Moira (LJ user ‘the_red_shoes’ and Elizabeth Bear (LJ user ‘matociquala’) are talking very intelligently about ‘broken’ books here and here.

And now I’m going to talk not so intelligently about broken books because I’m very worried that I’m working on one right now. E. Bear spoke a lot about other people’s broken books, which I’m not going to do. Essentially, the world boils down into books I like and books I don’t like and someone else’s book can be broken simply because I don’t like the main character or hate the writer’s style. Which isn’t very interesting to read about.

My book or story or poem may be broken for many different reasons, which I’m slowly becoming familiar with. And these are my reasons. Yours or theirs or hers may be different.

The novel I’m supposed to complete this summer has been in the works for almost six years…which is unheard of for me. I’m a sprinter as I’ve pointed out before so this is a very very bad sign. I love the characters but I’m not quite sure I’m in love with them anymore. And this is the second sign that what actually may be happening is a broken book.

The primary narrator in this book is damaged. Heavily damaged. And her sections are incredibly difficult to write. They have to be hallucinatory, but still intelligible and they have to move things along. Which they don’t do. So I brought in another narrator who’s the ‘normal’ one, Kiran. Her sections are ridiculously easy to write and they’ve begun to take over the story.

And the third character, Owen, who is impossibly important to the story because she’s (sort of) the villain, has no POV so she’s becoming a ghost figure. She’s disappearing from the damn book and everyone is beginning to notice. Including me. And, yes, I’ve tried writing her POV, but it doesn’t work. her motives need to remain hidden. She needs to be opaque, but she also needs to return to the story in a Big Fucking Way and soon and that’s so not going to be easy. In fact, it may very well break the book. If she dooesn’t do what she’s told and return to the story, it’s over.

The other problem is that one of the huge story arcs (a big teenage romance) that I originally had in mind for this book has been surgically removed. Because it was beginning to feel too Buffy or too gay or something and that was also beginning to take over. But now there’s all of this weird tension going on and the characters are looking at me, like, ‘okay, what’s my motivation here?’ and ‘are you sure we’re not hot for each other?’ and suddenly I feel like a director instead of a writer.

And all of that explains really…nothing. Except that I’m worried I’m going to have to ditch completely the 50k words I already have and start over because the story isn’t moving for me. In fact, I’m pretty sure that an editor would take one look at my ms and cut half of it. At least. I’ve even begun a short story/novelette set in the same AU that I’m enjoying the hell of right now and because it’s a short story. it doesn’t break as easily. Or maybe it breaks more easily and is therefore isn’t as difficult to deal with. I’ve never gotten 50K words into a short story only to realize that it may be broken. If it’s broken I know from the start and it doesn’t start.

Also, this is a book about teenagers and magic that isn’t written like either (YA or 98% of spec), so I have that angst as well.

So, um, yeah, all of that to say that writing a book is not all sunshine and puppies. I feel like I’m trying to build the Statue of Liberty out of Jello.

Basically, I know my books are broken when the characters start balking. They just don’t want to do what I want them to do. And I have to decide if I’m going to make them and possibly end up with a contrived plot or if I’m going to let them do their thing. Or there’s a third possibility which is that I just don’t want to write them right now and what the fuck do I do about that?

There’s also the fourth and very terrifying possibility that the thing really is broken and I’m just too damn lazy to do what needs to be done and start the fuck over because I’VE DONE TOO MUCH WORK ON THIS ALREADY!!!!

Hmmm, I think there’s something to be said for the writing process remaining a secret. Sort of like you don’t want to know how your sausage gets made. Why would anyone want to see all the nasty bits that are part of this process?