The Writer’s Journey Series #2, Post 5 of 5, Act 3, the Climax

 Act 3, The Climax

And so the Hero’s Journey comes to an end – but not before some final trials and challenges, just to be absolutely sure that the Hero truly has earned the Reward/Elixir he or she received after overcoming The Ordeal.  These are the last few steps of the Hero’s Journey as discussed in Christopher Vogler’s book, The Writer’s Journey Mythic Structure for Writers.

The Road Back

This is the opportunity for car chases, escaping bad guys, stealing the Reward back and forth, and any other last-minute setbacks that could hold the Hero back from making it home with the Reward.  In the movie How to Train Your Dragon, this would be when Stoic stops the match between Hiccup and the Monstrous Nightmare and makes the dragon go crazy and try to kill Hiccup.  Toothless then comes in and tries to save Hiccup, and Hiccup’s secret is out, but Stoic doesn’t understand it.

The Resurrection

The Hero has already offered up everything he or she had to give during The Ordeal, but the Road Back presented a final challenge or two and now the Hero must find enough strength for one more win.  This is the Resurrection.  It’s an opportunity for cleansing rituals or symbolic cleansing.  It’s also an opportunity for choices to be made.  Now that the Hero has discovered what is truly buried deep within his or her heart (after going through The Ordeal and the Road Back), the Hero is best able to make a decision about how to resolve the last remaining issues or problems.

In How to Train Your Dragon, The Resurrection is when Hiccup teaches the other Viking Teens how to ride their own dragons, sharing the knowledge he’s gained.

Return with the Elixir

Finally, the Journey comes to an end.  All subplots are resolved, rewards and punishments are handed out, perfection is achieved (or one step closer to it), changes are acknowledged, etc.  In the movie How to Train Your Dragon, this is when Hiccup and Toothless save the Vikings and kill the big monster dragon.  The Elixir that Hiccup brings to his father is the fact that they can work with dragons instead of always fighting against dragons.

Coming Soon:  The Writer’s Journey Series #3, Other Tips and Tricks from The Wrtier’s Journey

The Writer’s Journey Series #2, Post 2 of 5, The End of the Beginning

Act 1, part 2

These are the next steps of the Hero’s Journey that occur in Act 1, according to Chris Vogler in The Writer’s Journey Mythic Structure for Writers.  Although I am presenting these in the order that Chris Vogler suggests, I also want to make sure you are aware of the disclaimer Chris Vogler attaches to his suggested order:  These scenes represent forces and plot points, and can appear in any order the writer sees fit.  This particular order seems to be the most basic and chronologically sound.

Refusal of the Call

This happens about halfway through Act 1, based on the diagrams in Chris Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey, Mythic Structure for Writers.  It is the moment where the Hero hesitates before leaving the Ordinary World and plunging into the adventure.  On the other hand, this could also be a moment where a Hero is held back against his/her will.  I just watched the Miyazaki movie Ponyo recently, and there is a point near the beginning where the mermaid character, Ponyo, wants to go live with the humans and her father captures her and traps her underwater to keep her from going out of the Ordinary World (under water) and into the adventure.  Ponyo, of course, escapes, and leaps headlong into her Hero’s Journey.  For another example, in the book The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan, Percy Jackson fights for his life against a monster out of Greek Mythology but can’t quite believe that what’s happening is really happening.

Meeting with the Mentor

This is where the story inserts a force (either as a character or some other motivating force) that compels the Hero to respond to the Call to Adventure after the refusal.  At this point, the Hero is given what he/she needs to overcome the Refusal of the Call.  In Ponyo, this would be the moment where Ponyo escapes from the bubble where her father put her, and gets into her father’s potions, which allow her to escape completely from the ocean.  Her meeting with her father (Mentor) gave her what she needed to leave the Ordinary World (Ocean) and go to the Special World (Land).  In The Lightning Thief, this is when Mr. Brunner gives Percy a pen that turns into a sword he can use to fight off monsters.

