La Vie Boheme

Mythic retelling

I got some writing done tonight, finally starting one of the 'new' sections of The Host. I'm inserting three or four interludes that are separate from the main story, similar to the prelude with Maura. The idea is to trace how mythology changed from faeries kidnapping likely subjects to aliens doing the same. Just for kicks, since I haven't done it in ages, here's a little bit of what I wrote tonight:

Long and long ago there lived a handsome young man on the shores of Lake Lough. Fiachra was the joy of his family and the pride of his clan. He excelled at all things, so much so that some gossiped that he was a child of Lugh of the Long Arm, Master of All Skills. Fiachra was a fearsome warrior, had a deft hand with a verse, but above all these things, Fiachra was blessed with a voice that made the wind herself pause to listen. When he raised his voice in song, fruit ripened in nearby orchards, in season or no. Men on the verge of bloodshed would forget their wrath and swear oaths of brotherhood to one another. Some swore their cows produced richer, sweeter milk, and in greater abundance. Many pleaded with Fiachra to sing in their fields, in hopes of a larger crop. Fiachra would always do as he was asked, for in truth, singing was a joy to him beyond any other.

Nor were the cows the only ones enthralled by Fiachra's sweet voice. All the unmarried girls (and no small few of the married ones) thrilled to his singing, many of them tossing their hearts at his feet without a second thought. Alas for them, Fiachra's heart remained his own, and he loved none. The bereft maidens chided him as proud and unfeeling, and the words stung until he wept, giving their words the lie. He often wondered what flaw there was in him that made him unworthy to feel love, and he grieved.

Naturally, that voice of his is what gets him in trouble. ;)

Minions!

Well, the Minions met last night and we all did our first critiques of each other. I'll concur with Julie: We're a talented bunch. :) I have so much good stuff to work on with the first several chapters of The Host now, I feel more enthused about diving in and editing again. The only problem, of course, is that I want to go back and rework the first five chapters (well, prelude and four chapters) again. I'm resisting that urge, because I feel like I should at least finish rewriting the whole thing first, then go back and tweak.

The good news is, they liked it. This made me happy. They also had some great insights, both into factual details that were fuzzy or wrong (hey, the novel's set at the University of Michigan and all three of them are U of M alumni) and in the more esoteric type stuff.

The bad news is, as excited as I am to get back to work, I'm also feeling remarkably lazy. Part of my head is whining, "But I don't WAAAANT to completely rework David as a character!" Which is a problem, because David's a pretty lame character as written. (I've described him as the stereotypical hero's girlfriend in your basic pulpy sort of story: decorative, exists only for the hero's purposes, doesn't do much.) That's why my first instinct was to cut him rather than flesh him out. But he needs to be there. I'm realizing, thinking over the course of the novel, that there just isn't enough conflict between A.J. and her "real life". Sure, she's got conflict, but it's largely either internal, or completely removed from her everyday life. David, as a boyfriend or at least potential boyfriend, could be excellent fodder for real world conflict. I hint at it a little, but I don't use it enough.

You know, I'd tried retyping in the manuscript as a rewriting tool, thinking that would make me rethink everything I typed, but that hasn't happened as much as I had expected. When I type from a manuscript, I think part of my brain shuts off and I go into data entry mode. If I can just find a way to stop that...

So yeah. I want to rewrite. But I don't want to rewrite. Geh.