Tempest clears 5K

Tempest's story is up and running, though not without a couple of false starts. I'm still amazed I'm actually writing with only a couple weeks of worldbuilding and outlining under my belt!

I got about 700 words into the second chapter on Monday but it felt sluggish. I re-read it and couldn't see the problem. There wasn't an over-abundance of backstory or thoughts (two things that can grind a story to a halt in no time, especially in first person narrative), there was tension and the story was moving forward. In the evening I poked at the outline a bit to see what was missing. And the goal for the scene was too vague. I was in the right place, going the right direction (I think I only wound up tweaking half a dozen words), but with a blindfold on.

Tuesday I flew through the rest of that scene and well into the next one before the customers started coming. In the afternoon I basically designed flooring for a renovation and a whole house, so perhaps there is an excuse for not finishing the scene!

It's interesting--I'm not sure where this story came from. It's not a particularly happy tale. Sometimes when I'm working on a novel I can almost see the characters trying to hide from me--they don't want to go through what I've planned for them. With Tempest--definitely my darkest tale yet--it's like she's pushing me to tell it. It's like she knows she has to get through it to get to the happy ending, and just wants to push through.

So I guess I'd best get back to the writing!