After finishing my last chapter, I got myself a new job and damn near killed myself with my workload...soooooooo taking this weekend off from writing just to regain my strength. However, I don't want to leaven any readers I have hanging, thus a new Kernel of Insight. I imagine I will be slow in getting out chapters till after Christmas, which is a shame cause I love the upcoming ones, but it'll get done, don't worry. Anyway, enjoy my ramblings on the start of this series.
Kernel of Insight: The
fourth girl
So, did you
lot know that before I had finished what I was determined to be my final draft
before revisions came along, there was, for a brief span of time, a fourth
girl? Mina, Celine, and Daryl were parts
of all my previous drafts, but we also had a fourth girl, Claire, who was about
the inbetween in age between Mina and Celine.
Not the youngest, but not very old either. About average build with bright red hair and
seemingly no connection to the other girls besides they were close in age. Yeah...there's a reason she's not in the
current story and only appeared in my early drafts. This is the story of the fourth girl in our
group of heroines.
Okay, first
draft I had much much shallower characters.
I know that happens because of lack of ambition or lack of time or
interest or experience, but...first draft had way too many characters defined
by only one or two personality traits.
Mina was based on a girl I knew who was pure and open and
welcoming. Celine was the tom boy and
had a kinship with beasts. Daryl was a
magic user and had an interest in academics.
And then there was Claire. Claire
was an inventor of sorts. She had an
interest in gadgets. Now, the reason for
these four girls is pretty obvious. Each
was meant to appease to a specific group of people on Acacia, so that we could
get to know all of them. Have a reason
for them to interact and open up to them.
Mina was for Aeon and Vincent.
Celine was for Dakon and Echidna.
Daryl was for Nerise and Gadius.
And Claire was for Yuka and Merkel.
Deminos, as the new guy to the Acacia group, was kind of left out early
on in these first drafts. Or he was tied
to Gadius, so he and Daryl overlapped.
This changed later, but I digress.
So, what
happened? Where did Claire go? Well, the same place as Milena the
fairy. She was excised. I had too many characters I was juggling and
really...this was back when I was trying to do perspective chapters, each from
one of the four heroines perspectives.
Back in my early draft days. It
just wasn't working. So, I ended up
taking Claire out to tighten up the other characters. Daryl's academia took the place of Claire's
interest in machinery. Celine became
close friends with Yuka despite prejudices.
And Mina got to spend time with Aeon, but also grew closer to Yuka and
Deminos because of their age.
However, a
part of me looked at the early concepts.
At the idea of another teenage girl character to bounce off the other
three. And I still enjoyed the
idea. So, a re-worked version of her
will be returning at some point, though in what way may surprise you. But she won't return in this story and not
while Mina and the others are still in Gesthal.
We're talking way down the line.
Why bring
this up? Well, for experience's sake,
honestly. Often, when you're designing a
character, you need to think about what they want to say and why they're
important to the story, otherwise you get characters set up to betray you, or
set up to die, or just set up to be plot devices. I'd rather have three strong protagonists
with their various faults and foibles than four characters who are relatively
banal. I knew what I wanted to do with
Daryl, Celine, and of course Mina even back in the first draft. However, with Claire...no matter how I
envisioned it, I had no real reason for her to do anything. To stay in Gesthal, to join the clergy, to
follow Aeon...she was a device for exposition to a degree and never fully
fleshed out enough. I took her out and
tightened up the friendship between the three girls. Looking back, it made for a much more
compelling group dynamic, with the reluctant one, the wary protective one, and
the eager one. However, no character
truly dies, even when excised from a story.
And changes I've made, in my head, to Claire will drastically change the
characters and dynamic of the series. If
we ever get there. That's still a ways
off.
I look
forward to it. It will be different, but
also similar to what we've seen. Right
now, we have our young female heroines trying to come to terms with personal
sorrows or what have you. Imagine the
situation reversed? Imagine their
encounter with a sad Nerise, but with a much more immature girl with a much
smaller support system. I really hope we
get to it. It all depends on the success
of what I'm writing now and my own determination.
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