Friday, December 5, 2014

Slogging through the Dead Marshes - OR - Those Fucking Middle Chapters

This is a continuation of me writing about writing a novel. (Warning: If you haven't read/seen Lord Of The Ring, just go ahead and skip this post)

I'm in the mushy, flabby middle part of my novel, and let me tell you, the beginning was easier. You remember Lord of the Ring, where Frodo and Sam were on an epic quest with the Fellowship, but then left them, and ended up trekking through Mordor and eventually destroying The Ring? Of course you do, because the Fellowship had a wicked awesome adventure, and the Mordor thing was so dramatic because HOLY SHIT THE FATE OF THE WORLD IS ON THE LINE!!!!

BUT -

Do you remember the parts in between those two? The Dead Marshes and climbing the stairs and whatever those confusing maze of mountains were? I'm betting the answer is "Barely". Because this is the saggy middle between an epic beginning and the Giant Spider Fighting event that kicks off the end-portion and climax of the story. You only kept reading those parts because the beginning was awesome enough to get you hooked and wanting to know how the story ended. Sure Tolkien threw you a bone here an there, introducing the crazy dragon things that the Nazgul ride and throwing in some Samwise and Gollum drama, but overall, it was not nearly as engaging as the parts that preceded and even less engaging than the events in Return of the King.

Well let me tell you: Writing that middle shit is even harder than reading it. Hell, I threw in a random ninja vs knight fight just to keep myself entertained. But I'm pounding through it anyway, because I really like the beginning and the characters I've written so far. It's a good start, and I want to see how it ends. I have a pretty good general idea, but I don't know the words that are going to hit the page yet.

Also, HOLY SHIT the ending is awesome. Maybe it's just because it's mine, or because I'm a huge nerd... whatever. The ending is SO FUCKING COOL and I CANNOT WAIT TO WRITE IT. But I have to, because I know if I don't get through the middle first, the ending won't make enough sense, and I owe my characters (Matt, Jenny, Siri, Walker and Phalanx) a shitload more respect than writing the end before I finish the middle section.

Tune in next week, same bat-time, same bat-place, to read me writing about writing about writing a novel.

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