Post by Dabeagle on Mar 21, 2016 10:19:33 GMT -5
This is a consolidated thread to share the process and ideas that went into this story. For most it might be an interesting footnote, if you were a fan of the story; for others an insight into my creative process.
The inspiration for Ehren came from the character of Ehren in the Jim Butcher novels, The Codex Alera. Ehren became my favorite character for a few reasons - he was smart, intensely clever, loyal and brave as well as having a few moments of wit. He was also one of the 'side characters' who we didn't see all the time or in every scene. In fact, he wasn't introduced until the second book of the series. One of the interesting things about 'side characters' is that some parts of them never get fleshed out - like sexuality, as a for instance. It was easy to picture Ehren as whatever you wanted, outside of how he was described in the series. Late in the final book it appeared that Ehren had died, and I was pretty upset. I have salvaged characters from other series and universes and placed them into my own before - Jake Tull, from Long Day, is a stand in for Jake Chambers, found in the town of Tull in the first book of the Dark Tower by Stephen King. Tyler Marshall, from the short Forever December, was from the Stephen King/Peter Straub follow up to The Talisman, Black House. Devyn Kennedy, from the Sanitaria Springs universe, came from the serial All In by Craftingmom.
So, I had my character - his qualities and his physical description, being short and blond. I had plans for him for a serial titled The War of the Seven Houses, and even started it. Finding the image used for the series only spurred my mind on as I tried to create my story:
This image evoked a lot of mystery, to me. The down turned face, hidden from our view. The anonymous beach and body of water behind him. The set of the arms implied, to me, a kneeling position. Why was he there like that? WHat does he look like? He seems slender - by design or circumstance?
Part of the reason Wot7H didn't get going was my editor. I have a very good relationship with him but he won't edit fantasy/sci-fi and so I began to think more heavily on the story that grew into Things We Lost. Even though the story is, at heart, a love story I thought we needed to really see where Ehren was coming from before we got to the romance. Also, I've written a lot of romantic stories and I wanted this to have a lot more going on besides simple emotion - I wanted to balance peril, real street existence - essentially to make this more realistic than other things I may write.
One thing that came up from editing and some comments was how long Ehren stayed at the Malone residence and how the parents didn't catch on. Well, I wrote is - but didn't reinforce - that the younger Malones would sneak Ehren in or ask for him to stay over in order to ensure he was cared for. Also, the parents did suspect and had been pumping Piper for information, not as much at first, but as the summer wore on their suspicions grew leading to the scene of conflict in chapter 7. I didn't want to delve too deeply into the parents and when they wondered just what was going on because it would have ruined that scene of conflict and sent us toward our resolution.
As I wrote the scenes in the Malone house, I had intended for Ehren to take longer to fall for Tris. Unfortunately, Ehren is smarter than I am and I realized that, given his street smarts and his book smarts, he'd figure out Tris was a decent guy much faster than I'd wanted. Instead of fighting it and making the story longer another way, I let Ehren stay true to his character. Oddly, something similar happened with Brandon.
Brandon is based on a real life person. My husband and I went to a party and this young man was there. When he was introduced, I was initially impressed with his presence and his willingness to talk to an adult, which is somewhat rare. However, as the night wore on, he made rude comments and made some rude actions, for being a guest especially, and I found it odd that his parents weren't correcting him. Of course, I was expecting them to keep my standards, which was silly, however the boy stuck with me. Later, when I discussed things with our friend, I was told that he's a good kid but he has his issues. That's why, as the story progressed, Brandon retains his rude exterior while still showing that, while he 'has his issues' he's still a good kid.
At some point during the development I stumbled across these two images:
Now, some folks will remember the description of the picture in the Malone's living room, down to the blue shoes. This stand in for Tris is actually a stand in for the person who inspired Tris, a guy who works at my local Y doing - you guessed it - after school care. He looks as described in the story, but I thought these images would give you a rough idea of where I was when writing Tris.
The version online is similar to the original, unedited story. However, after many questions and comments had been made by my editor, several pages and scenes were added to the story. In retrospect, I probably should have held it for a few weeks as I kept tinkering with it; adding a bit here and tweaking a bit there, to the point that I had a second editor, my friend Valkyrie over at GA, make a pass through it so the parts I'd added or adjusted would get the benefit of an extra set of eyes.
In the end, it was one of the easier stories I've written, flowing like few others had before and very few spots where I 'got stuck', with the exception of the beginning. That initial scene gave me fits.
