Young Writers Society

Since I hate actually finishing projects, and love starting them and having half-finished stuff sprawled all over my computer, I am going to participate in this!

So, yeah. Leave me comments if you must if you want to, and whatever else I am supposed to be doing in here - remind me of it, or just hang on and see if I can actually write an entire novel in one month. I doubt it. 90,000 words in one month = hectic and screaming sessions galore.

So I'll probably end up doing it.

My idea is called The Watched, and it all derived from a writing exercise at my local writer's group... so we'll see how it goes. Science fiction/thriller - both of which are new to me, which means lots of fun writing them!

When I think about it, I can't help but wonder if I shouldn't start this new idea and focus more on one of the ideas I have at present - two ideas having more than 20,000 words already to their name, and one with 300,000.... I really don't know if I should start another project, but continue with the one's I have.

But you know me. I'll probably decide what I want to do when this thing is half-way finished.

The challenges can be done at any time, and the information will always stay put so it's not like you couldn't go through and do this again and again with this journal and every idea you come up with. You can even suggest challenges, offer advice on how to make them better, and talk to your fellow journalists about their ideas too.

So I am wondering if I should even bother with making character templates and actually fill them out, because my characters always change as I write the book. Always. I mean, I start writing and by the third chapter, the main character is someone other than the first chapter, and by the fifth chapter... yeah. And I know writing out a character template will help fix that, but I always like the last one the best, and then everything is fixed up in the last draft... so I don't know.

Maybe I will make character templates, but I will probably skip by and just write and watch where my characters fly....

I totally agree! I hate templates because I don't like putting my characters into a pre-made mould. Like you, I prefer to watch them discover themselves I usually just start off with simple physical descriptions and watch it grow from there. I have a feeling I'm going to struggle with those templates :/ Best of luck!

So I have been forced advised to write Affinity - a project already in the works, only about 10,000 words into it - for NaNo. It's a science-fiction story I already have posted on YWS, and already have basic plotlines out. Of course, I never truly know what's going on until the chapter arrives, but yeah. There it is. I am doing Affinity, and @Deanie should be happy now. I am.

I think part of the thing you have to remember is that this is just information for setting up your story, at the very beginning. Characters are supposed to change, That's part of character growth. Having someone who is too rigid can be interesting in a story, but that growth can be super important. As you move through the story, you can edit your character profile. It's not like just because you put it up here means you don't have the option to change it. I tried to include little to nothing about personality because personality is such a situational thing.

I hope that if you choose to make a character profile, you use it to keep track of things that cannot change, like the history of your character, the hair, skin, and eye color of your character, or those other things which are pretty much going to stay the same.

I'd also like to assure both you, and @Silverlock that there will be character Discovery challenges and not just character profiles, because I completely agree. Some characters are better to learn about by writing them. We just haven't gotten to those challenges yet. If you choose to not include character profiles as a part of your journal, that is completely up to you.

I just hope you consider creating profiles for those characters that will remain stagnant, or the basic gist of concrete details to have it written out and solid instead of flexible due to lack of memory. <3

Yes, Deanie is very happy
But your avatar doesn't look it D:

My avatar is just in stunned silence. He may explain sometime @Deanie

First day of doing NaNo (and that is assuming I have started on the right month), and I have written only about 1100 words... not too bad for a normal night, but I was hoping for more, especially since I stayed up so late to get it. Anyway, I think I sorta did well for a first night.

Thank you so much for your helpful advice, @Aley. I will begin making rough character sketches for my characters soon.

I am so behind in all these challenges. xD

My challenge 9 Q&A session, ordered by Miss Bossy (aka @Deanie). She keeps nudging me to do this stuff, and good thing, too. Otherwise I would be woefully more behind than I am right now.

Here we go.

1: What is the quickest way to get from your starting point, to your ending point regardless of what you want to have happen, your characters, or your plot?

Usually, the shortest distance between two points is a straight line, but I am assuming this has nothing to do with Geometry? The quickest way would be for my two characters to discover what they need to discover, learn the absolute basics and then escape ARC... but only when they find out what's wrong with ARC, and why it is so dangerous.

2: What is normal life like for your character?

I wish I knew. That may be a part of their lives no one every taps into. I may leave it entirely up to the reader to come up with their backstory, supplying it as they feel necessary. Because, as of right now, they have no memories. Nothing.

3: When is normal life disrupted and how?

The beginning of the book is the disruption of normal life, them taken to the ARC facility and their memory strangely evaporating. They know nothing of normality now, only what they must grow used to as their new life.

4: What causes the story to go back to normalcy?

There is no feasible way for them to go back to normalcy, really. They will be different, warped - no matter how they try to fight the changes that go in inside them. But I think I will wrap it up with as close to normality as I can conjure.

5: How would a different character solve the problem given to the main character?

It depends, since the main character's (two of them, alternating perspectives) are so, so much different from each other. I will take this question and warp it a little, and instead answer what the other would do as opposed to the other. Uh, yeah. That made sense.

Ally has more of a tendency to think about thing, weigh the possibilities and the odds, overthink things, too. He likes to build up an idea, formulate everything in his mind just the way he likes it. Then, he hesitantly acts.

