jennyK on Writing
A reflection on creative fiction and the funny thing that happens when the writer fights the story. The harder it tries to tell itself, the harder it is for me to hear it.
Mother of Crow – Sundered World 2. That’s what I’m working on. Slowly, painfully, bit by bit, and scene by scene. Damn, this shit is hard. This building a place and an emotion, a tension and a world, characters worth bothering with is a self-made nightmare at best, a confidence crusher at worst. Do I have any of that crucial stuff in this story? Or is it just a collection of words and interesting descriptions of thoughts and things that will move no one? Neither to tears nor laughter.
I’m not sure.
But I can’t let the story go. It lives in the back of my mind. And it changes. Characters fade and appear to freeze in some diffuse edge of the canvas where I build my world. Other come forth, wondering where they can lay their story, their thoughts, their history. And it all happens without me doing any writing for long stretches of time. Are those creatures and humans building something I cannot yet see? Do they speak amongst each other about events I have not been able to discover?
Maybe.
I think, as I write this, sensing them stir in my periphery in part glee at my powerlessness, part frustration over my inability to acknowledge the obvious, that yes they do. And it seems clear to me that I should let them. And hope that the next time I put my fingers to the keyboard that I will be able to allow them to tell me what they know.
A character
There is a dragon. Truth is that he is not quite a dragon. But he is not wholly man-made either. He had a name but that was before. He is restless. Ill at ease. These humans, what do they want? Oh, so that’s it is it? Very well. Anywhere but here. Anywhere. Come then. Come.
From
Jenny K Brennan
December 2018