Crossing the First Threshold

This is the end of Act 1 and the “point of no return”.  This is the point after Meeting with the Mentor, when the Hero finally enters the Special World and cannot go back to the Ordinary World.  In Ponyo, this would be when Ponyo runs through the ocean and creates a tsunami in order to get to the land and find Sosuke, the human boy she’s fallen in love with.  In The Lightning Thief, this event is almost the same thing as Refusal of the Call, and Meeting with the Mentor, because it happens in two places:  one, when Ms. Dodds becomes a Kindly One at the Art Museum and Mr. Brunner (Mentor) gives Percy the magic pen that turns into a sword; second, when Percy fights a Minotaur and loses his mother just before escaping into camp half blood.  In both cases, there is a sense that Percy is being forced out of the Ordinary World and into the Special World (while at the same time he is realizing that his teacher is more than he seems, and his other options are being taken away so that he will be forced to continue his adventure).

The Order of Events

Sometimes certain steps in the Hero’s Journey can appear to happen at the same time (as with The Lightning Thief, where Percy experiences Meeting with the Mentor and Refusal of the Call at the same time as Crossing the First Threshold).  Is there anything wrong with this?  Absolutely not!  The Lightning Thief is a fantastic story as it is, and so is Ponyo.  The thing about these steps in the Hero’s Journey is that they are almost like characters themselves.  They have their own personality and flavor, and they can be tweaked and combined, just like the archetypes can be.  As to which steps in the Hero’s Adventure are most essential, I’ll point you toward Chris Vogler’s Blog, where he has a post title “Hero’s Journey Short Form” which discusses the most essential steps in the Hero’s Journey.

Coming Soon:  The Writer’s Journey Series #2, Post 3 of 5, The Plot Thickens

Done…ish

Are you ever really done with a manuscript?  Probably not.  Because as you grow and write more things your writing grows too and you could pick up a published copy of something you wrote ten years ago and take a red pen to it because you’ve learned so much  more since then.  But thank goodness you only knew what you did when you wrote that story, or that exact particular story would never have existed!

The reason I did not post last week was because I had just finished editing my manuscript…and the ending sucked.  Completely fell flat.  Totally lost.  It took me another week to fix it, but now it’s done.  It currently makes me cry, and I’m the one who wrote it.  It’s probably time to hand it off to someone else who can read it with a fresh eye.  I’m definitely too close to really catch everything that’s wrong with it.

In the process of fixing the ending this last time, I had to cut three scenes and change two.  Two of those scenes I cut had been there since I started chapter one.  It was really hard to let them go, but they just weren’t working and were completely not necessary.  It’s so much better without them.  But I still miss them.  They had their good points.  I saved them in separate documents, so I can keep them and maybe work them into something else.

Now I’m scared to do the whole consistency edit.  I need to sit down and read this thing from page 1 all the way to page 486 without stopping (except for food and sleep and stuff like that), but I’m afraid of what other “darlings” I may have to kill.  *sigh*  On the other hand, the sooner the consistency check is done and all typos and misspellings are corrected, the sooner I can send the first three chapters to the agent who requested them.

I am so close it hurts.  I think the only thing I ever wanted more than getting published was to marry the guy who is now my husband.

So CLOSE!

Chapter 33 has been edited – a scene was added and three others were trimmed.  I have 7 chapters left to edit and the next two days are going to be absolutely insane!  First of all, there’s work.  The school system has a two-hour delay on Wednesday, which means full days on Monday and Tuesday.  On Monday, after dealing with detention duty, I have to cook my chicken stir fry dish for the Holiday Gathering that’s happening after work on Tuesday, and go to a small reunion of high school friends.  On Tuesday, I have work, the Holiday Gathering, and then my writing group (with any luck whatsoever I might actually read everything before I get there, but we’ll see what happens).  On Wednesday, I plan on packing up as soon as the students are gone, getting lunch, and going home.  At that point, I will edit some more of my manuscript (hopefully at least two chapters).  If I spend Thursday (three chapters) and most of Friday (two chapters) on just editing, I think I might be able to finish before Christmas.  After that, it’s just the consistency check (done by December 28, I hope) and then it’s off to the agents (just in time for New Years)!  It’s only been about seven months since I met that agent at a writing conference who requested the first three chapters of this story after the polishing was done – and of course, what I thought at the time was just polishing turned into full-blown editing.  Anyway, I am THIS CLOSE to finally getting this submission to her!

