Season 2, Episode 37: Dig In And Keep Going
IN THIS EPISODE
“We’re at the point where you just have to dig in and keep going.”
Mel and Abby are at the point in their manuscripts where they're still working on their stories, and nothing significant has come up, no new (big) issues that need dealing with. They are over halfway through - it just takes a loooooong time, and sometimes it's discouraging!
Kemlo says all this is very normal, and it's what makes writing a book harder than short-form stories. You have to have the tenacity to move through the slog and still see the bigger picture of your story and what you're trying to do and say.
Mel started her chapter out with the word “No,” and Kemlo warned against this. She suggested more of a subtle recap, a little more information. You want to avoid forcing readers to look back to the last chapter. People put books down between chapters, and you want them to be able to pick up the book and keep reading, and not have to guess who is talking, where they are, etc. Even though you, as a writer, just finished writing chapter 12 and moved right onto chapter 13, you can't assume that the bare minimum of context is enough for your reader. Don't lose the immersive experience - you want to challenge them with the story, not with how the story was put together.
“You want your reader to be anticipating things - you want them to have to puzzle and try to figure out some things, but not at the sentence level. Not pronouns or where someone is in time and space.”
Speaking of recaps: Mel threw in a recap mid-page in an attempt to remind her readers of certain events, but she's got to throw it out because there's not a reason for it to be there. If her protagonist needs to ruminate on this, that's fine, but it has to make sense in the context of the story. Often we don't give our readers enough credit in remembering what happens chapter-to-chapter.
In regards to the relationship between Mel's protagonist and the potential love interest, Mel needs to go back to previous chapters and find opportunities to plant little seeds for this - signs that her protagonist's opinion of this guy is changing, and a little more projection of what she's hoping and/or fearing. Get the readers looking for these things - it helps us root for her.
Kemlo and Mel work through some strategic plotting/character motivation later in the book - what we're looking for is a change in our characters, a completion of our arc. Readers want to see how the events in the story affect the characters. Plot twists are useful in that they need to help the protagonist realize things - ask yourself, is this helping them learn what it is they need to learn to make my point with the story? It needs to a) mean something to your protagonist, and b) move the story forward.
