Before I started writing Grace, I knew what it was about. It was about being the normal one in a family of people with gifts (Grace) and about being the different one in a family of normal people (Noah) and about finding out that you can be yourself–whoever you are–and still belong.
I read that and sigh. It still sounds like a good book to me. That’d be a good book, wouldn’t it?
But that’s not what that book I’ve written is at all. Not even to the teeny-tiny-most minute degree. This is a book about moving on. About letting go. And I don’t have the slightest idea how it turned out this way. The name doesn’t make any sense at all anymore — not that I’m going to change it, because what would I change it to? But Grace was supposed to realize her own gifts, along with giving Noah the gift of acceptance, and I really don’t see that happening at this point. Instead… well, I won’t spoil it. Suffice to say that that’s not the direction in which I’m headed. But this fairytale’s ending is going to be bittersweet, I think.
My Monday to-do list worked out pretty well, though. Oh, I still haven’t folded the laundry. Ha, I should maybe do that. But I did clean the kitchen and I did work on painting the bathroom and I did walk the dogs, and most importantly, I did manage to map out the remaining chapters of Grace. I had one last plot point that was unresolved and sticky, and I figured it out this morning. It leads to a short story that’s not going to be included in the main story, but that’s okay. I’d actually really like to write more short stories that are scenes — not full-fledged plots, but more just moments in the day. I’m not sure I’d feel right about publishing them, but I think I would find them soothing to write. Low pressure!
And now back to it — I’m glad I know what comes next, but it feels like I’ve still got a lot to write.
Dying to know (tho you don’t have to tell me) bittersweet because they don’t end up together?
Oh, no, they do, of course. I’m not that mean. But the story’s not just about Noah and Grace. It’s about Dillon and Rose. And I’ve worked on the ending three times and every time I’ve wound up with tears streaming down my face. Moving on and letting go is hard, even when it’s right. Of course, other people may not feel the same way about it and that’s fine. I’m far more invested in these characters than anyone else would be. They’re real to me. Hmm, it’s a very Doctor Who sort of ending, I suppose.
I will probably be ok with it. I’m usually good with letting go if it’s organic to the flow of things.
Reading the most recent Bujold novel and that seems to be her overarching theme, moving on, letting go, starting from a new normal, new goals. Kind of comforting to know as you let one thing go your arms are open to the new. It even makes death transformative.
I was so disappointed in that book. I think I would have been okay with turning Cordelia and Aral’s relationship into an open poly relationship — I can see that it wouldn’t have phased Cordelia, even though I’m uncomfortable with the idea that Aral didn’t take his vows to her seriously — if anything had happened in the book, if the characters had grown or changed. But it felt stagnant to me. And Miles’ tolerant reaction to discovering that his father had a twenty-year relationship outside his marriage felt totally out of character, too tolerant to be truthful. Saintly characters don’t make for interesting stories.
I’m glad you’re o.k. with allowing the story to unfold however it will. Maybe what you’ve written is what you NEEDED to write, even though it’s not what you thought the story was going to be at the beginning. It rings of what you said about Noah: Acceptance. And that’s a good thing to experience, whether it’s within yourself or in your characters. Hugs… T
I’ve been fighting this story for so long that I have admitted defeat — it will be whatever it wants to be!