Massacre Your Darlings
Mar. 5th, 2012 06:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
madwriterI've murdered m'darlings before in stories great and sundry when I thought it was necessary, but the idea of taking out a 19,100 word swath all in one blow is a little new to me, and gives me some pause no matter how I gripe to myself that the book may be too long. Specifically, I'm thinking about chopping out Part 2 of Chapter 1 of Arizona--the section set in 508 B.C. and titled "Corn Mother and Corn Maiden". As much as I like the characters in the section, I wasn't all that fond of the story when it was written, and I haven't grown more fond of it in the couple of months since.
I won't let the axe fall just yet, but I am getting more inclined in that direction. As an editor of James A. Michener once told the author when she chopped out a 40-page swath of one of his books (I think Centennial), "It adds but it does not illuminate". Besides liking the characters--especially the strong female protagonist, a holy woman named Ooljee--the reasons I have for keeping it tend not to be good ones, such as it bridging a chronological gap.
In other writing befuddlement, this past weekend my brain suddenly solved a major story problem for me...on an unfinished book I set aside in 2007. (Specifically, Burning Avalon, the one about the supposed return of King Arthur after an apocalypse.) It was actually a simple change but it made everything fall into place and highlighted (glaringly) the bad parts of the novel. Ah well, I'll write everything down, but I'm certainly not going to stop work on Arizona. The best Burning Avalon might get is Story B status--the story that gets worked on when Story A is causing writer's block. I've never attempted two books at once, though, and luckily Arizona, after being in my head for a quarter-century, doesn't give me writer's block very often.
Anyway, I did a bit of writing today, which wasn't too bad considering that today was the first day (of 2-3 months) of my going into work two hours early every weekday. It helped that I'd already written most of it in my head, so mostly all I had to do was type fast.
PROGRESS REPORT
New Words: 1300 on Chapter 3 ("Spirit, Faith, and Reason") of Arizona. Fray Bernardo finds a way around Captain Cristobal's strict new rules at the Awatovi pueblo, benefiting pretty much everybody but Captain Cristobal.
Total Words: 104200, potential 19K chops notwithstanding.
Reason For Stopping: Getting ready for work.
Book Year: 1638.
Mammalian Assistance: Vegas strolled casually into the Writing Room with me, and alternated between guarding his box pile and my lap.
Exercise: Walking Tucker 'round the neighborhood; walking down to campus.
Stimulants: Dr. Pepper.
Today's Opening Passage: The threat of cutting off the supply wagons did not stop Fray Bernardo from writing letters of protest to Santa Fe over the next few months—or occasionally pacing fitfully and arguing with the air as Fray Miguel hurriedly took down the elder friar’s words. All went unanswered by both the governor and the friars' superiors in Mexico City. Neither friar was surprised that the governor ignored them, but Miguel was stunned that the bishop did as well. “Don’t they understand how many souls we stand to lose?” he cried in frustration one night as they finished yet another letter by candlelight inside their cell. Candles, Miguel thought distractedly. Something else they would lose if the wagons stopped.
Darling Du Jour: Miguel had never heard the elder friar so angry, and obviously neither had the soldiers. A few looked defiant, but many trembled, a few crossed themselves, and one was even in tears on his knees. “Be thankful, all of you,” Fray Bernardo continued just as loudly but with less anger, “that I discovered this wretchedness in time to save you. All of you,” he repeated, surveying the women now. Even the unconverted Moqui were withdrawn under his stern glower. Then Miguel realized that ultimately the particular words hardly mattered. Fray Bernardo’s voice was desert thunder rolling down a mountainside, the swell of rain followed by the rush of a flood in a riverbed dry just moments before.
Non-Research / Review Books In Progress: Farmer; Bragg.
I won't let the axe fall just yet, but I am getting more inclined in that direction. As an editor of James A. Michener once told the author when she chopped out a 40-page swath of one of his books (I think Centennial), "It adds but it does not illuminate". Besides liking the characters--especially the strong female protagonist, a holy woman named Ooljee--the reasons I have for keeping it tend not to be good ones, such as it bridging a chronological gap.
In other writing befuddlement, this past weekend my brain suddenly solved a major story problem for me...on an unfinished book I set aside in 2007. (Specifically, Burning Avalon, the one about the supposed return of King Arthur after an apocalypse.) It was actually a simple change but it made everything fall into place and highlighted (glaringly) the bad parts of the novel. Ah well, I'll write everything down, but I'm certainly not going to stop work on Arizona. The best Burning Avalon might get is Story B status--the story that gets worked on when Story A is causing writer's block. I've never attempted two books at once, though, and luckily Arizona, after being in my head for a quarter-century, doesn't give me writer's block very often.
Anyway, I did a bit of writing today, which wasn't too bad considering that today was the first day (of 2-3 months) of my going into work two hours early every weekday. It helped that I'd already written most of it in my head, so mostly all I had to do was type fast.
New Words: 1300 on Chapter 3 ("Spirit, Faith, and Reason") of Arizona. Fray Bernardo finds a way around Captain Cristobal's strict new rules at the Awatovi pueblo, benefiting pretty much everybody but Captain Cristobal.
Total Words: 104200, potential 19K chops notwithstanding.
Reason For Stopping: Getting ready for work.
Book Year: 1638.
Mammalian Assistance: Vegas strolled casually into the Writing Room with me, and alternated between guarding his box pile and my lap.
Exercise: Walking Tucker 'round the neighborhood; walking down to campus.
Stimulants: Dr. Pepper.
Today's Opening Passage: The threat of cutting off the supply wagons did not stop Fray Bernardo from writing letters of protest to Santa Fe over the next few months—or occasionally pacing fitfully and arguing with the air as Fray Miguel hurriedly took down the elder friar’s words. All went unanswered by both the governor and the friars' superiors in Mexico City. Neither friar was surprised that the governor ignored them, but Miguel was stunned that the bishop did as well. “Don’t they understand how many souls we stand to lose?” he cried in frustration one night as they finished yet another letter by candlelight inside their cell. Candles, Miguel thought distractedly. Something else they would lose if the wagons stopped.
Darling Du Jour: Miguel had never heard the elder friar so angry, and obviously neither had the soldiers. A few looked defiant, but many trembled, a few crossed themselves, and one was even in tears on his knees. “Be thankful, all of you,” Fray Bernardo continued just as loudly but with less anger, “that I discovered this wretchedness in time to save you. All of you,” he repeated, surveying the women now. Even the unconverted Moqui were withdrawn under his stern glower. Then Miguel realized that ultimately the particular words hardly mattered. Fray Bernardo’s voice was desert thunder rolling down a mountainside, the swell of rain followed by the rush of a flood in a riverbed dry just moments before.
Non-Research / Review Books In Progress: Farmer; Bragg.
