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rynlingI’ve been playing around with my concept for The Demon King, and I think I’d like it to be a trilogy, each narrated from the perspective of one of the three main characters. As always when I plan a longer story, I can see a vague outline of the plot from start to finish, but the end is much clearer than the beginning.
One of the big reveals of the second book is that the “present” of the narrative is actually a dystopian future for the demon king. He’s not a bad person; but, in his mind, nothing he does in the present of the story matters, since his goal is to change the immediate future of his time, which is technically in the past. If he has to kill people and destroy an entire city in order to gain the power to do that, then those are sacrifices he feels can be justified. It’s not that he doesn’t care about the people in the present, but he doesn’t come from their world and, in fact, wants to erase its entire existence.
What this means is that I have to write the entirety of the first book knowing that this is the case but not overtly stating or even suggesting it, and I’m not sure I’m talented enough to pull this off, especially in terms of consistent characterization.
The children of Tumblr seem to enjoy trashing the Harry Potter books, but listen. It’s a lot easier to nitpick minor details of characterization than it is to write a densely plotted series of novels in a way that allows each book to stand on its own as a cohesive story yet still connects to a larger narrative, I’m just saying.
One of the big reveals of the second book is that the “present” of the narrative is actually a dystopian future for the demon king. He’s not a bad person; but, in his mind, nothing he does in the present of the story matters, since his goal is to change the immediate future of his time, which is technically in the past. If he has to kill people and destroy an entire city in order to gain the power to do that, then those are sacrifices he feels can be justified. It’s not that he doesn’t care about the people in the present, but he doesn’t come from their world and, in fact, wants to erase its entire existence.
What this means is that I have to write the entirety of the first book knowing that this is the case but not overtly stating or even suggesting it, and I’m not sure I’m talented enough to pull this off, especially in terms of consistent characterization.
The children of Tumblr seem to enjoy trashing the Harry Potter books, but listen. It’s a lot easier to nitpick minor details of characterization than it is to write a densely plotted series of novels in a way that allows each book to stand on its own as a cohesive story yet still connects to a larger narrative, I’m just saying.
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Date: 2018-12-26 06:12 pm (UTC)Also, I hear you on plotting for a thing and then it suddenly becomes A Thing™. Consistency in general is so much work. Don't mind me, I'll be cheering for you from the sidelines.
Also also, I can't speak for the children of Tumblr, but I know whenever I eyeroll at Harry Potter, 45% of the time it's because every other fic I read seems to be yet another person trying to mimic her writing style (which is fine if that's a thing someone enjoys or if they're trying to figure out their own voice... but wow, it's kind of everywhere).