Writing discussion (looking for advice)

[the_rck]

Hm. Now that I’m starting to write down what I’m stuck on in terms of various WIP, a lot of it comes down to me needing to figure out world building, plot direction, likely lines of character development, and/or combat choreography. So, basically, it’s a problem with me being a pantser and hitting points where that just won’t work. I do my best writing when I have two or three characters in a confined space and talking with each other or otherwise interacting. I almost never do prolonged scenes with more than three actively involved characters.

These are only a few of my stalled WIP. I’ve mostly been writing about them because my brain is kind of mush due to recent anxiety issues.

Rheotaxis (Weiss Kreuz): I’ve been stuck on this one for a couple of years. The next chapter takes Nagi, one of the main characters (more antagonist than protagonist), to a new to the reader place and leaves behind all of the other characters. I want the character to interact with people he’s not used to and— if I can pull it off— to think a bit about how he treats other people and what it means. Ideally, I would like to to do that while showing the place he’s visiting as complex and multi-cultural and, most of all, solid. The Taisken have been in the background, but I don’t think they’ve been very real so far, the High Lord aside. I’ve written two fragments of Nagi interacting with different people, but neither goes anywhere or makes Nagi think outside of his habits. The end of the story hinges on Nagi starting to grow up. On a bunch of other things, too, but Nagi’s the character who has to change for it all to work.

Kenshin AU: This has been snagged on a logistical problem for years. I can write the Megumi POV sections and the AU backstory for Sanosuke and Kenshin and Aoshi. I just can’t manage to get Kaoru and Yahiko and Misao to where I need them to be. I can’t quite justify them being alive given how the backstory is set up, and I need them to be alive in order for the larger story to work. I think that Kaoru could and would decide to take the actions necessary to keep them alive. I’m just not sure how she could actually pull them off. Also, she needs a real sword for it to work, and I can’t for the life of me figure out how to get her one during the battle at the Aoiya. I’m also truly terrible at choreographing and writing combat, and this story, being a Rurouni Kenshin epic, requires some well executed fight scenes. There’s also a problem that I’ve been dancing around in terms of writing something convincing to explain where Kenshin is when the story begins because it’s a long way from where he used to be. I think I’ve set up the situation properly, but I need to show it so that readers will buy it. Part of me wants to throw out the stuff with Kaoru, Yahiko, Misao and all and just stick with the part I know I can write. I think the story would be a lot weaker and a lot more depressing if I do that.

Torsion: This has reached the point where it needs actual plot as opposed to character interactions, and I really have no idea where to go with it. I’m not sure that dark!Kritiker actually works within the larger canonical world, and I’m faltering at the idea of trying to pull on the rest of canon to build something that does work. Why would Persia who heads a dark!Kritiker not have murdered his brother already? If Kritiker is nasty, are the rest of the Takatoris still terrible people? I’ve implied that they are. The setting may collapse under the sheer weight of awfulness. Maybe this should mean making Estet into good guys? I’m not sure I can do that. Maybe I should just ignore Estet and not bring them into things at all? Basically, when I expand to a larger world, the setting starts falling to pieces.

Apotheosis: This needs to parallel Kapital with some, mostly behind the scenes, alterations to fit with the magical elements I’ve introduced— immortal mages and sort-of-gods who can only be killed by particular people (with both the Estet elders and the entire Takatori family being 'gods'). I’m not sure how to make that interesting. I’m also not sure how to finesse things so that Ouka survives (I think it has to happen in such a way that 90% of the characters still think she’s dead because anything else changes events too much. I really have no ideas), and I suspect that she needs to. Omi might forgive Ouka dying or what Crawford (and Schuldig) has done to Yohji, but I don’t see him forgiving both. This may need to sit on the back burner for a very long time.

