The Final Push

The battle of the adverbs has come to a close. I think.

I went through the latest draft last night, after the Indians destroyed the Yankees in Game 1 of the ALDS, and I took another look through it after the Tribe squeaked out a second victory in a game that, quite frankly, the Yankees didn't deserve to win anyway.

At this point, I think I've excised every adverb that doesn't need to be in the book. Now I have one final task ahead.

I have to finish the damn thing.

I've been stalled on the last two chapters for some time now, since the end of the summer, in fact. Getting hung up on some particular spot in the story is not unusual for me, and I suspect it isn't uncommon for most writers. At one time or another over the last year and a half, I've hit snags of all kinds in writing this book.

What I've found is that when I get to a spot where I just can't write, where the story just seems to stop on me, it usually means one thing. I took a wrong turn somewhere. And I think this current roadblock might have its root there.

I don't really know how other people write. I've met quite a few other authors since my first book came out, but I've never asked, and no one has ever told me how they do it. There's a book by Stephen King called "On Writing" which gives some insight into how he works through a story, and there was a movie a few years ago with Luke Wilson and Kate Hudson about a writer dictating his novel that kind of explored how the author thought his way through the process.

I recognized things in both, but neither one was dead-on, at least from my perspective.

If anyone is interested, here's what I do: I wing it.

I don't outline a thing. Ever. Instead, I start with some kind of idea, a premise or a group of one or two characters that I think might be interesting for some reason (they're self-loathing, ageless changelings, for example). Then I try to figure out what those characters might do, where'd they go from day to day, how they'd see the world, and what their problems might be. Some kind of a story usually comes out of that, and I go from there.

Most of the time, I write the whole first section of a book with absolutely no idea how it's going to end. Every so often, I stop and look at where I am, where the characters are, and try to figure out what they'd do next. I like to think they tell me, but I know that sounds kind of flaky. It does feel like that, though. They kind of dictate where the story goes, and I fill in the details.

Anyway, for the current manuscript, I've got all the characters in the final scene, about to make the decision that will define the ending of the book -- and they won't do it. Or, at least, I can't quite figure out what they do next. I know what I think they're going to do, and where I think that will ultimately take the story, but I'm not at all sure how to get them there.

So that means that I have to spend the weekend back-tracking. I have to back up about 100 pages, read a little and try to figure out where I went off course. Or, where I left out something that needs to be there to make the ending come together.

I have some ideas. For example, one of the main characters is in an ill-advised romantic relationship with a co-worker that was probably doomed from the start, although only one of them realizes it -- until it's too late, and that's the point where I need to focus.

As luck would have it, I have recently gathered a bit of real-world experience in exactly that department, so I just might get this thing done pretty soon, after all.