Introduction
It’s hard to believe that this was a story I wrote 20 years ago…
I look back on this story and how I thought I was so sure it was ready to publish. Now I’m kinda glad it wasn’t. Clearly it wasn’t ready. But the line in my head since my last attempt has been- “I’m stuck in rewrites so it’ll finally be ready to try again.”
I got as far as maybe chapter 4 and I’d been stuck ever since.
My story takes place in high school and it was from a more innocent time where things like this weren’t constantly questioned. And part of me is terrified my story won’t come off the way I intended it to.
And I thought all I had to worry about were Twilight comparisons- despite the fact I wrote my story from start to finish back in 2003 (I didn't read Twilight until maybe 2007) and it has nothing to do with vampires.
On the Cutting Room Floor
I think back on the various plot lines that make up the story. Many of them I can’t get behind anymore because they’re exaggerated or borrow from every soap opera cliche you can think of.
I didn’t even start watching All My Children until a year after this so I can’t help wondering how I got some of these ideas in the first place.
These “throwaway” ideas include Jonas being thrown off his horse into a frozen pond and he temporarily loses his hearing. Another is where Nina has an accident during a pep rally cheerleader routine and she develops a temporary case of amnesia where Jonas is the only person familiar to her.
These things pad out the story and without them, there’s not much that happens between one major plot point to another.
But I think I can at least salvage the cheerleading accident and do something with it… if anything, concussion protocol could take her off the squad and she gets reacquainted with another hobby she hadn’t done in years. This hobby is an idea I’d been sort of tinkering with to give Nina more of a back story so she’s not just the new girl who later becomes a love interest.
The Necessary "Evils" of Conflict and Character Goals
One writing “rule” I’d read on every writing site: your protagonist HAS to have a goal they’re pursuing and some sort of conflict keeping them from achieving it and that moves the story.
Typically what I end with are characters I love spending time with and occasionally something happens involving outside stimuli and they respond to it.
But Twilight got published despite having similar issues. And technically the first Harry Potter book was Harry figuring out life at Hogwarts until finding more about the Philosophers Stone and that mystery propels the story forward. So having a character-driven story isn’t necessarily a deal breaker.
The origin story (which I fleshed out in greater length here https://romantasyland.blogspot.com/2020/10/angels-origin-story-of-jonas-and.html) that started this whole thing- I still vividly remember sitting down to write it after seeing Spirited Away for the first time.
I wanted to write something with a "chosen one", reincarnation, and good vs evil. Plus I wanted to do something with mythological creatures. That all came out in 2 pages and maybe half an hour of typing.
Then what ultimately followed was the kind of story I really wanted to read in that moment- I wanted Haku and Chihiro to meet again and their time together to last forever.
Jonas has elements of Haku in him that’ll always be there but other than him and Nina possibly having a connection from a former life, there isn't a lot in the story that calls back to that initial spark.
Among them: I need to find some part of balance about Jonas’s level of confidence. Because I feel like it flucuates a lot.
I’d done a lot of brainstorming over the last couple years, but not much that’ll make the final product. Some, I’m very excited to share on this blog and plan to soon.
I look back on this story and how I thought I was so sure it was ready to publish. Now I’m kinda glad it wasn’t. Clearly it wasn’t ready. But the line in my head since my last attempt has been- “I’m stuck in rewrites so it’ll finally be ready to try again.”
I got as far as maybe chapter 4 and I’d been stuck ever since.
Recent Difficulties
Nowadays, what’s been stopping me is doubt. The fact I knew nothing about romance (and still don’t) didn’t stop me from writing it in the first place, but in this current atmosphere, if rom-com classics like “sleepless in Seattle” aren’t considered romantic anymore, what is love supposed to look like?
Nowadays, what’s been stopping me is doubt. The fact I knew nothing about romance (and still don’t) didn’t stop me from writing it in the first place, but in this current atmosphere, if rom-com classics like “sleepless in Seattle” aren’t considered romantic anymore, what is love supposed to look like?
My story takes place in high school and it was from a more innocent time where things like this weren’t constantly questioned. And part of me is terrified my story won’t come off the way I intended it to.
And I thought all I had to worry about were Twilight comparisons- despite the fact I wrote my story from start to finish back in 2003 (I didn't read Twilight until maybe 2007) and it has nothing to do with vampires.
On the Cutting Room Floor
I think back on the various plot lines that make up the story. Many of them I can’t get behind anymore because they’re exaggerated or borrow from every soap opera cliche you can think of.
I didn’t even start watching All My Children until a year after this so I can’t help wondering how I got some of these ideas in the first place.
These “throwaway” ideas include Jonas being thrown off his horse into a frozen pond and he temporarily loses his hearing. Another is where Nina has an accident during a pep rally cheerleader routine and she develops a temporary case of amnesia where Jonas is the only person familiar to her.
These things pad out the story and without them, there’s not much that happens between one major plot point to another.
But I think I can at least salvage the cheerleading accident and do something with it… if anything, concussion protocol could take her off the squad and she gets reacquainted with another hobby she hadn’t done in years. This hobby is an idea I’d been sort of tinkering with to give Nina more of a back story so she’s not just the new girl who later becomes a love interest.
The Necessary "Evils" of Conflict and Character Goals
One writing “rule” I’d read on every writing site: your protagonist HAS to have a goal they’re pursuing and some sort of conflict keeping them from achieving it and that moves the story.
Nothing I've written has anything like this...
Typically what I end with are characters I love spending time with and occasionally something happens involving outside stimuli and they respond to it.
But Twilight got published despite having similar issues. And technically the first Harry Potter book was Harry figuring out life at Hogwarts until finding more about the Philosophers Stone and that mystery propels the story forward. So having a character-driven story isn’t necessarily a deal breaker.
