makes it a very dark urban fantasy with philosophical pretensions, and, oh yes: sixteen year olds.
I didn't enjoy being a teenager: I don't enjoy writing about it. Sixteen year olds have a very limited scope of action. Contrary to what appears to be the current literary vogue, I don't believe that being young grants you an appreciation of what's wrong with the world and how it can be fixed, any purity of purpose or emotion, nor any especial facility with the martial arts. A person with any real talent at that age is confused, miserable and gratuitous. All that granting them power is going to achieve, is to make the damage a bit more... obvious, say.
"And she couldn't hear herself any more for the scream was back, the dreadful, clotted scream. And the barred door next to hers were clanging, as something flung itself against it and the scream went on and on, like something squeezed through, and even though she'd shrunk away from the door, she glimpsed motion.
A hand. Fingers scraping into her field of vision, clawing at the stone, and in the shadows it was completely white and the nails danced like little specs of firelight. Orange nails sunk deep in the dead skin, and every centimeter was puckered."
