there's a gun and ammunition just inside the doorway

[ann_leckie]

 You know those moments, when you're working on something, when a character is going to either say something crucial or not say it? And either choice is going to dramatically affect the story going forward? But you can't quite figure out if this person can, will, or should say the thing, or can, will, or should conceal it instead? And it's so crucial you can't move ahead without it?

Yeah, I hate that.

Puddin' is trying to help me, but all her suggestions are things like, "If you pet me some more, I'll purr a lot and that will fix EVERYTHING EVAR."  Which, don't get me wrong, I don't want to discourage her help. She's always been a very skittish cat, and is only Miss Tremendously Affectionate Lap Kitty when there's no one here but me and her and The Trouble Twins (Bast and Sekhmet) are safely off somewhere else in the house and everything's calm and quiet and--if at all possible--I've got a space heater nearby. But she's not proving to be very good with the writing thing.

Comments

[green_knight]

Are you actually at the point of writing? Or are you still planning what to write?

When I get to a place like that, I need to sit on my ego and let the characters speak and act. Very often what turns up on the page is not the same thing as what I had imagined; I need to take my expectations out of the equation instead of trying to manipulate the character into what I think 'will make the better story'. (It doesn't.)

[ann_leckie]

Yeah, I'm in kind of a weird middle-space. I know the overarching course of the plot, I know the basic emotional arcs of the characters involved. But this piece of information will irrevocably affect the details of how that plot moves forward. I think I need to see the specific way the scene will play out and make sense within those arcs. There's a way to do it, I just haven't seen it.

Some of it, someone else has pointed out to me, probably depends on a firm grasp of the secondary character who would receive (or not) this information, and I very possibly don't have the clarity on her that I need. And some of it is waiting for details to click that will not only make the scene itself work, but set up the later explosion. It's very tricky work, even when I do have all the characters involved completely clear. Bits of it sort of resolved themselves yesterday afternoon, but I think I might need a couple more long walks for the rest.

[green_knight]

I'm a different writer - for me, the only chance of being certain that I got it right would be to write it. It's the character's decision.

I'm only the chronicler. It's up to me to make sense of what happened afterwards. And often it doesn't seem to make sense, but _it's what happened_ and I need to deal with that. (One of my characters has just pulled a rather dangerous and unnecessary stunt, so I have a character involved I wanted to avoid for a while... but that's Valendon for you.

You seem to have a much better sense about what else is going on in the scene, including other characters, which is something I am often missing.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I was struggling with the climax of the novel I'm working on, and my problem was not only whether the characters would say stuff ("Is this too much like the villain saying, 'Now let me tell you my nefarious plan?' I think maybe this is too much like the villain saying, 'Now let me tell you my nefarious plan'....") but also what *language* they'd say stuff in.

It sure does suck to be in a situation where the characters with the most to say might not say it in a language the narrating character can understand.

... I think I worked it out, though. I hope.

Good luck with your to-say-or-not-to-say dilemma. Cat affection is a definite vote of confidence even if it doesn't help with the decision making.

[helivoy.livejournal.com]

Run both scenarios through your head while pittipatting Lap Kitty. Then decide.

[ann-leckie.livejournal.com]

This is my plan, but it is not working. I am probably going to have to hope something condenses out of shower steam, or take a walk and hope one or another character will come clearer to me.

[marycatelli]

At that point, I drop something else entirely in the plot so that the character doesn't get a chance to say it.

Sometimes.

[paulliver.livejournal.com]

When that happens to me, I go to the gym or wash dishes or something until the answer clicks in my head. All the variables in your novel are bouncing around in your head and will settle down eventually.