Sorry I haven't been very active on the site, but I have been trying to resolve many issues regarding a novella in my collection. It initially started out as a simple 'character sharing a story with the protagonist' but as I made further drafts it has morphed into this behemoth that I am struggling to control. The different plots and themes, I feel, are lost as I've developed undeveloped sections of the story, the different timelines making past tense and present tense grammar tough with dual voices in this story needing to be distinct and individual to the voices and styles of the characters, and more, all proving to be difficult to hold together. I've been working on this story solely for a week now (it's around 11k in length) shutting away distractions to focus but progress is incredibly slow. In amending plot holes from the draft before, I find more issues with the whole 'meaning' and theme. Some parts I really like. They are well written with a gentle flow that I feel creates a nice ambiance for a reader, but I have had to remove them for the sake of the story, and its been painful to do. I am only half way through yet the story reads different from the drafts before, better in many ways and much more in line with my desire for it to be a standalone tale, yet it has been quite consuming. I worry that I am too 'close' to the story having to go a few passages back every time I sit down to spend more time on it and that I have lost track of the purpose and theme of this story. Has anyone else encountered this problem and/or any advice in which you overcame this?
Is it imperative that the voices have different tenses? You can draw distinctions between them without messing with the tenses. It's great if it works, but that sounds like a pain. It's possible that's a symptom of a comparatively weak story. I've often found that when I have perceived issues with theme or meaning that the nuts and bolts story isn't strong enough to support them. Meaning that all that secondary stuff grows naturally from a strong story, and not the other way around. I've never been able to work backwards from meaning to plot. Some might be able to, but I can't do it well. Overall, I would simplify whatever you have to its most basic story elements and build from there. Me personally, I never worry about theme or meaning until it has something to adhere to. Theme can be too elusive and interpretive to attack head on sometimes. It's hard to shape a narrative around that, so I usually don't bother. It if the story ends up with a good meaning, then great, but so long as it's a good story, I'm usually happy. Hope this helps.
Step One: Write the first draft of the book as it comes to you. Step Two: rewrite and edit the book. Hang in there.
I will also add allow the story to percolate for a while before the edit/rewrite. It's surprising how many ideas flow from the original draft.
Every writer is different. Some like to start with a theme and build from there. The theme drives the story. (This is true in my case.) Some like to start with a plot and let the theme emerge as they write. If I understand correctly, you are concerned that you have lost the theme as the plot has taken unexpected turns. Do these turns fit in well with the narrative? Do they help to make a coherent narrative arc? Then, let the plot inspire you. Don’t be afraid to change the theme of a story as you write it. Fixating on a theme may work against your creativity, as the story unfolds.
It is quite a complicated story (with a story in a story) rotating around different timelines so the narrator reflects on the past hence the changes in tenses. There are 2 characters but their voices and styles are very different (one is a female and the other a male) and I've gone so far down the rabbit hole that I'm fixing quite a lot of issues that I missed. This is probably true, it is why I try to attach a deeper meaning to the story and couple it with a running theme. I added quite a lot from the very first draft that the plot has had to change with it but I found so many loose ends that I never realised before. It is an 11k novella that I've spent over a week and I'm only at the half way mark, hence I am little frustrated at the slow progress. I've been debating whether to pause and pick this back up later, but worry this will method will mean I spend longer on this story as I have to reconnect with it all again. I've been 'toughing it out' lately to fix a lot of the problems I created, and it feels like I am changing a leaking pipe. I fix one thing, screwed in all the bits and bolts and it is still leaking so I have dismantle another part to make sure the pipe is straight and connected to the other... seems never ending. Louanne response below kind of hits the nail on the head for me, in that every writer is different. I start with a theme and build from there, but I've added so much that I need to elevate the message I was trying to get back to. I have saved earlier drafts to fall back on which is the bonus. Hello Catriona, it's a novella and I'm on the 6th draft. The early ones was just a simple story inside a story but it lacked a strong message thus the subsequent drafts after developed the message more. In doing so, I had to expand the story with each draft and I have been taking on feedback from readers about my writing especially one common issue that a few have raised in that I can be quite vague in parts, thus I have been trying to rectify this by detailing more. Obviously doing this has meant the story lacked balance and disrupted the flow, so there has been a lot of restructuring and deleting of passages and it is quite 'messy' at the moment, hence the title of this thread. Hello PiP. I'm sure you will remember the short story I sent you, Firefly... this one is similar to that in that there are a lot of 'moving' parts in the story that I had to tie all neatly together at the end. This one is different in telling, as Firefly held a central theme throughout, but this one seems lost with motions of the story. I'm chopping and changing a lot to realign everything as I've made it very complicated and it is the 'connecting all the loose ends' that it is a challenge at the moment. I simply found many plot holes in the story and have removed some because it pushed the story the wrong way. The passages are 'nice' but the direction they go don't align with 'the reason to tell this story' and I worry about it being a dull read. In some feedback you offered (not to this story) you stated that I could add more tension, and this is something I've been wary of for a while. The story flows even with the changing timelines and voices, but they don't add up to anything, the story doesn't fit with the anthology I am creating which is a big problem. I don't really worry about creativity, because I am confident that my stories are quite varied that a reader won't be second guessing what happens next thus they can only relax and be lead away by the story, thus it the theme I'm struggling to keep focus on. I was thinking whether it is best to keep plugging away (for how long?) or tiptoe into writing something else so the time away can offer some clarity in how I can amend the different parts of the story that needs connecting. Sorry for this long reply. But thank you so much for sharing your views.
