Meredith Mansfield, Author

I had a really good weekend last week working on the first draft of BECOME: TO CATCH THE LIGHTNING.

Things slowed down a bit during the week–which should not be unexpected. I’m still not up to that level of progress this weekend, but I think I know why.

The chapter I’m currently writing is one that . . . doesn’t so much raise the stakes for my main character as make them painfully clear. Painfully, because the very next chapter is the one that’s going to change everything. This chapter needs to really paint that picture clearly, even while not all that much, plotwise, is actually going on. It’s a still place, the calm before the storm.

I’m quite sure I’m not getting all the emotion that needs to be in these scenes in. I’m fairly sure I’m eventually going to have to break this into two chapters. I’m reminding myself of that Shannon Hale quote about shoveling sand into a box in preparation of building castles later. And I’m trying to gather myself for that next chapter which is going to rip everything apart and, basically, force my main character to start from . . . not even from the beginning. Farther down than that.

Authors are supposed to torture their characters for the good of the story. That doesn’t mean it’s always an easy thing to do.