I am also excruciatingly excited about working on something other than this “Buffy the Vampire Slayer Meets Angels and Demons” manuscript.  Maybe dragons, or sorcerers, I think.  Or possibly the emoish vampire story I’ve been sharing with my writing group, since they’ve been giving me such awesome editing advice.  Or maybe I’ll go back to that epic fantasy thing I started when I was in high school.  Who knows?  I might even come up with a poem or two.  Anything that is not this manuscript.  And then if (when?) I get a positive response from an agent about this manuscript, I will be able to go back to it with a fresh pair of eyes and a healthy level of enthusiasm.

I will probably be posting my query letter and pitches along with advice that I’ve gathered about writing such things, so hopefully this blog will be about something interesting and useful for once instead of just me ranting or complaining or sharing even more editing updates – because really, how much fun is this thing to read?  Maybe I should start doing writing exercises on this.

NaNoEDMo!

Since I have a hefty-sized manuscript already, I have decided to participate in a self-imposed “NaNoEdMo” while all my writing friends do their frenzy of writing.  I worked it out this afternoon that if I edited three chapters a week, I could be finished with this round of edits by the end of the month.  I rebroke all the remaining chapters and came out with a total of 36 for the whole manuscript.

At the end of the day, I have finished editing two and a half chapters and managed to write in enough extra material for one more chapter in the manuscript, so now I have a total of 37, which means I need to edit one and a half chapters tomorrow instead of just half of one in order to keep to my goal.  Ugh.

What’s making me really nervous is the fact that my manuscript is now well over 90,000 words, and if I keep adding chapters here and there, it’s going to be up to 100,000 pretty quick, and this is supposed to be young adult.  So I’m hitting my threshold of length, and I’m scared that I’m going to have to go back through and cut like 100-400 words from each chapter.  Granted, having to cut that much will make each chapter that much stronger, and it’s probably a really good exercise to do anyway just to make it that much more awesome, but it means another round of edits before I can send it to the agent who asked for it.

And I refuse to settle for sending her something that’s good.  I’m not sending it until it’s knock-your-socks-off awesome.  Every word will demand that she read more.  The plot will blow her mind.  The characters will fly off the page and drag her into their reality.

I will get as damn close to these goals as I can before I send this thing off into the world of agents.

Patience is an Author’s Best Friend

Writing is not a profession of instant-gratification or even monthly-gratification or even yearly-gratification.  Writing is a profession of patience.  You have to be willing to wait, to work every day with little or nothing to show for it.  You don’t get to see your fans screaming at you from the mosh pit while you perform on stage.  If they’re anywhere out there in the darkness beyond the spotlight, they’re curled up on the floor with your book in their laps, reading.  You, author, don’t get to see your fans at all, unless you spend some time on twitter, Facebook, MySpace, the blogging arena, and everywhere else on the internet.  Even then, you don’t have time to catch up with fans.  You’re an author.  You have to spend every moment you can spare working on that manuscript.

There are things like writing conferences where you can go and meet other authors and people who love to read and who love books.  If you make it to mid-list, you might be invited to speak at a local school or something…but that’s about it.

No career is for the faint of heart, and writing is no exception.  You may love writing, but you won’t love what you’re writing every day you write it.  You work at it every day anyway, not knowing for sure how your readers are going to react.  Maybe you find a writing group of people you trust to share your work with, and that gives you some companionship and criticism to work with.  You do this for a year, and then your agent tells to fix it.  You work on it with the agent for a few months, and then your agent find a publisher and the publisher’s editor tells you to fix it.  You work on it with the editor for a few months, and then the publisher begins the sluggish process of putting it in print.  You won’t hear anything else about it after that.  The world has it.  The world is reading it.  Reading is a silent activity, most of the time.

There will be no screaming mosh pits for you, author.  Just another day in front of your laptop, typing patiently on the next silent concert while your fans gather in the darkness beyond your spotlight and read.

