Today is the first day of National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo. The other day at co-op, I saw one of the teenagers in the common area wearing a homemade NaNoWriMo shirt, so I went over to talk to her. She hasn't participated before, but she has a friend who did last year. Her friend is going to be her partner and help her stay on track.
So I asked her if she had a plot idea, and she told me this wonderful tale of a female outlaw in the old west and her search for justice. My jaw just dropped. It sounds like a great book. And then she asked about mine. "Well, it's a romance. Sort of a romantic suspense thing. With a kidnapping." Man, how lame. "It's sort of a sequel to the one I did last year." Okay, she doesn't care, stop talking. "There's a music group with six guys in it, and last year's was about one of them, so this one is about another one of them."
Now I'm rethinking. There are so many stories to be told. Is this really the one I want to spend a month with?
But you know what? I really love this character. I once met a writer who told me he had to fall in love with his female characters to write them really well. I think this character wants me to write about him. And if there's one thing I've learned as a writer, it's to let the people in my head talk when they want to.
Exactly - I started a series in which I planned to make my female heroine the star of the next books - but instead, her best friends brother needed his adventure to be told. Some characters just need to be written.
ReplyDeleteI'm not participating this year - the entire pregnancy thing has got my mind geared away from writing for a while.
Good luck!