Dark and Deep: I have two specific sequences in mind for this going forward, but neither take it to any sort of ending. Part of the problem is figuring out who the Pevensies would turn into as Jadis’ proteges. What would each of them be interested in? Good at? Peter’s on a different path from the rest; I’m definite about where he’s going. I just don’t want the story to be only about Peter. Plus, a lot of what happens to him is going to be happening in a way that Jadis sets up but can’t observe. I’m firmly in her POV and would like to stay there.

Zombie Apocalypse aka Deep in Memory (Weiss Kreuz): This needs some jungle combat scenes with guns against more or less invulnerable monsters that can be knocked back by bullets but not otherwise harmed. The monsters are, fortunately, not very fast or very bright. I don’t know diddly about guns, and I loathe writing combat, but I don’t see how to avoid it here.

I’m definitely looking for advice, brainstorming help, and discussion on all of these.

Comments

[edenfalling]

A blog for combat-related writing advice: howtofightwrite

A guide to guns, written for the Inception fandom but applicable to many others: Cyanide Breathmint's Guide to Firearms (four pages, each linked internally from the bottom of the previous page)

[the_rck]

Ooh! Thank you! I will bookmark both for later, when my brain is working properly.

[lunabee34]

Re: Narnia, can Jadis use an object to spy on Peter or animals? Birds and insects seem likely candidates.

[desdemonaspace]

Late hubby talked a lot about jungle warfare. I'm lucky; most women married to Viet Nam vets lived with their men talking about bupkes. Frank told me scads. Two tours, and the second was as a sniper. When he got home, he taught close combat.

If nothing else, I could give you atmosphere.

[the_rck]

Thank you! I would be exceedingly grateful.

How is best to talk? Here? PM? Some form of chat? Email? I'm willing to try any of those.

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

Have you tried acting out the combat scenes with action figures? You might naturally do things that your brain didn't think of in front of the computer.

" Why would Persia who heads a dark!Kritiker not have murdered his brother already? "

Usually, that involves parental guilt and promises to keep sibling safe.

Can Ouka disguise herself and maybe avoid everywhere the other characters would be while she does her thing?

[the_rck]

In canon, Ouka gets fridged. She's shot on screen by the series bad guys so that she can die in the arms of her newly discovered brother (who may actually be her cousin) as it starts to rain. The bad guys who killed her then persuade her father (another bad guy) that it's someone else's fault and get him to attack the targets they want him going after.

It's the dying in Omi's arms part that's hard to get around. I don't know that I can handwave and say, "Magic!" even though I'm adding magic to the setting because magic shouldn't work very well on either Ouka or Omi. I'm not convinced that the bad guys could convince her to play along with faking it, but that may be the only solution.

Persia is the younger brother. The quarrel is that his older brother married Persia's one true love (she was pressured into it) and then treated her badly, eventually driving her to suicide by refusing to pay the ransom for their youngest son when he was kidnapped. Of course dark!Persia may have other, completely different issues with his family. The way that later canon handled that family doesn't actually fit with the early canon.

I might see if we can get some minis (I don't think we have either minis or action figures at present, and I think minis are more likely to be long term useful for other things) and then try to get my husband to help me act out the scenes.

With Rurouni Kenshin, part of the problem is that nearly all of the characters are the best of the best in terms of fighting and have their own specific weapons and their own specific attacks with specific effects. The manga-ka went to great lengths to make everyone unique (and often, at least for the villains, grotesque).

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

OH, whenever I didn't recognize a character, I assumed it was original!

[the_rck]

I can see why you'd assume. Sadly, I've got to fit this one around canon. I'm trying to write something where canonical events happen but have a completely different meaning because there are more layers. Keeping Ouka alive is the only deviation from canon that will be difficult because things happen after she dies-- because she dies-- that I need to keep the same.

In canon, her death is useful to the villains. In this version, however, actually killing her would wreck the lead villain's long term plans. But, if people generally know she's alive, I have to make fairly major changes to canon and have to write those changes so that readers know what's going on.

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

So, you can't do the Romeo and Juliet thing and fake her death?

