Question from a reader: Have you ever gotten into writing a book only to stop, pivot, and go a completely different direction?
Answer: Yes. It’s happened in many different ways, and at many different stages of the process.
- The one time I started a book, gave it to my editor and she said, “Yeah, this doesn’t work. At all.”
I tried to write a contemporary YA romance based off of The Phantom of the Opera. It was bad. That’s the only book I’ve started and then completely trashed. - That time I wrote If I Could Stay and then had to rewrite the second half of the book because the police procedures I had imagined up weren’t accurate.
Fortunately, I had the presence of mind to talk with a former FBI agent after I’d written the first draft. I told him how the plot had worked out and he said, “That’s not how it works. Let me tell you how it does work.” - That time I wrote a book in dual POV and had to rewrite it into single POV.
The Hidden Gift was originally written from both Annabelle and Nico’s points of view. However, when my editor got a hold of it, she was like, “Bad news. The dual POV isn’t working.” Rewriting half a book is…tricky, to say the least. But she was right. It’s SO much better now. Plus it gave me some great deleted scenes that are available for my newsletter subscribers! - That time I tried to start Kinley’s story and ended up scrapping at least three beginnings before settling on the one that stuck.
Good news though! Two of those beginnings ended up making their way into later books! The beginning of Cloaked in Scarlet was originally written with Kinley in mind. And the scene in The Swindler’s Daughter where Miriam finds Rowan sick and helps him to bed and he says the things…yeah, that was originally written for Kinley’s story as well. - That time that John’s story was going to be a Jack and the Beanstalk retelling with a love interest named Melody (Golden Harp character).
Obviously, that didn’t happen. I tried so hard to get that story off the ground. I even included Melody in one of the last scenes of The Swindler’s Daughter, expecting that John’s story would be book four. But it just never went anywhere, so I pivoted and told Elise’s story first, then went back and turned John’s story into a Sleeping Beauty retelling with Roslyn. So now Melody is just this out of place, named character that I bring up in Swindler’s Daughter and you never see her again. Haha. - That time I finally finished my first book after more than seven years of writing, and when I looked back at the finished draft, I realized that nothing I had written in the first five years had remained in the manuscript.
Just Ella took me a long time. Writing that first book taught me so much, including how to say goodbye to my darlings and consider that maybe I could write that scene better if I started from scratch.
The moral of the story: if you have a niggling feeling that maybe that scene isn’t as good as it could be, do it over. Don’t try to tweak the original. Start over. Rewrite the whole scene without referencing the first. See what happens.
If you think the scene IS good, but it doesn’t work with the story. Put it in a drawer. You might have a place for it later.
Trust your instincts.
*Disclaimer: This is an updated post from last year. So if it seems familiar, it probably is.*
Clean Romance Highlights
A Dragon Inside by Anabelle Raven is a romantasy new release.
She is a princess. He is chained in the dungeon. They don’t trust each other, but they are Solvar’s only hope for escaping war.
The Smallest Shop on Main by Laura Ann is a new release with a biker boy and a small town.
Your dream man walks into town just when you need him most…only he doesn’t feel the same.
Serendipity by Fran Thomas is on sale for September!
Feng shui and tarot and ghosts. Oh, my!
If you would like some Clean and Wholesome Fantasy Reads, check out this list on Bookfunnel.
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