Monday, December 29, 2008

"Missing's the word."


18,000 words on the cursed fanfic story, just a few thousand words left to reach the end... and I'm stuck. I've outlined the whole thing up to present (after writing it) to make sure everything's in the right order (almost, but not quite). I've freewritten. I've daydreamed. I've played with the dog. I've read more of the novel I'm reading. I've watched half of Alvarez Kelly again (I've decided I think I need to own that one - the subject line is one of my favorite smug WH quotes from it, only I'm feeling anything but smug). I've done more freewriting but, mostly, I keep rewording the same damned question, the one I can't answer, the "why" question that's halted me in my tracks, hoping that maybe if I reword it just so, the answer will jump out at me.

Thinking about it now, I did let myself go slightly astray in the story, which might have been a bad idea. It gave me a new cool scene and direction, but I think all I did was complicate matters. And to go this direction, I had to throw out a scene that's been in my head from very early on... I'm wondering what might happen if I yank the new scene and re-write more along the original lines, might that eliminate the problem? No, cuz the nasty question still remains unanswered, and I can't move forward until I know the answer. Grrr.

Can't write a nice simple story, no... it has to have enough subplots, character arcs, and povs for a novel. Seems to be a commonality in my longer fanfic stories lately... and that makes them both logistical nightmares and, despite my frustrations, very fun.

(And I think I need to write a post sometime about the Movie Clothes I Wished I Owned. Like Dana's jacket in The Ox-Bow Incident.)

2 comments:

Ginger Ingenue said...

Sorry you're having trouble with your story...I'm sure it'll all smooth out eventually. :)

"And I think I need to write a post sometime about the Movie Clothes I Wished I Owned. Like Dana's jacket in The Ox-Bow Incident."

You should! :)

Then tag me, and I'll do it too...

I'd also make a "Movie Character's Hair I'd Most Like to Run my Fingers Through" post; for Number One: Dana Andrews in THE OX-BOX INCIDENT. ;)

DKoren said...

"Movie Character's Hair I'd Most Like to Run my Fingers Through"...

Oh yes indeed, Dana definitely gets #1 for Ox-Bow! Those must have been some industrial strength hair products back then for him to keep that mass of curls tamed most of the time. Of course, part of the fun of his early movies is watching them escape the slicked back look and re-curl. Joel McCrea's thick wavy locks in any of his early movies gets #2, and William Holden's own mass of curls in Golden Boy gets #3. Hm... Aldo Ray's short spiky hair in Battle Cry gets #4 and... hm, don't have an immediately #5 to round it out!

And I have to start work in a few minutes with this on my mind? LOL!

I'll think about other movie clothes, cuz I know there's a bunch, I just can't think of them off the top of my head! Feel free to beat me to it, if you've got some cool outfits/items in mind!