To the readers, thank you for reading my work. Much bigger thanks to those of you that discussed my story and took the time to share comments - it's how I measure how good one of my stories are.
D
The inspiration for Ehren came from the character of Ehren in the Jim Butcher novels, The Codex Alera. Ehren became my favorite character for a few reasons - he was smart, intensely clever, loyal and brave as well as having a few moments of wit. He was also one of the 'side characters' who we didn't see all the time or in every scene. In fact, he wasn't introduced until the second book of the series. One of the interesting things about 'side characters' is that some parts of them never get fleshed out - like sexuality, as a for instance. It was easy to picture Ehren as whatever you wanted, outside of how he was described in the series. Late in the final book it appeared that Ehren had died, and I was pretty upset. I have salvaged characters from other series and universes and placed them into my own before - Jake Tull, from Long Day, is a stand in for Jake Chambers, found in the town of Tull in the first book of the Dark Tower by Stephen King. Tyler Marshall, from the short Forever December, was from the Stephen King/Peter Straub follow up to The Talisman, Black House. Devyn Kennedy, from the Sanitaria Springs universe, came from the serial All In by Craftingmom.
So, I had my character - his qualities and his physical description, being short and blond. I had plans for him for a serial titled The War of the Seven Houses, and even started it. Finding the image used for the series only spurred my mind on as I tried to create my story:
This image evoked a lot of mystery, to me. The down turned face, hidden from our view. The anonymous beach and body of water behind him. The set of the arms implied, to me, a kneeling position. Why was he there like that? WHat does he look like? He seems slender - by design or circumstance?
Part of the reason Wot7H didn't get going was my editor. I have a very good relationship with him but he won't edit fantasy/sci-fi and so I began to think more heavily on the story that grew into Things We Lost. Even though the story is, at heart, a love story I thought we needed to really see where Ehren was coming from before we got to the romance. Also, I've written a lot of romantic stories and I wanted this to have a lot more going on besides simple emotion - I wanted to balance peril, real street existence - essentially to make this more realistic than other things I may write.
One thing that came up from editing and some comments was how long Ehren stayed at the Malone residence and how the parents didn't catch on. Well, I wrote is - but didn't reinforce - that the younger Malones would sneak Ehren in or ask for him to stay over in order to ensure he was cared for. Also, the parents did suspect and had been pumping Piper for information, not as much at first, but as the summer wore on their suspicions grew leading to the scene of conflict in chapter 7. I didn't want to delve too deeply into the parents and when they wondered just what was going on because it would have ruined that scene of conflict and sent us toward our resolution.
As I wrote the scenes in the Malone house, I had intended for Ehren to take longer to fall for Tris. Unfortunately, Ehren is smarter than I am and I realized that, given his street smarts and his book smarts, he'd figure out Tris was a decent guy much faster than I'd wanted. Instead of fighting it and making the story longer another way, I let Ehren stay true to his character. Oddly, something similar happened with Brandon.
Brandon is based on a real life person. My husband and I went to a party and this young man was there. When he was introduced, I was initially impressed with his presence and his willingness to talk to an adult, which is somewhat rare. However, as the night wore on, he made rude comments and made some rude actions, for being a guest especially, and I found it odd that his parents weren't correcting him. Of course, I was expecting them to keep my standards, which was silly, however the boy stuck with me. Later, when I discussed things with our friend, I was told that he's a good kid but he has his issues. That's why, as the story progressed, Brandon retains his rude exterior while still showing that, while he 'has his issues' he's still a good kid.
At some point during the development I stumbled across these two images:
Now, some folks will remember the description of the picture in the Malone's living room, down to the blue shoes. This stand in for Tris is actually a stand in for the person who inspired Tris, a guy who works at my local Y doing - you guessed it - after school care. He looks as described in the story, but I thought these images would give you a rough idea of where I was when writing Tris.
The version online is similar to the original, unedited story. However, after many questions and comments had been made by my editor, several pages and scenes were added to the story. In retrospect, I probably should have held it for a few weeks as I kept tinkering with it; adding a bit here and tweaking a bit there, to the point that I had a second editor, my friend Valkyrie over at GA, make a pass through it so the parts I'd added or adjusted would get the benefit of an extra set of eyes.
In the end, it was one of the easier stories I've written, flowing like few others had before and very few spots where I 'got stuck', with the exception of the beginning. That initial scene gave me fits.
To the readers, thank you for reading my work. Much bigger thanks to those of you that discussed my story and took the time to share comments - it's how I measure how good one of my stories are.
D