You aren't supposed to talk about your writing, because it can hinder your creativity, but that is really half the fun for me, to get these ideas out and play with them.
The Awakening is a new version of my same story I keep re-writing. I have put some elements back into it that were there in my first version that I took out when I re-wrote it as a regular gothic romance. Now it is back to being a dark fantasy/gothic romance, but it is presently, and may always, be without a hero-focus. Originally Gisele/Gisela was an angel/savior figure toward the damned inhabitants of the castle with their animal curses. I'm doing that again, and I'm also going more toward the ambiguous about her "true love," and I'm not sure she's going to have a true love. I'm exploring Gisele deeply. I find she is deeply moved by the thought that others would want or love her. This is basically "enough" for her, and the technique I have been studying in my very favorite novels is that the protagonist finds what is "enough" for them, and this is the basis of the happy ending. It's really important that they don't have "more" than what they desire, because that diminishes the importance and the specificity of the ending. That is what I really got seriously from reading Villette. The gothic hero is the fatal attraction of the codependent, and Gisele is this funny, asexual little thing, not too much female or male, and I don't think she's going to buy either of these heroes. It will be really interesting to see, because in all my previous versions she has ended up with the young hero, or anti-hero.
The Soul of the Rose is more complicated plot-wise, but more simplistic emotionally. We have Delphinia, who is just a mess, your typical high-strung, highly romantic woman, and then Gauvain, who is a cave man. They have wonderful chemistry, but their struggles are usual. I like exploring Delphinia. It's a way of gratifying lots of things I maybe shouldn't gratify, living in a charmed, enchanted world where she has an amazing wardrobe and all of this, but only desires that man. It's basically me playing Barbie, except as a grown-up. Then Oriente is Gauvain's sister reincarnated in the present-day. I did this to have Oriente closer to me. I like to think she's in Paris right now, researching those old costumes and hanging around the coffee shop to avoid going home to her empty apartment. She's pretty typical too, I guess, pretty modern, she has an immense beauty that she makes no effort to bring out, which makes it all the more real. She doesn't believe she's attractive enough to have a man, so she tends to direct negativity toward men. And I am playing with a Neverending Story kind of dynamic between herself and Delphinia. In the past year I have been really loving The Neverending Story, and I wanted to do something like that myself plot-wise.
Otherwise I've been reading more about the Indigo Children and Angels. I saw a book in The Book People I was really strongly tempted to get about the Indigo people, but I decided to hold off. Not because I'm uninterested, but because I am really book-whelmed right now. I have got to get through what I'm reading and absorb an entire concept for once instead of moving on to the next thing.
I thought this article was interesting. I didn't completely agree at all, but it gave me a jumping-off point to examine my feelings about winter solstice, and it actually helped me with some realizations. For one thing, I don't think I'm any more depressed than I am any other time of the year, if anything I feel like the rest of the world catches up to me a little bit on that. I disagree, I think Christmas and all that is completely shallow, and I think you can blame your feelings on that, it's totally understandable.
This year is the first year I have really enjoyed the early darkness. I just like it. I don't know. It gives me a feeling like "you think it's about to be over, but it's not. You have a whole night to do stuff, you just have to find your way through the dark and do it." I guess that's what all of life feels like to me in this epoch.
The Awakening is a new version of my same story I keep re-writing. I have put some elements back into it that were there in my first version that I took out when I re-wrote it as a regular gothic romance. Now it is back to being a dark fantasy/gothic romance, but it is presently, and may always, be without a hero-focus. Originally Gisele/Gisela was an angel/savior figure toward the damned inhabitants of the castle with their animal curses. I'm doing that again, and I'm also going more toward the ambiguous about her "true love," and I'm not sure she's going to have a true love. I'm exploring Gisele deeply. I find she is deeply moved by the thought that others would want or love her. This is basically "enough" for her, and the technique I have been studying in my very favorite novels is that the protagonist finds what is "enough" for them, and this is the basis of the happy ending. It's really important that they don't have "more" than what they desire, because that diminishes the importance and the specificity of the ending. That is what I really got seriously from reading Villette. The gothic hero is the fatal attraction of the codependent, and Gisele is this funny, asexual little thing, not too much female or male, and I don't think she's going to buy either of these heroes. It will be really interesting to see, because in all my previous versions she has ended up with the young hero, or anti-hero.
The Soul of the Rose is more complicated plot-wise, but more simplistic emotionally. We have Delphinia, who is just a mess, your typical high-strung, highly romantic woman, and then Gauvain, who is a cave man. They have wonderful chemistry, but their struggles are usual. I like exploring Delphinia. It's a way of gratifying lots of things I maybe shouldn't gratify, living in a charmed, enchanted world where she has an amazing wardrobe and all of this, but only desires that man. It's basically me playing Barbie, except as a grown-up. Then Oriente is Gauvain's sister reincarnated in the present-day. I did this to have Oriente closer to me. I like to think she's in Paris right now, researching those old costumes and hanging around the coffee shop to avoid going home to her empty apartment. She's pretty typical too, I guess, pretty modern, she has an immense beauty that she makes no effort to bring out, which makes it all the more real. She doesn't believe she's attractive enough to have a man, so she tends to direct negativity toward men. And I am playing with a Neverending Story kind of dynamic between herself and Delphinia. In the past year I have been really loving The Neverending Story, and I wanted to do something like that myself plot-wise.
Otherwise I've been reading more about the Indigo Children and Angels. I saw a book in The Book People I was really strongly tempted to get about the Indigo people, but I decided to hold off. Not because I'm uninterested, but because I am really book-whelmed right now. I have got to get through what I'm reading and absorb an entire concept for once instead of moving on to the next thing.
I thought this article was interesting. I didn't completely agree at all, but it gave me a jumping-off point to examine my feelings about winter solstice, and it actually helped me with some realizations. For one thing, I don't think I'm any more depressed than I am any other time of the year, if anything I feel like the rest of the world catches up to me a little bit on that. I disagree, I think Christmas and all that is completely shallow, and I think you can blame your feelings on that, it's totally understandable.
This year is the first year I have really enjoyed the early darkness. I just like it. I don't know. It gives me a feeling like "you think it's about to be over, but it's not. You have a whole night to do stuff, you just have to find your way through the dark and do it." I guess that's what all of life feels like to me in this epoch.