Guilt (M/F)

[Marquis De Sade]

It's funny and sometimes a little scary how, often, it's not nearly so much that you are writing a story as that your are telling it; and your characters do things you didn't expect, or even approve of! Do you ever feel somewhat helpless when you're writing?

Never given it that much thought to be honest but it's true. Often, a story will come, the characters written. I can try, try, try all I want to steer it all in the direction I first wanted something to go, but once the characters take on lives on their own, it becomes painfully impossible to break with what makes sense in THEIR world. Their world is governed by a specific set of rules, they have their own individual driving forces and personal codes they live and die by. To mess with that is pointless because it either all comes to a grinding halt, or I'll read it back and it's all a bunch of crap that doesn't work nor make any sense.

They usually aren't "built" from the ground up either, as some fictional characters are which is fine because this is usually how writing works. Step by step. What they wear, how they speak, what they want, what they look like, conflict with other characters, etc. I use music a lot, character traits borrowed from people I know or even other books, so they appear fully realized from the beginning whether or not I'm fully aware. Like a finished song complete with every backing instrument. As I write, compare it to listening to a song for the first time. The song knows there's going to be some amazing breakdown in the middle of it, I have no idea until I hear it.

But, helpless? Nah. It's exciting man. The female assassin in Checkmate for example, knew all along she was indeed, the best there is and had the upper hand the whole time, and no way was she going to allow herself to truly be taken advantage of to the end even though I originally had VERY different plans for her.

Btw, here's a PDF file of Guilt. As it was meant to be read. 🙂

 

[prestidigits]

True story: a novelist's wife comes home to find him crying. "What's wrong?!?" she asked, in sincere alarm.

"Jim's dead," he replies, sobbing.

"Jim? Jim who?"

"Jim Jameson."

"Isn't that a character in the book you're writing?"

"Yes," he choked out the response. "He's dead. I killed him."

I know exactly how that writer feels!