The Fifth Chapter of the Writing for Children Course was about fantasy worlds, examining the ordinary and making it extraordinary and menace; or creating a tangible sense of dread.
One exercise was about collecting and creating names - I have always collected names and working with legal documents of some age and quality of quirkiness I have always been gifted with some of the most outrageous names. I have notebooks full of names, half names, some with question marks showing that I appreciated them but wasn't quite sure what I could use them for, while others have definite comments; like "village idiot", "dangerous man" etc).
The others exercises were about examining an ordinary object say a chair and creating an extraordinary story/happening with that object and creating dread/menace.
The fifth assignment is split into two - 1,500 words each and to be targeted at separate age groups. The latter didn't bother me. I targeted the first story, The Sycamore Chair at girls 7+ and the second, Keeper at boys 10+.
Gathering ideas was easy for the first - mainly from an exercise in the chapter and a property programme with a quirky cottage which fitted the setting I wanted to create. The details flowed into my mind as my character, May, explored. My tutor uses the term Characterphile (meaning that your imagination or writing is driven mainly by the character in your head rather than the plotting) and I love it. Once someone tells you where you lean, where the strengths are, you can look to your weaknesses and adjust to compensate. I need and will always need to plot - once I do this - thinking through each step of the story - my character seems to have more concentration on the adventure - I faff less.
Gathering for the second story was more difficult and the thoughts of menace kept bringing to mind a local legend about full moons and barrows and the sound of dancing faeries. This story took more time. Worse than that, after the first draft I felt that the character of the title, Keeper, wasn't complete; he didn't feel real to me or I wasn't being given enough room to create his back story. I stalled. I didn't want to work on it; so I returned to the first story and worked hard on that.
Sometimes the hardest decision I have is recognizing when to ask for help. This was one of those times and I took my resistance almost all the way to my deadline. Once the reply was received from Nina Milton, my Tutor, a huge weight was lifted. Her advice was to treat the second story as a "first chapter".
THAT was it! Suddenly I could see how the Reverend Clement who constantly goes around his church looking for a way into the realm in which Keeper is a prisoner, is a victim of madness; how all the Vicars for this parish end up being slightly odd due to the sounds of the partying and mischievous faeries and the fact that Keeper was former incumbent's "house boggart". Since he went missing each of the vicars has thought the house was missing something, not really understanding what, and they become increasingly odd in the way they act.
How Keeper got there, why he helps Alan escape after falling into the barrow and why he will never be allowed to leave came in a flash - all because I could tell that later - this was a first chapter.
I worked on a third and fourth draft and thought it was time for my partner to read it.
The response I got shocked me. Very positive - so much so that the character of Keeper was vivid, sympathetic and endearing. I didn't know what to say - literally stunned to silence. My response was "Really!?"
Of course I worked on the stories again and worked through them with the reader always in mind - enjoying the reading out phase again which always highlights fuzziness.
This has been rewarding, but I think Nina Milton and her advice regarding "treating it as first chapter" was awesome to my process. It freed me up to relax and not try and tell the entire story, landscape etc in one go. More than that it put into my head that there was a second, third and fourth chapter just waiting and that plotting was the key to achieving this.
Awesome!
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