Jennie Jones Romance Blog

How does this story end?

7/9/2013

That was my goal last week: to determine how The House at the Bottom of the Hill would end.

Knowing so much about my characters (as I’m half-way through writing the story) I had to figure out what my hero and heroine needed to find, gain, settle into or acknowledge at the end of the book before cranking up the risks and
dangers they need to face in order to (hopefully) make my second book in the Swallow’s Fall series a narrative story and not just a list of incidents and events.By drafting the last scene I gave myself a writer’s boost.

I discovered a way to grow the motifs already in place; how to highlight the tension and varied conflicts (internal and external) that I put in situ with pocket-sized knowledge of how they would evolve (given my preferred seat-of-my-pants style of writing), and also how to merge the additional issues, needs and desires of the townspeople of Swallow’s Fall into the lives of the main protagonists in order to make the story whole.

I even wrote the last line of the book.

The last line.

Truthfully, I nearly cried. I adore the backward pathway this last line gives me so much that I’m going to keep it because that last piece of dialogue in this story – just two words - gives me the reason to complete the empty ten chapters waiting for me and therefore give my characters life, which in turn means I’ve given myself a raison d’etre in my chosen field because I created something.

Feeling enthused, and not a little thankful. I love this job!

Jennie x

Jenn J McLeod | House for all Seasons link

7/9/2013 08:49:04 am

Hello from a fellow pantster and house lover! I love the backwards thing too. :) so, I guess you're not tellihng the last line now!!! hehehehe

Jennie Jones

7/9/2013 09:50:21 am

Couldn't possibly divulge the last line Jenn but I'm happy and somewhat surprised to hear that you're a pantser! Never would have thought it after reading the wonderful House for All Seasons. Guess that just gives me more gusto for carrying on in my own instinctual manner. (That's manner, nor manor as is the country manor I'd really like to living in as I finalise my second book). Truthfully, any house that is a home is a country manor at heart.

Janet Gover link

7/9/2013 11:22:37 am

Wow Jenny - what an interesting idea. I always have the last scene of a book in my head - but the last LINE??? I'm a bit scared to try it... in case I get it wrong :-)

8/9/2013 01:48:19 am

No, you wouldn't be scary Janet - not if you knew the last line! It has, of course, evolved from what I've already written and will sit nicely until maybe my editor tells me I can't use it :)

lily malone link

7/9/2013 01:57:29 pm

I like the concept, but it sounds a bit too much like mathematics to me, somehow, so I'll just keep pantsing along. Or - it may be due to the fact I have a crushing hangover today, and anything with long words is just too hard for my brain. LOL. (no - *giggle quietly without setting off headache*)

Shirley Wine link

7/9/2013 10:19:49 pm

Jennie

I have also done this with the final chapter of my latest book "Old Secrets" ... and I have found this makes it both easier and more difficult... more difficult because as you have to make the conflict 'real' and not just 'filler' or as you put it ... 'not just a list of incidents and events' ... an energising and invigorating process. I have the black moment but not quite the end and now have to fill in the angst and conflict between my main characters.
I'm keen to read your next book.... I love the title "The House at The Bottom of The Hill."

8/9/2013 01:54:51 am

Shirley - I could not have drafted the last few paragraphs of this story or written the last line without first having put in the initial conflict and then found the motifs that go nicely with those. But I do know a number of writers who use this 'backwards' style as much as some use the 'what if' scenario. This isn't the first time I've written a last chapter when I'm only half way through a story but I might not be able to do it with subsequent stories. I'm just taking whatever inspiration comes my way, as it come, and running with it :)

8/9/2013 03:02:35 am

Jennie

When I was in college I had an English teacher who was fascinated by the way I read books... he told me something I've never forgotten...if you want to work out how to structure a book...read until you reach the middle and then go to the back of the book and read it chapter by chapter backwards, you can then see all the hooks the author has put in all the little hooks that keep a reader turning the pages until the last one.

It's something I've never forgotten and as a writer something I find incredibly useful. And I suspect this is what I do when I reach midway through a book and then go to the end and work my way backwards... By the time I've written the first half I know my characters and their conflict and I can then layer in all the nuances that add to that conflict and character growth. A process that I never grow tired of.

8/9/2013 03:21:08 am

Shirley that's beautiful! I think this might be me finding my way whilst writing this second novel. I'm feeling very comfortable working this way and, like you, find the process energising and full of creative surprises. I'll not forget what your English teacher told you either. Thanks for passing that on Shirley.

8/9/2013 03:44:55 am

Jennie

He also told me ... when he found me reading Scott's Waverly novels as a 4th former ... that it I skipped all the boring descriptions they were rollicking great yarns ... LOL. Something else I've never forgotten ... translated to my writing as... leave out the boring bits your readers will skip over anyway! (I'm smiling as I write this)

Dear Mr Cornwall you've inspired me for far longer than half a century!
He has a very special place I my memory as he was the first teacher ever, who treated me as a person in my own right and someone who was worth having a real conversation with.

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