All heading in the same direction

Welcome back to another blog hop, with #OpenBook. Here’s this week’s prompt.

Don’t forget to click the purple button to see what everyone else has to say on this week’s subject. It’s at the end of my post.

How do you handle it when one of your characters starts going in a direction you hadn’t planned?

This week’s topic is an easy one for me.

As I have absolutely no idea where things are going to end up when I start pressing the keys, I generally sit back and let them get on with it.

That’s the great advantage of not having to plan things, the story appears to me in a linear form, a bit like life, it all happens one thing after another and I write it down.

I can’t control what I have no influence over.

Even if I tried, there would be little point. The characters seem to know what’s going on and I’ve learned to leave it to them.

In the past, I’ve attempted to structure a novel before writing it. My attempts all failed. I can’t do it on my own, I have to have input from the characters for the process to work. This is why I always say that I don’t write the stories, all I do is transcribe the work of others.

It’s the same with sequels. Once an adventure is complete, I might get to see the start of another straight away, or it could be some time until (or even if) I do.

For example, I wrote the first two Andorra Pett stories in one go, but after six years I’m still waiting for a sequel to Life and Other Dreams.

I know there is one, I saw the first chapter at the end of the original story but I have to be patient and wait for the characters to tell me the rest. I’ve tried writing it a couple of times, I get a glimpse but that’s about all.

I used to think that it was a strange way to work. After all this time, I can’t imagine doing things any other way.

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Until next time.

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