Department of Unexpected Events

[akirlu]

I believe I am in love.

Yesterday I started writing a novel. A murder mystery with supernatural beings and ancient gods and an improbable amount of explicit sex, in fact. Basically, I would like to read more books like Kiss of Shadows would have been if it wasn't quite so prone to slipping into tired romance tropes. But from what I understanding of subsequent books in the Merry Gentry series -- I gave up after the second, Caress of Twilight -- if I want to read more books like that, I'll have to damn' well write them myself. So, after a little prodding, I am.

But I have started fiction projects before. What surprised me this time was how quickly I got caught up in the process. I wrote most of the opening paragraph in an LJ comment. From there, plus the realization that I would need to introduce elements that would keep the thing from seeming like too much of a Hamilton rip-off, I had a world, a protagonist, a mythos, the skeleton of a plot, a mcguffin, and a first murder victim, plus glimpses of what happens after. There is now the better part of an entire book in my head, and unlike any fiction project I can remember, I really want to get on with writing it so I can find out what happens next.

I stayed up until two last night, writing, and I didn't want to go to bed even then. I wanted to get at least to and through the first major sex scene and on to the murder of the Egyptian God of Fertility, but at some point you have to recognize that you have work in the morning. So here I am, underslept and logy and fretting about when I can get back to work on the first chapter.

Lord, o lord, why now? I need another project like I need to enter my head into a St. Sebastian look-alike contest. And yet this thing is so alive in me right now that it feels actively wrong to put it aside for a better time. It could go cold and dry and sterile in the interim.

Now would be a good time to suffer from insomnia.

Comments

[shelleybear.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, you could be one of those lucky writers who can deal with the sound of their own voice and get a cheap voice actuated tape recorder to keep track of your ideas.

[pnh.livejournal.com]

Very cool!

[marykaykare.livejournal.com]

Cool indeed. I've been talking with kimber_kay about nudging each other into writing by setting goals and stuff. Sounds like you don't need nudging though.

It's odd how these 2 stories I wrote in the past have suddenly taken over my brain with pleas for being rewritten. Maybe we should take to doing the kind of Thud Reports papersky does.

And you know, I like those sorts of things myself and would be willing to be a test reader eventually. Should you need one. I've read all of Laurel Hamilton...

MKK

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

I think wanting to create the work that would be your favorite (it was a zine for me, in the 80s) is a great source of inspiration. Congratulations and good luck!

[samildanach.livejournal.com]

Ooooooh and [various other enthusiastic noises of literary encouragement]. I want to read this book.

[athenais.livejournal.com]

I highly recommend writing at the expense of your sleep. It's worth it! Write it while it's hot, babe.

[bibliofile.livejournal.com]

Go you! No, I mean, what the heck are you doing wasting time on LJ? GO! Write. Now.

[cluefairy-j.livejournal.com]

Suh-weet.