A Part of Myself

Confession: Every so often, while I'm eating sushi, I have a "what the hell am I doing?" moment. It passes.

Reading:

• "L. DeBard and Aliette: A Love Story," by Lauren Groff
  
• The House of Mirth, by Edith Wharton
  

Writing:

• "Ferian Fetlock Catches a Cold" - Outline 100%
  

Revising:

• "The Revenant"
• "Cora and the Sea" - Third draft 50%

Do you see that? Do you? The Ferian outline is done. Hells yeah. Woo hoo! W00t! Etc. I took a nice long Ramble tonight and finished it to my satisfaction. That's not to say that it won't change somewhat in the composition, but now I'm in a position to actually do that composition tomorrow.

And that is still my plan, to go to Greenport and knock Ferian over the head. If I can manage to get the same seat in the same cafe I went to last time, all the better. (Hmmm... hope it's open on Sundays.)

What was the mystery piece of the puzzle that I hadn't figured out? Well, it was a matter of conscience, really. Ferian is a character unlike me. He does things that I would not do. As a result, unless I think about it, I wind up making him react and feel as I would, and that's not right at all.

I think I put a part of myself into all of my characters. I have to--I don't know anyone else from the inside looking out, so a lot of who I am and how I think informs the way I write. And for the most part, I can successfully write a POV character that is mostly unlike me by writing about myself, but through a filter.

Ferian isn't like that, I think it's because his morality and mine are dissimilar. As a result, it takes an extra effort to understand how he would be motivated in a given situation. He's pretty selfish at heart. Once he tried not to be, and it backfired, so now he embraces it. There's still a bit of selflessness left in him, and people see that. Some people are attracted to him because of it. But then he acts selfishly, and those people feel betrayed. And Ferian is upset, because he never claimed to be anything but selfish, and they're just reacting to their own opinion of him. Except a little part of him does feel bad, and it makes Ferian feel like a traitor, and he hates that.

In other words, expect Ferian to get more callous every time someone penetrates his exterior, even just a little bit. Because he has to prove to himself that he's only looking out for himself.

He's a very lonely man. And it's not in my nature to leave him like that forever. I think the longer I write him, he'll change to be a nicer person. But would that be a betrayal of the character? How quickly should that happen? And for the purposes of the story, does he become uninteresting the moment he becomes a hero?

Publication Status:

• Submitted: 5
  
• Accepted: 1
• Rejected: 1
• Pending: 3