IWSG: Navigating the Dark Side

IWSG: Visit other blogs listed to enjoy more discussions, even confessions, about writing.

 

The awesome co-hosts for the February 6 posting of the IWSG are Raimey Gallant, Natalie Aguirre, CV Grehan, and Michelle Wallace!

In between the work required to republish my first novel, my thoughts are on writing Forbidden’s sequel. I cringe at the thought. I don’t like sequels in movies or books. So much of the tantalizing discovery has become ‘old’. And other authors have warned me about the pain of writing book II.
So why am I even considering to put on those shackles?

Unfinished business. It nags at me though no reviewer has complained that a thread was left dangling. But there it is, teasingly waving in and out of focus with no discernible anchor. It’s blood stained. Justice has failed.

And, like the inspiration for Forbidden (which tormented me with its complexity and shifting plots), visions reveal a dark time ahead for Eliza. She looses faith with her values. Destroys bridges with her loyal friends. Every kindness and softness is replaced with cold objectivity.

I have to admit considerable trepidation to walk with Eliza during her mental and moral collapse. In my darkest moments, I’ve visited the evil recesses of my mind. Anger is quite empowering. Fans of Darth Vader would roar with pleasure.

It’s going to be certainly an interesting writing experience. The reader needs to be drawn into Eliza’s final desperate struggle to protect a man she adores – her husband. A man who no longer remembers his past, including their escape from a killer. In one day, she has become a stranger to her husband. The pain has driven her to replace her good character with that of a woman obsessed to find and kill one man.

How low and evil can I take her character? What do I retain from her original personality? Do I allow the reader to see her ugly parts merely as a means to an end, or should they believe she has turned, body and soul, to the dark side.

I don’t like spending too much time in the minds of criminals and the insane. It can begin to overshadow rational thought, seeing shadows and feed paranoia. Thankfully, my close friends know when to haul me out of my cave and fill me up with a nourishing Tim Horton’s coffee and apple fritters.

Oh, just in case you haven’t read Forbidden, let me tempt you. It’s on sale now for $.99 USD.