I’m nearly 40,000 words in and am completely frustrated with how my story had developed, to the point where I’m not sure if I can rescue it or not.
It’s supposed to be an epic fantasy, and that genre thrives on global conflict, world-building, epic landscapes, good versus evil . . . and I have none of that. Too many of my scenes are happening in the dark with my hero alone with her thoughts and no action, worrying about her developing powers or what she might have done. It isn’t a story I want to read.
Maybe my planning process is to blame – both what I did and what I skipped. I think too much of the advice that I tried to follow in creating this story was based on literary fiction – and my story goes too close to that plot-less genre, despite the epic fantasy backdrop.
I think I need to take a step back. Right now, I’m not enjoying writing, and I’m disappointed with my results as often as not.
I want to write a different story. One where it isn’t so much about the character’s mental development, but taking all that stuff about internal development that I’ve studied and translating it to an external, exciting plot.
I want to shelve the Book 1 Project and start fresh. My, what, fifth book 1? I don’t know if this is what I should do. If I should fight to finish this story, knowing that I essentially need to rewrite it for it to stop sucking? If I should go nuclear and try again? Will I ever finish that way? I don’t know. But if I’m not enjoying it, what’s the point in the first place?
I have a lot of thinking to do.