AQATSA: Too much snogging!

[inverarity]

Current Word Count: 216K words, 34 chapters.

Actually, the problem (and I had a revelation that this is one of the main reasons for the book swelling in size, and indeed for much of the bloat in my previous books) is too many subplots. I spend a lot more time on subplots involving secondary characters than Rowling did.

Consider Cho Chang, Fred and George, Dudley Dursley, and hell, Ginny freaking Weasley. Each of them got a handful of scenes throughout the books. Rowling kept a pretty tight focus on the Trio. Secondary characters only got significant page space when a subplot directly involved them, and then they were lucky to have more than a few lines of dialog.

But I love my secondary characters. Also, my core group is larger -- instead of three, I have five. And I find that when I am writing big scenes where "everyone" is present, I have a hard time shuffling all the minor characters off to oblivion with a line or two. I want to describe what happens to everyone. This is the blessing and curse of fan fiction -- I have the luxury of adding material that would be cut by an editor, and sometimes an inability to see which subplots really don't need to be there.

Anyway, snogging, yes. (Why am I saying "snogging"? Charmbridge Academy is in the Midwest, not the UK.) I just finished the Winter Ball chapter, in which the Winter Ball was really not the most important event in the chapter but nonetheless took up the most space. There are some subplots which amuse me but probably aren't really important, and some others which might be foreshadowing or might just be me screwing with the readers. :D But I'm debating whether I could cut most of the chapter and replace it with: "The Winter Ball was that night. The next day...."

(Actually, I have debates like that about most of my chapters.)

So anyway, for a slightly more interesting Wordle, let's see which secondary characters are getting the most word count:

(Click for larger version.)



There is one name obviously missing from this word cloud. I left Alexandra's name out because it would be huge and take up as much space as all the other names put together.

Also, TealTerror, email me please. (I don't have your email address.)

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_silverfox/]

I'm debating whether I could cut most of the chapter and replace it with: "The Winter Ball was that night. The next day...."
As far as I'm concerned I'd prefer the long version. Don't I always ... but this time I've got a better reason than just that I love to hear about the secondary characters, too. Here the only ball in school is the prom (and I didn't even go), so this isn't something I can just imagine for myself easily.

[luminique.livejournal.com]

Despite my impatience to actually read the thing, I say put in as much detail as you desire.

[(Anonymous)]

Let's see. There's a lot of Grimm in there, but they are cheating, since they are two sharing the same name. But I see that Brian's name is bigger than Payton's, even though Brian is a muggle and they hardly spoke to each other since Alexandra first left for Charmbridge. Abraham continues to be an absent father, as we see from the insignificant size of his name, heck, it's a small as Archie's, though that's artificially deflated, since she obviously doesn't call her father by his first name.

Now if we could get our hands on two advance chapters ...

Keep it up,

--Geneva

[kerneyhead.livejournal.com]

I'm reminded of The Stand, by Stephen King.

In the nineties some time they came out with the expanded version which was a lot of what the editors took out.

A lot of people think what was added added nothing to the story.

So are you writing that hundred extra pages that add little to the story that even good writers like King do? or are their really cool subplots that will add to the story later?

Perhaps it's some of both.

[inverarity.livejournal.com]

I liked the expanded version of The Stand. But I am also one of those people who complains about King writing bloated books with hundred-page tangents. It's all interesting, but a lot of it doesn't actually move the plot forward. So yeah, my internal editor is something I need to work on -- especially since I'm not Stephen King.

[(Anonymous)]

Payton's back! I liked him. And it's cool to see David seems to be getting a lot of focus.

Angelique doesn't seem to be there, though. Has she been Put On A Bus? Or are she and David just not together anymore? (Shame if that's true, they were cute. Also, I kind of had a pet idea that Angelique grew up to be a polar opposite of Darla, or the good person Darla could have become - they start off as very similar, and then they grow up into different people; one Dark, one a genuinely heroic person. Seriously, I'd actually been hoping she'd become a Cordelia Chase type character; starts out the Libby, then ends up one of the gang. Sad to see her go).

[(Anonymous)]

Oh hey! Does this make room for some Alex/David...? I'm game for that.

Provided Alex doesn't get together with a redhead moments before they're kidnapped by pirates. That would probably not be an ideal situation.

~DarkSov

[(Anonymous)]

Is it wrong that I'm hoping for a little Alex/Anna? I've never been drawn to the whole slash-for-the-sake-of-slash phenomenon in fandom, but somehow, I like the idea of those two. Maybe its because Anna's relationship with Alex is the only friendship we've seen of Alex's to get heavily developed. David's always been a little shunted to the side, and Constance and Forbearance don't change that much.

