My Novel Idea

As you can all no doubt tell by now {I hope!} I am a writer. I love writing; I would do it all the time if I could. The only things holding me back are time {nasty little thing called a job seems to get in the way, somehow, and then I just want to sleep or at the very least, not look at a computer screen}, medium {seems like a strange thing to be holding me back, but it is a valid one: for some reason I just can NOT write my novel on the computer, it has neither flow, continuity, nor attraction when I do it that way} and creativity {can’t write like a lunatic if I don’t have something to write about!}.

And really, that means that all the things that are holding me back are in my head:

·         I’m tired when I get home from work, sure, but I don’t (can’t) go to sleep as soon as I get home, or I’d be waking up around midnight wanting to do things.

·         I can’t write my novel on the computer, but I seem to do just fine writing my blog on the computer – although I don’t really need much continuity, and I generally lose interest within a certain amount of time… But still…

·         If I just write and write and write, something will click. Creativity doesn’t have to come from the start – I’m hoping – it can happen when I least expect it. {either that or I’m so full of natural creativity that no matter what I write, the creativity will come! Hope, hope!}

Or I could say, cruelly, what creativity is needed when I’m doing the 35176^th re-write of a novel {actual re-write number may vary} of a novel I’ve been re-writing since 2002?

The answer to that is: more and more, and less and less. Simple, but complicated. {Sigh}

The characters have become more real to me, needing less and less creativity to think up their actions and motivations, less and less time spent thinking up how to describe them because I know so well what they look like.

More time, however, has to be spent on something that has been grossly neglected from the start: a plot. My most recent version was extremely slow moving, slight bad-ness {can’t think of the right word, maybe it’s too early to be writing} with continuity and small details… it kind of ended up just being a story about a girl who got drunk with a bunch of vampires every night.

Yeah… I don’t see that being on the top 100 list, let alone anyone’s top ten.

Although, edited right, it could become an “outtakes” or “extra scenes” type thing for my die-hard fans – and we all know that one day I’m going to have die-hard fans other than The Crazy Flatmate.

Well, anyway, all that aside. The moral of this blog post is nothing (semi-nothing) to do with that at all. Basically just a preamble into the following statement:

I’m getting that urge again to work on my novel.

I’ve realised, looking back, that my main character may be an undiagnosed (and unknowing) aspie so I’m wondering if I should play that up.

Aspie/vampire romance rather than slightly crazy in the head mortal/vampire romance. Haha.

I don’t know if it would work, I don’t know if there’ll be a market for it – at all in either case. I’ve been added to an aspie writer group on Facebook and I’m going to ask around on all the Aspergers related (and private – sucks to be Aspie-outed by facebook to people I don’t want to be aspie-out to) groups I belong to on Facebook to see what the general consensus is.

So: Aspergers girl (openly or not, knowingly or not both as yet undetermined) meets vampire boy and they fall in love. Kind of.

That’s the general plot. There’s issues along the way (these are ones that are already in there, before I realised she may be aspie): he’s trying to woo her and she doesn’t even realise they’re pretty much a couple being the biggest issue.

Plus there will be conflict and adventure and misunderstandings and… well.

This time round I want to try and plot things out, actually have a plot and events on a timeline that I have to reach by a certain point… In other words, I can’t be 300 pages in and still in the first week – which is at least a week away from the first major plot/conflict event – and every chapter just them getting drunk and watching movies. Yes it’s good for character development and relationship development, but not good for creating a book that will get published, I don’t think.

I’m going to give it a go.

If you’ve been lead here from my link(s) on Facebook groups, please leave comments or whatever, your thoughts on the idea of making the main character Aspie. Please!