What Happens Next

I reached chapter 25 last Friday. Then the weekend came. We had a work party on Saturday afternoon, and then Communion and pot luck on Sunday, so I didn't get much work done either day. But today I got back to work... staring out the window, lying on the couch watching the penguins, trying to figure out What Happens Next.

My agent called me last week, just to touch base. It's been awhile since we've talked and for all he knew I could have suddenly started writing Prairie Romances. I assured him that would not happen.

We talked about my process, and he said I write with outtakes. I just get these snippets of scenes -- a few lines of dialog, an image, a situation -- but I have no idea where they go, or what they have to do with each other. I just sense that they are supposed to be there. It's much more intuitive than logical or linear. Which is not the easiest way to do things. But I like that observation. I've been dealing with my "outtakes" today, writing around the edges of them and slowly but surely they are expanding into something.

Like when a character I thought was somewhere else began to intrude on the sequence I was writing today, and by the end he was the whole point of the scene. He and Cam even had a conversation that took me totally by surprise.

Back to my agent, though. Because we also talked about the next book, and I learned that Bethany House is waiting for me to send them a synopsis. Imagine that! Well, I have a book I already started developing back right after Arena sold, but it's a lot different from what I'm doing now. I'm quite intrigued by it and would love to write it, but maybe I should do something more along the lines of what I'm doing now.

Like I have time to be thinking of that, when all my brain is used up trying to figure out What Happens Next in Enclave. But that's God's problem, not mine. Mine is chapter 25, and I now have almost 12 pages of that written. Only a few places left to figure out before the chapter's done.

Grace,
Karen