I’ve been stumped for a while on my women’s fiction manuscript re: a key growth moment. The easy solution would be to kill the scene that isn’t working just to get over the slump, but it lessened significant growth that I insist needed to come at a certain point and from a certain character.
I think I’ve solved that. At least in my head. Getting it down, on the other hand…
But now I’ve hit a new block. I wrote the original ending fully aware I rushed it. I wanted, nay, longed for my heroine to get with the right man. I mean seriously, I’d been writing sexual-tension scenes for eighteen months. Enough! And so at the first seemingly plausible opportunity I thrust them together. But I shortchanged her growth.
So here lies my conundrum: Do I go the traditinal romance route and end it dramatically and with great fanfare? Would it be more effective to draw out the eventual romance, or would that just bore the reader? Because let’s be honest, when we see all the prides and prejudices that keep our heroine apart from her true love we break out the pom-poms and toss in a couple of herky splits just so they’ll get it on already.
My instincts say to draw it out. But the entire book is fairly fast-paced. Not sure how gradually real love should grow and still mimic the rest of the manuscript’s rhythm.
I suppose I could go this route: "She didn’t mind being alone anymore, yadda yadda yadda and three months later he shows up and they finally get busy."
That could work…
Hey, next time write “Spoiler Altert!”
or Alert…
hahahahaha! Fixed!
I like the yadda yada yadda
It truly sums up so nicely
I was going to repeat the advice to have someone burst through a door holding a gun, but that doesn’t seem helpful, really.
Draw it out. It’s so much more satisfying for the reader that way.
I agree to draw it out. You can cut scenes later, and often you don’t know what you need until after you’ve overwritten. Unless you put in new stuff, you might never create that ideal moment that might be waiting for you to snatch it from thin air.
that is a great point, the risk of missing an ideal moment. The scenes I did linger on and draw out are still my favorite scenes.
Thanks!
But you know, sometimes a gun isn’t a gun…
I think I will follow my instinct. She’s close to being ready for this guy, but not just yet. If they stay together they way I’ve written it, they’ll just break up in six months over some silly peeve or another. I can’t have that heartbreak on my conscience.
Sounds like if it’s fast paced, you can’t draw it out toooo much . . .
Really, it depends how “literary” it is. If it’s chick-lity, you wouldn’t want to draw it out so much. If it’s more literary/realistic than that, then you can draw it out more.
It’s not chick-lit, but it’s closer to Bridget Jones’ Diary than Time Traveller’s Wife.
It’s probably closest to Good in Bed, but I thought some of that could have been tightened.
I want to draw it out but keep the pacing. I think if I throw in some fun/poignant scenes it would work.
Must.keep.writing.
Hey, wanna hook up in Lawrence again sometime soon?