Preciousness, a final risk and plotting on the edge....

The Fourth Assignment is in. One more chapter of the extended piece to do and in my mind this should be the flowering of the course, the big bang of a firework display.

Following being knocked over by the last assessment I radically re-wrote the fourth chapter. What I thought I would do, now felt like an enormous "information dump". So I discarded half the chapter I had written - well being the way I am I cut it and secreted it away in another document "just in case".

The first half of the chapter is about the main character doing something "out of character" and being caught; this then escalates into a changing of his behavior, a departure. I want to stretch him from being a compliant "boy" into a young man or tetchy-teenager. I want to give him the justification in his own mind for demanding answers...about himself, his history, his place (being the strange environment in which he finds himself) and above all to show his frustration. In the first half he is caught, shamed, confronts and then dismisses the adults continued aloof reaction to his demands.

The narrative from here has been sculpted to fit the third assessment; it predominantly includes the secondary character and interaction between the protagonist and his new friend. This was the main comment about the characters - my Tutor, Nina Milton, wanted more about the character and interaction of Luan. With this in mind I naturally brought in the main theme that is linked with the character and his world which is he is being bullied. This he reveals to the protagonist Adam who, because of his sheltered and controlled upbringing is shocked. In this atmosphere of sharing confidences they return to the magical landscape and while there experience a shocking shared happening....

I needed for there to be a bang to the end of this chapter. It felt like this scene was building up in the storyline and I am hoping that when I get the assignment back my Tutor, Nina Milton, will agree with the timing. "Somethings got to give" is how it felt and I needed to let loose a little (not completely, still holding onto the secrets really quite tightly).

I returned to my process of printing out the chapter and working on it with pen - rather than on the screen where I seem to miss inappropriate punctuation. This felt so good, like returning to a favored place to walk. It allows me to switch activities and concentrate on presentation with, I hope, more effective control.

This third level course has shown me that I am departing from my previous "precious" behavior; in that before I would have fought tooth and nail not to change the plotting or sequence of how I first splurged the story on the page. But now, this seems to have dropped away. I can cut a scene out because it wouldn't happen that way or it can be moved to later in the story.

This is quite a revelation for someone who once, in a previous course, re-wrote a short story thirteen times without changing a single part of the plotting....I may have to revisit that piece and see what occurs now.

My final chapter for the piece is yet to be plotted and is my greatest risk. I KNOW what I want to happen, a small reveal (small in the sense that we get to hear some secrets while more clues are dropped in) but then I also want to wait and find out the reaction to the fourth assignment (and the inevitable re-write that I will undertake before moving on).

So - now I am "plotting on the edge". I am not writing set scenes for the fifth chapter as such but rather jotting down some thoughts and ideas....mostly questions I am asking myself

Example (on smartphone, written halfway through a meeting with phone hidden in my lap because I was afraid I would lose the thought processes and I had broken my pencil):

"Wakes up in the mud with ALL around him? (ALL being the main characters that have been introduced so far, and hinting at their strengths and concerns for him)

Wakes up in his own bed?

Both? The first coming so the revelations can be seeded and the latter so security is felt by him?

BUT - he has to see the spirit of the boy, tethered to the light coming from the pool, a curtain of darkness behind his glowing figure (the darkness being a veil of time which divides the spirit from the current world)"

The Fourth Chapter mini-reveal is a taster but the fifth chapter could be the greatest challenge in how I show the central part of the mystery without giving away too much and still keep many secrets of the main group of characters and especially the protagonist to continue interesting the reader....