Back to the drawing board

So I finished the re-write of Battle for Odana yesterday. I spend this morning reading it aloud to myself in the privacy of my bedroom, in order to line edit. Then I come out and a conversation begins about it.

And I realise that it’s crap.

Well, no, that’s not fair. The idea I have is good. It’s an idea that folks here love to discuss and have done since the Metung retreat, three years ago. It’s an idea that excites them.

But the story I’m telling isn’t doing that idea justice. I’ve got myself caught up in the original inspiration and it turns out that original idea (came from a dream, yet again) isn’t the actual story that is going to carry how interesting this idea is.

What I haven’t done, which this conversation pointed out to me, is two things that I worked out early in the process of writing the gadda books and informed and guided them all the way through, regardless of what changes I made to the book.

I haven’t worked out the mechanism of this world, and I haven’t worked out what I want to say.

In the gadda books, I worked out the mechanism of how this secret race existed and lived alongside us as one of the very first things. And when I started writing, I wanted to achieve two things – I wanted to write books that were fun, and I wanted to write books that showed it was perfectly fine for a woman to be sexually experienced and still fall for the great love of her life.

So now I need to work out what those things are for the odana story. I’ve been playing with some thoughts, and things are making me interested, but nothing has settled in my soul and said ‘Yes, this is what you must do’.

Until then, writing of the story will cease. And when it recommences, I’ll be drafting all over again.

The things we do to ensure that we are creating art we are proud of.

-Nicole

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