Get Yourself a Kindle (or something similar)

My husband bought me a kindle, and it arrived a couple of weeks ago. You should get one. Or something similar.

Here’s why I love my kindle:

1. The screen does not hurt your eyes. It’s made using electronic paper, which means it uses an ink-like substance combined with electrodes or magnets or something and every time the screen changes, the ink blips kind of like clearing an etch-e-sketch (if you’re old enough to remember those things – do they make them anymore?)  In other words, it’s not like a computer screen, which requires light in order to work.  There’s also zero glare.
2. It has already paid for itself at least three times over. If you’re buying recent, popular titles, the prices are going to be about the same as what you would see in a bookstore, but you can find some of the really old classics for less than two dollars and sometimes for free.
3. You can get blogs and newspaper articles and magazine articles delivered daily directly to your kindle. Sometimes before they are available in print.  Sometimes for a fee.  I don’t use this, because I don’t read blogs or newspapers or magazines regularly.  But the capability is there!
4. You can email PDF files and TXT files (and other files, I think) to your kindle for $0.15 each. If it’s a TXT file, it functions pretty much the same as a regular ebook.  If it’s a PDF, it’s more like trying to look at a picture that happens to be of text instead of an image.  That’s the extent of my experimentation so far.
5. You can download music from your computer to listen to while you read. The kindle has speakers and a headphone jack.  You do have to convert your music to MP3 format.
6. It has a read-a-loud feature. True, it’s a robot voice, and nowhere near as dramatic as some audio books can be.  On the other hand, the robot voice beats some of the audio book readers I’ve heard in the past.
7. You can download audio-books. But you have to send them to your PC first, because the files are so huge.  I just use the robot voices.
8. You can organize and categorize your books however you want and search by title.
9. It comes with the New Oxford American English Dictionary, and if you scroll to the first letter of any word in any ebook, it will automatically look up that word in said dictionary and give you the definition at the bottom of the screen.
10. You can create bookmarks and notes anywhere in the text. This also works with TXT files you email to your kindle, but not for PDF files.
11. You can download kindle for PC for free and read everything there that you also have on your kindle. For free.  Anything you read or write on your kindle for PC program is immediately available on your kindle as well.  For free.
12. It has a simple web browser. I was going to get internet on my cell phone, but now I’m thinking I don’t need it, since I carry my kindle with me everywhere and it has a decent web browser that will do most of the things I would need it to do when I’m away from my laptop.  Like check my email or look something up on google or wikipedia.  For free.
13. You can read anything at any time. If you happen to be away from your personal library and you want to read a mystery, it’s there.  If you’d rather read science fiction, that’s also there.  If you want to read a story book, you have that too.  Your entire library is available at your fingertips at all times.  No matter where you are.
14. The battery lasts forever if you keep the wireless turned off when you’re not using it.
15. It has wireless 3G access. Everywhere.  For free.
16. It’s linked to your amazon.com account. So it uses your amazon.com billing information and you can opt to use one-click payment when you buy stuff.  For free.  Even when you’re “buying” free stuff.
17. You can get free samples of just about everything. And buy it later.  Or delete the free sample.
18. You can download sudoku and other puzzle books. Although playing them is tricky.  It’s almost not worth getting them.  But the capability is there!
19. You can delete anything from your kindle, to save space, or because you don’t want to read it anymore, but Amazon.com will keep it on file for you in the infinite space of the internet, so that if you ever change your mind, you can download it right back without having to pay for it a second time.  This does not apply to free samples.  Those disappear when you delete them from your kindle.
20. It has enough space to hold up to one-thousand, five-hundred books. That’s my favorite.  Let me type that again.  It has enough space to hold up to one-thousand, five-hundred books.  If I ever own one-thousand, five-hundred books, I might just die of happiness, if old age doesn’t get me first.  If you’re some kind of god and happen to own more than one-thousand, five-hundred books, you can archive them infinitely on that amazon.com magic internet space thing, and download them back to your kindle when you want to read them.  So, really, it’s more like there’s infinite space for an infinite amount of books…

Now, if you will excuse me, I have some reading to do.