I’m enjoying that moment of finishing the first 15,000 words of writing a new story. At this moment, the book has enough length that I know it’s “real” and not merely a scene I was trying out or a fleeting idea which may or may not amount to anything. I love this moment!
Right now, the story has nothing but possibility. The page count is still up in the air, although I have a general target, and most of you know I tend toward the 100,000-word mark, unintentionally, on many of my books.
Beyond that, the story as yet has the flexibility to go any which way the characters want to take it, with a little guidance from me. I am not an outliner/plotter (to my dismay because I have tried). I get the germ of an idea, let it ruminate in my brain for a time, and then start to write. With my current work, I’m still in the stage of having a general sense of what’s going to happen but without most of the details. I fill those in as I research.
Yesterday, I spent hours reading about Regency-era workhouses, just so I could write a couple paragraphs as my heroine pays a visit to St. James’s Workhouse in the parish of Westminster, London. There was some information from the late 18th century and the first decade of the 19th century that made it seem as though this particular house for the “able-bodied poor” was well-kept and practically a model for the dozens of others in and around London. Until the end of my writing day, when I came upon this line:
“By 1814 the workhouse buildings had become ‘very delapidated [sic] and dangerous’, although this is not apparent in the engraving of 1809 reproduced on Plate 38b.”
Of course, I had been looking at the 1809 engraving all day. Gah! So, a scene that would have had my heroine exclaiming over the upkeep of the workhouse instead has her pointing out the crumbling ceiling and cracked floors that existed by 1814. It worked out well because she was there to make a sizable donation, and the clerk running St. James’s was pleased to receive it.
And now I must get back to writing and figure out what’s happening next. I can’t wait to share the titles to this new Regency series and am also looking forward to covers. I know you can’t judge a book by one, but a completed cover always inspires me to finish a book more quickly. 🙂