[(Anonymous)]

For some reason or another, I got an Alex/Anna vibe as well. I thought that sometimes during the second book, as well as during the third. Maybe it's also because I just see no suitable male character around (and no, David doesn't work for Alex. At all.) Funny to see it's not just me, though. Inverarity, feel free to sit down for an interview and tell me I'm delusional. Otherwise, you now have two Alex/Anna shippers :p

- Sesc

[(Anonymous)]

I remember Inverarity did a poll on this blog about who people wanted Alex to end up with, and Anna won. Good times~

Also, I'm smacking myself for not noticing the absence of Angelique. What happened there? Even Darla's name is fairly big. Hmmm...

-TealTerror

[(Anonymous)]

Does Mary join charmbridge then? And am I the only Alex-Brian shipper out here? :(

lol
-Jesse

[(Anonymous)]

"Consider Cho Chang, Fred and George, Dudley Dursley, and hell, Ginny freaking Weasley. Each of them got a handful of scenes throughout the books. Rowling kept a pretty tight focus on the Trio. Secondary characters only got significant page space when a subplot directly involved them, and then they were lucky to have more than a few lines of dialog."

And it came back to bite her in the ass, once she needed Ginny to be more than she was before. But I agree with the analysis.

For what it's worth, I liked the size and the subplots in the prior books; even if that may have had to do with the fact that I read the books in one go -- and when you do that, you always want the book to be longer ;)

- Sesc

[david kotsonis (from livejournal.com)]

I find your world fascinating. At the same time, though, and as your epic chapter-by-chapter reviews on ff.net have mentioned, you face different challenges than JKR; Harry's plot tended to be focused in the school, with OotP being the first time that isn't the case. As such, it was easier for JKR to intertwine the main plot (Big Bad Scheme of the year) with the subplots of the supporting cast, as well as with the exposition of the world and its rules. You have different agonists and have consequently different issues.

I, personally, have a high tolerance for tangents that are not relevant to the main plot of the book. However, I think that if you feel you might love your subplots a little too much, just try to make sure that each chapter or two moves the plot forward a little.

All that said, if you do happen to cut subplots, please please please hold on to your notes for them, because deleted scenes make excellent DVD extras after the story is released.

On Subplots and Pacing

[(Anonymous)]

I mentioned in one of my reviews that I thought Deathly Regiment suffered from subplot bloat. It is true that fanfic, as a medium, is much more forgiving than published novels regarding this kind of thing; the expectations are different. But even in fanfic, this can be a problem.

My personal opinion is as follows: It's fine to have a bunch of subplots as long as they don't overtake the main plot. In Deathly Regiment, the main plot gets put on hold for a lot of the first half, especially chapters 10 and 14, because you focus on subplots instead. This contributed to a lot of the book's pacing problems too (hence the title of this comment). Therefore, if you focus on advancing the main plot--even a little--in every chapter, it might not matter how many subplots you have. Especially if they're interesting.

Of course, as soon as you start ratcheting up the suspense for the climax the subplots should probably be put on hold no matter what. ;)

And the "I can summarize the chapter in one sentence" test doesn't really work, because you can always do that. Besides, the Winter Ball might help the pacing in giving the Serious Plots a little downtime. Kind of like comic relief, except with making out.

On the Wordle: Hmm. Several new, apparently minor, characters: "Tsotsie," (house-elf maybe?) "Livia," and "Hecate" (a name I've always really liked, incidentally). Looking forward to the returns of Quimley and John Manuelito. Seems like Grue is the most prominent teacher this book, and Forbearance is slightly bigger than Constance? Interesting...

-TealTerror

P.S.: I couldn't find your e-mail so I sent you a PM over ff.net instead.

Re: On Subplots and Pacing

[(Anonymous)]

I know I'm over a month behind, but I reread this post while looking for the outtake set in the Ozarks...

I just finished rereading all three AQ's back to back. AQDR definitely felt like the slowest moving of the three. It never hit the tedious point, but it was definitely slow. I think every chapter did move the plot ahead, but sometimes by an amount dispropotionate to their length. For example, the chapter about Thanksgiving at Croatoa: the scene at the blessing and Alexandra's coversations with Valeria were important, but the parts about riding the granians, preparing for the storm, and learning the parapluvia spell easily could have been cut or referenced with only a sentence or two since they neither advance the plot or teach us anything new about the world (umbrella charm could have just been mentioned on the way back from the crypt).

Also, there was a heckuva lot of people kissing people on the cheek in AQDR. It felt like once or twice a chapter someone was kissing someone else. Maybe its a cultural thing, but growing up in the mid-atlantic region we only ever kissed family, never friends (unless of course you were dating).

So this is real life...

[(Anonymous)]

Excited to see Quimley's back, but definitely strange that Angelique seems to have completely disappeared.

[lordfedora.livejournal.com]

"There are some subplots which amuse me but probably aren't really important, and some others which might be foreshadowing or might just be me screwing with the readers."

Keep it. It'll make the foreshadowing that much more fun, so that we won't know what's important and what's not.

Also, good to see Claudia getting a decent sized role. Sucks to be Archie though.