Author: janelake

Published author of five novels of romantic suspense. There's always sex in my stories, and there's always a dead body somewhere along the line.

Add Title

Dean Koontz says a title can be a starting point for a book, and I feel surrounded by good titles. The Delta Variant, for instance, could be a great thriller owing a lot to Outbreak, or The Hot Zone by Richard Preston. Then there’s Coma by Robin Cook. Cook read a bunch of thrillers and then wrote one. Another perfectly good approach. He studied bestsellers, figured out a bunch of techniques that writers use and wrote them on index cards. He says he used every one of them in Coma.

Buzzard’s Luck, a new incarnation of Dark Matter, has been reincarnated yet again and become Deguello, a totally great title that means “slit throat” or “beheading.” Perfect, really, and it allowed me finally to figure out who killed Harry North.

It hasn’t solved another central problem, however. Who is the protagonist? I am still struggling with that one. In spite of having quite a bit of it written, I can’t start putting it together in its next iteration until I know whose hand I want to be holding as I stumble through the story.

While I work on figuring that out, I’ve taken The Achilles Factor up again and made a tentative marketing plan to start sending it out for the second time. After fifteen rejections last year, I bought Writer’s Market and highlighted every agent whose blurb included both “suspense” and “thriller.” Yield: 95 prospects.

Since I sent it to most of the biggest most desirable houses last year, I thought I might retitle it and send it to them again. I’m still weighting that option, but meanwhile the new title is: The Doomsday Mistake.

Already taken were: The Doomsday Factor, The Doomsday Effect, The Doomsday Scenario, The Doomsday Reckoning, and The Doomsday Device.

Considered and not already taken but ultimately rejected were: The Doomsday Complication, the Edge of Doomsday, the Brink of Doomsday, The Doomsday Principle, The Doomsday Crisis, The Doomsday Dance, The Doomsday Man, The Doomsday Satellite, The Doomsday Emergency, and The Damocles File.

That last one snuck in there, along with Rocket Science, Dead in Space, How the Universe Works, Loose Nuke, Probability Theory, Chaos Theory, Chaos, The Cosmological Constant, Problems in Orbital Mechanics, Staying Alive, and Don’t Die.

The fate of The Doomsday Mistake remains to be seen. Getting ready to send it out again. I’ll let you know.

Buzzard’s Luck #3

“My main goal is to try to get the reader to finish the story – no easy feat – by making each little motion of the narrative compelling.” (George Saunders)

Studies in Craft:

  1. Robert McKee, Story, basic structure, adapted to
  2. Shonda Rhimes’ 5-act structure, integrated with
  3. Christopher Vogler’s Writers’ Journey (Hero’s Journey) 12 story beats.

Scenes form.

Buzzard’s Luck #2

Got my casting done. I have portraits selected for Harry, Rachel, Manion, Mary, Morris Smallstars, Nikki, Mesa, Alyssa, Bleuzette, Malaika, and Starlene Navarro plus the vultures, the dervishes, and old father storyteller.

Started my index cards with nine key scenes or sequences.

Went through story by Robert McKee twice and I’m halfway through the Writer’s Journey by Chris Vogler. Listened to a Vogler podcast about transformational narratives.

Gathering the playlist: Bob Dylan (Self Portrait, Another Side of Bob Dylan, and Rough and Rowdy Ways); Yo-Yo Ma (Goat Rodeo); Oh Wonder (All We Do is Hide Away); Robert Johnson (King of the Delta Blues); Van Morrison (Moondance and Saint Dominic’s Preview); Tim Buckley (Sefronia).

Goat Rodeo: a situation that order cannot be brought to at any time, or a scenario that requires about 100 things to go right at once if you intend to walk away from it.

Buzzard’s Luck: can’t kill nothin’ and nothin’ will die.

Buckled in and riding with Buzzard’s Luck.

Report to the Commissioner No. 58

Finished Chapters 47, 48, and 49. Word count: 60,067.

Starting in on Act V. The story enters a new phase, and I have realized that characters who were minor players in previous appearances now have more moments on center stage in this last act. This has meant that I had to go back in and get a better sense of who they are as people. No less than 14 characters. Apparently I have a fairly huge cast for this book. I vamped them in for their previous scenes, but I really need to know them better as they take over a big part of the last act.

I delved into my files filled with magazine tear sheets of people and faces and have now completed the casting for these 14 characters who have taken over a wall and a half in my office. I am enjoying their company as I begin the final chapters and resolution of the book.

My word count is exactly on target at 60,000 for the end of Act IV, with about another 15,000 words to take me to the end of Act V. I’m aiming for an overall total of 80,000 words. If I bring in this draft at 75,000, I’ll be in good shape for the final draft, since I have lots of detail I’ve glossed over for the sake of getting this draft on the page.

I’ve read it over, and I’m seeing only minor stuff to fix, rather than the big gaping wounds I’ve seen in past read-throughs of previous drafts.

Do I dare to eat a peach?

 

Report to the Commissioner No. 57

Finally finished Chapters 45 and 46; word count: 56,255

Plot Point II landed on the exact right word count (56,250!), so that’s good. The new sequence of events is making sense, and I can see Chapter 47 taking shape. It gets a bit murky after that, but I am making forward progress, however slowly. Reminded of the old adage about driving in the dark, with the headlights illuminating only a little way ahead. Making the whole journey that way.