Writing from the Heart

So, you remember how I was going to try and re-write my novel, starting further along in the story? Funny thing…I played with it for several days. I tweaked here. I tweaked there. I added and subtracted and all other sorts of math. And I couldn’t make it work. So I set it aside, mentally and physically, and determined that I wasn’t going to think about it or do anything with it, that I would just start something else and worry about Lydia and Kevin another day.

But they wouldn’t leave me alone.

So I started praying about it. Really praying, not just a toss away “use my writing for Your glory” type of prayer, but looking for honest guidance about what to do. And it came down to the fact that I need to write the story I’ve been given. This story – with all its warts – is one that I need to tell. And I need to tell it as it’s going on, not just as back story so it fits into a particular genre box.

It still needs a good bit of editing – and I’m working on that. Lydia still needs to be more likeable (and the thing is, in my mind as I read it, she’s not unlikeable as she is, so I clearly need to just do a better job of how I’m portraying her. Cause I didn’t set out for her to be a villain.) Kevin needs to not read gay. (This may be a harder tweak, because while he’s the hero, he’s not a buff warrior/football player/caveman. He’s a nerd. Sexy nerd, yes. But still a nerd. So I can’t make him seem straight because he’s swaggering around and grunting – he’s going to use words that cavemen don’t know…but somehow I have to make it clear without typical alpha male stereotypes.) But the story is going to stay true to the one that God laid on my heart.

Will it sell? I don’t know. But at the writer’s conference last week Alton Gansky said something that keeps echoing in my mind. He said the worst writers are only focused on publication…all that matters is writing the stories God gives us.

So that’s what I’m going to do.