But if I really look into whatever “plot” I have for this story, nothing really concrete happens until the last 20 pages. When the bad guy makes an appearance and Jonas fulfills a destiny that was unfulfilled in a former life.
Inspiration at its Sources
The origin story (which I fleshed out in greater length here https://romantasyland.blogspot.com/2020/10/angels-origin-story-of-jonas-and.html) that started this whole thing- I still vividly remember sitting down to write it after seeing Spirited Away for the first time.
I wanted to write something with a "chosen one", reincarnation, and good vs evil. Plus I wanted to do something with mythological creatures. That all came out in 2 pages and maybe half an hour of typing.
Then what ultimately followed was the kind of story I really wanted to read in that moment- I wanted Haku and Chihiro to meet again and their time together to last forever.
Jonas has elements of Haku in him that’ll always be there but other than him and Nina possibly having a connection from a former life, there isn't a lot in the story that calls back to that initial spark.
But as I worked on him in later years, I began to see him more as a reflection of myself. I’d never want the same fantastic destiny that he has. But into him, I poured a lot of insecurities and uncertainties I still deal with in my daily life.
It sounds ridiculous but I’ve always had this dream that I’d meet the perfect person that would magically erase all the things I don’t like about myself. That I’m socially awkward and shy and it’s hard for me to make the first move in a conversation. And my ever present difficulties with making friends.
The strange thing is that I’ve made friends over the years without really having to try. It's just sort of happened. But I don’t know how the hell I ever did it. If I did, I might have avoided a lot of the setbacks I've had in my life... but the devil's advocate would go "no, you'd just make another batch of mistakes altogether."
I think what my biggest issue is- I just had one too many times in elementary school where someone I wanted to be friends with didn't or I had a friend, come next school year, made new friends they liked better and cut me out of their life… so I just stopped making the effort. If I wasn’t going to have a positive result, why even bother?
This has followed me my whole life and it made me feel like there was something wrong with me. Like nobody wanted to give me a chance because of some missing ingredient or there was nothing interesting about me that made friendship worthwhile for them.
I could go into future detail about why I didn’t like recess or hated working on group projects but I think I've made my point. Wouldn’t want to bore anyone else still here reading this.
Jonas has a little more that’s abnormal about him than I do.
The strange thing is that I’ve made friends over the years without really having to try. It's just sort of happened. But I don’t know how the hell I ever did it. If I did, I might have avoided a lot of the setbacks I've had in my life... but the devil's advocate would go "no, you'd just make another batch of mistakes altogether."
I think what my biggest issue is- I just had one too many times in elementary school where someone I wanted to be friends with didn't or I had a friend, come next school year, made new friends they liked better and cut me out of their life… so I just stopped making the effort. If I wasn’t going to have a positive result, why even bother?
This has followed me my whole life and it made me feel like there was something wrong with me. Like nobody wanted to give me a chance because of some missing ingredient or there was nothing interesting about me that made friendship worthwhile for them.
I could go into future detail about why I didn’t like recess or hated working on group projects but I think I've made my point. Wouldn’t want to bore anyone else still here reading this.
Jonas has a little more that’s abnormal about him than I do.
On my own time, I’d sketched out how he’d had seizures as a kid and his last one was after he survived the same car accident that killed his parents.
In the place of them came mind-reading abilities (physical contact is required) and telekinetic powers (it's essentially a defense mechanism but under extreme stress, he'll create a barrier of protection around himself).
I still have a lot of things to figure out but those are the basics. He isolates himself because he doesn’t want to hurt anyone or at least people to think he’s a freak. He doesn't know why he has these powers and the latter of the two, he doesn't know how to control it when it arises.
What IS the Story here?
In terms of story, this is all I have so far that’s going to stick
The story in its current form barely clocks over a hundred pages so I’ll have to figure out a lot of things to add padding.
I still have a lot of things to figure out but those are the basics. He isolates himself because he doesn’t want to hurt anyone or at least people to think he’s a freak. He doesn't know why he has these powers and the latter of the two, he doesn't know how to control it when it arises.
What IS the Story here?
In terms of story, this is all I have so far that’s going to stick
- Nina moves to a new house and new school
- There’s a thunderstorm where she hears some unexplained phenomena, including a voice that's familiar to her
- The meet cute with her and Jonas
- The early seeds of friendship are sown between the two of them, involving meeting his horses and iguanas
- One of the horses has a foal and Nina finds out that Jonas has been struck by lightning several times in his life- explaining his rumored periodic absences
- The pep rally cheerleading accident
- The love triangle arc where two guys vie to be the head cheerleader's boyfriend
- The loser of the love triangle picks a fight with the winner and Jonas gets involved and his powers resurface
- Christmas- Nina finds out what happened to Jonas’s parents and why he still blames himself for what happened
- The antagonist finally makes an appearance
- The school dance
- The showdown between good and evil
- The aftermath of the duel
The story in its current form barely clocks over a hundred pages so I’ll have to figure out a lot of things to add padding.
Conclusion and Upcoming Ideas
Yeah, I get to the end of this and I’m thinking “I was worried for nothing. This is doable.”
But there are still a lot of incidentals I need to work out.
Yeah, I get to the end of this and I’m thinking “I was worried for nothing. This is doable.”
But there are still a lot of incidentals I need to work out.
Among them: I need to find some part of balance about Jonas’s level of confidence. Because I feel like it flucuates a lot.
I’d done a lot of brainstorming over the last couple years, but not much that’ll make the final product. Some, I’m very excited to share on this blog and plan to soon.
