I was looking through the posts to this site and realized I’d made some comments about future release dates that didn’t quite pan out. It wasn’t intentional, I assure you. When I said Guardian’s Faith would be out in June, I really thought it would be. I thought I could impose a schedule on myself and my mind and I would adhere to it; a Guardian’s book, a Wolvers, a Hidden Mountain. Write, write, write and repeat.
What’s that they say about the best laid plans of mice and men? Yeah, well, it’s even more so for writers like me. I freely admit that earlier in my writing career, I would have given my right arm to be picked up by a well known publishing house. Now, I’m not so sure. Indie publishing has given me the freedom to write what I need to write as opposed to writing what I’m supposed to. Guardian’s Faith is a case in point.
I thought her story would be easy. While writing Guardian’s Hope, I thought I knew Faith well enough to foresee her future with Broadbent – Think Jane Austen’s long suffering Colonel Brandon and Marianne. (I rooted for the poor Colonel throughout repeated readings of the book and when Alan Rickman played him in the movie, well, didn’t he just do me in!!!) It was a fine idea and in real life, they might have made a happy couple, but this is fiction, folks, and by the end of Guardian’s Joy, I knew there was no story there to be told. (Unless you’re willing to pay me $2.99 to read the words “Faith and Broadbent formalized their union and lived happily ever after.”)
I wracked my brain. I really did. I knew there was more to Faith than being the pretty and spoiled sister of Hope, but I couldn’t discover her secrets. I’d promised my readers her story and yet there was no story to be found. (Unless you were willing to pay $2.99 for the words “Faith and Broadbent aren’t getting together.”)
Meanwhile, Jazz reared her blue streaked head and started demanding to be heard. Almost instantly, Doc Goodman was there, Jazz’s complete opposite. I knew these people, knew their histories and their secrets and knew that in spite of their bantering and bickering, they were meant to be together. I made some notes and set them aside, but every time I sat down to write about Faith, those two were there instead.
I made excuses. It’s difficult for me to pull away from one type of character (Wolvers) and focus on another (Guardians) with a different setting and point of view, etc., etc. The truth is, Jazz’s story was forming while Faith’s would not. She was as mute as her character. So I went with the story that I couldn’t get out of my mind.
Don’t think I sat down and wrote 100,000 words about Jazz and Griz from beginning to end, amen. I wish I could write like that. I can’t. Telling a story for me is an arduous journey, writing and re-writing and working out plot points that come as a surprise even to me. It takes months. It’s the characters who create my stories and not the other way around.
Which brings me back to Faith and Lucien who both finally got around to speaking out once I stopped imposing my will on who they are and what they’re like. Their story is now unfolding and I’m excited to sit down at my computer each day to see what will happen next. I’m liking these new characters. A lot.
I’ve always known my stories were character driven, but Faith and Lucien have taught me something more. I’m not really a writer of stories. I’m merely a chronicler of the events. They tell the story. My job is to make you feel and see what they feel and see in each other and the world around them. Amen.