Avery is more of a person that does before thinking. She is very emotional - mostly veering toward rage - and doesn't hesitate to take her anger and doubt on whoever is closest. She is afraid, but likes to put on a façade of bravery, so when given a problem she would probably react in a very instantaneous way.

6: What are the tools at your character's disposal to discover information?

There aren't many, really. They have their own deduction at hand, and the ARC facility to supply the information. So, severely limited.

7: What are the tools for your character to end conflict?

Probably their combined minds and strength? There's a rule with Affinity: together. Everything must be together, no matter what. That is their biggest and most crucial tool - and one that they will get better at using as they grow into their new life.

8: How would the plot change if your main character wasn't in the story?

The plot wouldn't be there. ARC will be thrown down in the end, and the only reason it happens is because Ally is going to be assassinated for rebelling (or something along those lines - and an attempted assassination. You can breathe easy)

9: Is the plot driven by the character, or outside events in the story?

I would say I have a pretty even balance with plot driven and character drive, but the outside events don't impede too much on the here and now, but they definitely do add to the story, including one immense historical additive that I can't divulge because too many Affinity readers are, erm, reading this.

10: Looking at your story from the perspective of someone who believes that all people are good in some way, what rationality would you have for your plot points?

Rationality? oh dear. I have to confess I don't understand that too well, but, ah, let's try for it, anyway. I would say that from that perspective, ARC could be seen as some good? Let's face it: they do something very rash and brave, if nothing else. And they go farther back than people even know - and few people know about them. I totally failed this question.

11: Now, looking at your story from the perspective of someone who believes that all people are in essence greedy and bound to do bad things, what rationality would you have for your plot points?

Oh dear. I would say yayyy. Everyone has their greediness... somewhere, and everyone is bound to do bad things. My characters aren't perfect, and they know it. ARC is going to train their wills, train their minds - not to dissolve those tendencies but to mold them to what they want to achieve. Yet another failed question.

12: What is the main conflict in your story, Man vs. Man, Man vs. Self, Man vs. Machine, Man vs. Society, Man vs. Nature...?

Man vs Man vs Society vs Machine. If I went through all the details, this question would have a million-word answer. Let's just say that there's a lot of conflict in the story, and everything is pushing against the characters.

13: What is the main point you want to say through the story?

That together, anything is possible - even destroying an entire way of life.

14: If you had to write the story in 1,000 words, what would the plot be?

The plot would probably be finding who they once were, and how they can come together - something that will seem impossible at first.

15: If you had to convey the story in a five minute speech, what would you focus on?

Their lack of memories, and the plot of the ARC, which will dominate the book and the characters in every step they make.

16: Do you need all of your plot points to further the plot, or are some of them just for spectacle?

Some of them are merely for spectacle, I think? But who doesn't like making the plot as big as possible? My plots always become an immense ordeal, built up as big as possible - some of them superfluous, I'd imagine, which are cut out as the story goes along. But most of them are completely necessary to the development of the story and characters.

17: Can your story start farther in without interrupting the plot or losing key details about any specific events?

No, my story must start at their new beginning, at their first involvement with ARC, because it's a crucial part of their character and new life. Although some sections immediately afterwards will be more concise in my last drafts, because as they are right now, you don't find out the character's name until they do themselves... four chapters into the book.

18: How would you summarize each of your chapters in 50 words or less?

I never know what is going on next until I finish the chapter I am working on. That is just how I work, I guess. And I don't really have all of the plot worked up in my mind. Yet another aspect of my writing mind, I guess. I focus on the here and now, and the future is deemed as superfluous until it arrives. Just me, I guess.

19: Where does your character, and your reader, get a break?

There are "breathing parts" in the story where the reader can slow down and read just the repeating parts of their days, their lives. Especially during the main training session they'll be having, although the first parts of the book and really most of the first book is pretty tense and action-packed (in my mind, at least). There's gonna be a lot of emotion inside it, primarily with Avery.

20: What is the time period of the story?

2250, give or take one hundred years. Haven't decided yet.

21: What would the story look like if you wrote it from the point of view of your least-favorite character?

Erm, I haven't come far enough to have a least favorite character, but when I do have one, I will definitely get back to you and let ya know. Sound like a deal? Good.

22: If your last challenge came first, how would the rest of the story go?

I cannot answer this question as it is against my religious principals. Or, in other words, I didn't do the first challenge so I don't know. Maybe I'll get to it eventually.

23: What would happen if your conflicts all happened at the same time?

General cacophony and confusion everywhereeee!

24: What sort of devices will you write into the story to get your characters out of situations where there is no solution, and how can they be used earlier to avoid getting into those situations?

I will be using their togetherness to be a big aspect of that, and that there will be some characters who will "help" them unexpectedly - all having a price, of course. But there will be many devices, I am sure. I usually come up with them on a come-as-needed basis.

25: How do you justify the change, or lack of change, of your character at the end of the novel?

Justify? Now that sounds like I am having to make it sound like their change is okay, when it isn't. I would have to say that I can justify their change, because even though they will be broken in many ways and very hurt in others, they will be stronger. In Affinity, there is a saying: We am Affinity - and it's that way because there are two of them, and they become one. So by the end of the book(s), they will have truly become an Affinity, one mind. And the change throughout the book all leads up to that.