[the_rck]

Not easily unfortunately. I haven't come up with a way to do it without her cooperation or with any reason why she'd cooperate. The folks faking her death need her to like them later on, and the events they're orchestrating will require her father, uncle, and grandfather to die. Two brothers are already dead, but canon suggests that she didn't know them well.

She's sixteen, sheltered, and more than a little spoiled. She's the openly acknowledged illegitimate daughter of one of the country's wealthiest men. She doesn't live with him, but he pays for everything. He's a terrible person, but he's always adored her.

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

Does this canon have magic where a person can appear as another person?

Like when King Arthur was conceived in his legend?

[the_rck]

There's no magic in canon, but this AU is dependent on adding magic, so maybe... The villains have a fifteen year old boy who might be a good candidate for impersonating Ouka. He's the one of the four who's not accounted for at that point, too. Fanon would have it that he wouldn't have the social skills to do it, but that's fanon.

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you're on your way to a plan...don't listen to fanon. They're usually wrong.

[trepkos.livejournal.com]

Maybe you could do the jungle fight scene retrospectively - "In the end ..." sort of thing?

[the_rck]

I could restructure to avoid the fight, but if it's going to happen, it needs to be on screen so to speak. The characters are enemies who are reluctantly acting together. I want them to respect each other later, and they're starting off with low opinions of each other. One thinks the other is sentimental and not particularly competent. The other thinks the first is capricious and unreliable. The first character was responsible for the second character's sister's death in a very unpleasant mindgame he was playing with the second character.

[daegaer.livejournal.com]

For dark!Kritiker could they more directly parallel Estet? Estet is fairly clearly the paranormal wing of the Nazi party in the Elders' youth, so could Kritiker be a holdout of unrepentant military/imperialist factions in Japan? (Possibly started during the war with Nazi advisors, given the German name). They might still have to play things relatively safe, and not kill Reiji, as they're few in number, and Reiji is a useful tool. Or Reiji could be the ultimate boss - is Suuichi sure he can take him down and not have something worse replace him? Or is Saijou pulling both their strings (always likely)?

How awful is the rest of the world in the story? Tokyo is both the relatively crime free real place and the child-trafficking/terrorist stalked/crazed incendiary-filled city of WK in the canon as is, so you could ramp that up. Reiji declares martial law, right now Abe wants to rewrite the constitution to explicitly allow Japan an army again (http://www.globalresearch.ca/japanese-prime-minister-shinzo-abe-pushes-to-remove-constitutional-constraints-on-military/5507965). You could have Reiji do that in 1998, ignore the public's protests, the protests of Korea and China, etc. There could be news reports that Weiss hear mentioning things abroad that indicate that the world is not quite our own - fuel rationing, perhaps, or something that echoes the odd/paranormal attacks in Tokyo.

[the_rck]

One night a week or two after you commented, I had a brilliant idea about this right before I fell asleep. Naturally, it was gone in the morning, and I haven't been able to get it back. I was sure it would cover everything, and I can't tell if that was real or not.

I think I have to decide what to do about Reiji. Is he as villainous here as in canon? Aya thinks so, but his sources are very limited. (Autocorrect keeps changing Reiji to Reiki which would be quite a different thing.)

I think that the world is darker on general and that Kritiker is part of a lot of what's wrong. They forcibly recruit and enslave people, after all, and that's the sort of thing that alters the larger society. I think this Kritiker is bigger and probably older than the canonical version. What they're doing to control people may well not be entirely science based. I'm not sure it's psychic powers either (though it could be).

Kritiker and Estet might work together in some cases and oppose each other in others. Always ready to take each other out or over if opportunity or necessity presents.

I think the upper echelons of Kritiker are mostly younger children or illegitimate children from powerful families. Reiji might worry about Omi near Ouka more because Kritiker might pull her in than because of anything else.

Okay, writing on my phone is getting too hard, so I'm going to stop throwing out ideas.