Commentary on Day Twenty One and Two

I’ve been thinking about this novella since yesterday when I got to the end of that little scene and what to do next.

Well, the answer is that I know exactly what to do but I also know that I need to go back and rewrite a fair amount of this. Had I not been publishing as I wrote it, I probably would have done a lot of this rewriting already, but, for the sake of interest, I kept marshalling on forward. But now that the ending is in sight, I think it makes sense to just go back and solve what needs to be solved now.

Because writing is an act of discovery for me, even making these changes will likely transform what the ending will be. And so continuing on just for the sake of doing it makes less and less sense. Now, this isn’t really in the spirit of nanowrimo, but this isn’t exactly my first rodeo, if you get me. If I was writing this just to write it, just to prove that I can write a novel quickly, then I’d continue on.

But I already know I can do all this, so it makes more sense to go back.

I’ve decided that I will shift this to first person. Which, sadly, does mean rewriting almost everything. I mean, much of that is just a case of switching pronouns, but some of it will be much deeper than that.

I’ve also decided that this works best without Odysseus’ perspective, which means I’ll be cutting those early chapters where we see her from his perspective. I think there is value in having these, but not in the story as it’s come to exist.

But, yes, so close to the end, I’m heading back to the beginning. I won’t be sharing all that here anymore, though I may decide to just publish the completed novella here on substack. Who can say.

Thank you for joining me on this little journey. It’s been fun! At least for me. But now begins the real work of turning this rough draft into a solid story.

As it is, I think it’s a bit of a failure. I mean that in a relative sense. I don’t think this is a draft I’d want any reader to read and take as representative of my writing. I think I never quite got the emotional resonance required to make this story work.

I’ll get there, but this version isn’t it. I think Calypso is a bit too one note and a bit too flat. I need to dig more into her as a person separate from Odysseus but I also need to fill out Odysseus more.

And so this will hopefully end up as the horrific romance I envisioned, but it’ll take some amount of tinkering.

With that, I say goodbye for now.