Musings & Thoughts for Thursday, May 23, 2024, or: After Being Becalmed in the Writing Doldrums, Reunion: Coda is Underway Again

Late Morning/Midday, Thursday, May 23, 2024, Madison, New Hampshire

Hi, everyone. It’s another warm spring day here in Madison’s Eidelweiss District. Currently, the temperature is 83°F (28°C) under mostly cloudy conditions. With humidity at 54% and the wind blowing from the west at 6 MPH (9 Km/H), the heat index is 90°F (32°C). Today’s forecast calls for partly sunny skies and a high of 84°F (28°C). Tonight, the skies should be clear. The low will be 52°F (11°C).

On Writing & Storytelling: Chapter 17 Gets a Second Scene!

There’s an old saying, “Third time is the charm.”

There’s another old saying, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try again.”

In writing, as with almost every human enterprise, there are days when I sit at my desk (sometimes for the entire four-hour novel-writing shift) and nothing, or almost nothing, happens. I’ll put on some pleasant instrumental music – I find that songs with lyrics are often more distracting – and open my Microsoft Word app. On bad days, like Monday and Tuesday of this week, I’ll either end up frustrated and angry because I wrote nothing, or I’ll “settle” for making edits and revisions to existing parts of Reunion: Coda.

This is why, in my previous attempts to write my first novel, I have given up after only writing a few chapters. I tend to get impatient and angry with myself, so much so that instead of taking the wider view of “Rome wasn’t built in a day” and carrying on the next day with a positive “can do” attitude, I figuratively toss the troublesome manuscript into the “round file” and never work on it again.

Thankfully, this has not been the case with Reunion: Coda. I started writing it almost 15 months ago after I read an email from my college journalism professor and mentor, Peter Townsend, about how much he’d enjoyed Reunion: A Story and how I could make a few necessary changes to improve it.

(Prof. Townsend also said he thought it would be a waste of talent if I didn’t write anything else after I made the suggested changes to my novella. He didn’t say “Write a follow-up story to Reunion,” specifically. But he did want me to keep working and improving my skills…like a good mentor does to a promising student.)

How I Overcame My Writing Challenges and Continued Jim Garraty’s Story

I’ve probably written about why I chose to write a continuation of Reunion: A Story in this blog, but I’ll repeat my main reasons briefly. First, I was already working on revising the existing story (it needed a  proper copyright page, and there were a few issues in the story that needed fixing), so I was already in Jim Garraty’s fictional world. Second, after many years of telling readers who wanted a story like Reunion: Coda (with Marty Reynaud’s story a bit more fleshed out) that “No, sorry. Reunion: A Story was written as a standalone narrative; I don’t see how I can continue the story,” I found a small detail near the end of the novella that became the hook for the novel I’m writing now.

The long and winding road to Reunion: Coda

I had to deal with a lot of setbacks, restarts, and a sudden move from Tampa Bay to Madison last December that put me on pause. But I didn’t give up. And now I’m happy to say that I’m close to finishing Reunion: Coda.    

Oh, I don’t know for sure how many chapters I need to write before I can type “THE END” and move on to the next stage  of the (self) publication process. But I do know that yesterday I wrote Scene Two for That Moment Divine, the 17^th chapter of Reunion: Coda.

How I Turned a Good Scene into a Great One and What I’m Going to Do Next

As I reported last night on my Facebook page:

Today was one of my better days, writing-wise.

Even though it was after my 6 PM stop time (I try to keep to a four-hour writing schedule, usually between 2 and 6 PM), I read Scene Two of Reunion: Coda’s Chapter 17 and…was underwhelmed.

Don’t get me wrong. The scene, as originally written, had a nice mix of comedy, romance, and “morning after” ambiance. It had, I think, good dialogue and a believable scenario featuring Jim and Maddie.

For all that, though, I wasn’t satisfied with the length or pacing. It was far too short and rushed, at least for my taste. So…I decided to revise it now rather than bull my way through Scene 3 and leave the rewrite for another day.

So…now the novel has 383 pages and 96,600 words…and a better, sexier, and funnier Chapter 17.

Well, that’s all for now, folks. I hope you enjoyed this sneak peek into my creative process and the challenges of revising a scene that was already good but needed some extra spice. I’m going to take my usual 2-hour midday break and then return to my desk to work on Scene 3, where Jim and Maddie will face some unexpected complications in their relationship. Stay tuned for more updates on Reunion: Coda, the conclusion of the Reunion Duology. And if you haven’t read the first book, Reunion: A Story, what are you waiting for? It’s available on Amazon in both Kindle and paperback formats. Trust me, you don’t want to miss this coming-of-age story blended with with a twist of mature reflection and regret for “what might have been.” Thanks for reading, and have a great day!