Trying to tell the Story

You sit staring at a blank screen, trying to figure out what you’re going to write and hopefully something comes out.

Every part of the Alliance started that way. Sometimes when I read parts of the first book there are scenes that I still have a hard time believing that I wrote them. Still there are plenty of others where I can see that a novice writer penned them.

You notice that I said “first” book, and yes, I started a second one and I believe the writing has gotten better, the story telling is better and possibly less predictable. Yet I stopped writing it at a peak in my storytelling ability. The reason? Someone will have to read and enjoy the first book before anyone will want to publish, let alone read a second one.

So, here I am trying to find a way to rewrite the first book in a way that doesn’t r what happens. I’m trying to look at the fist book in its current form as here is what happened. For better or worse, these are the events that took place. Each part of what happened, each specific event in some small way affected the lives of Calista, Coldstone, Doff, Dear and every other member of the Alliance not to mention every other human in known space.

You might tell me that it is a work of fiction taking place in an imagined future, so what difference does it make if the story changes. Because I wrote it! To me, it has already happened, and I can’t change it any more than you could say WWII never happened or happened differently than it did. True, you can create a fictionalized account of WWII but that doesn’t change what happened, and for all you know I already did that in the first book!!

So, now I must learn how to re-tell the story in a manner that will make it not just enjoyable to read, but told in such a way that will make you want to turn the page to find out what happens next. I know it may be a bit of fantasy on my part, but I want it to be the kind of book that I used to read before bedtime only to find myself reading as the sun rose on the next day, only putting it down because I had to go either to school or to work.

So, I have set myself a task. If I am not working on the re-writing, I am going to tell you about the Alliance and the main characters of the story. I believe that by telling you about them it will invigorate me to get this story done. This story began in 2002 and has been an off and on affair ever since, mostly the time spent on it depended on where I was in life. So many of the details from the beginning aren’t quite as clear as the once were, and I hope that telling you about everyone will bring everything back into focus. 

If I do nothing else in my life, I want to tell this story. Calista might not care if I do, but Coldstone would really want you to know.