Writer's Blog: Drama, oh Drama! Wherefore Art Thou So Difficult? (Patreon)

Mind Blind Wordcount: 389k (with 375k ready to be uploaded tomorrow)

Next Patreon Update: Tomorrow evening! Will include Chapter 12's missing scenes and the first part of Chapter 13.

The more I write, the more I learn about what works and what doesn’t. There’s nothing too revolutionary in this week’s blog, but I wanted to share some of my musings on why certain scenes work and others don’t fully resonate with me (yet).

Personally, I think it comes down to . . .

. . .

. . .

dramatic impact.

(Kinda.)

When writing, I often find drama-level a hard thing to balance. Especially for Mind Blind, where there’s a major revelation almost every other chapter. If I amp up the dramatic tension on each of these twists, they’d quickly lose impact (kind of like how your arm will eventually become numb is someone keeps punching you in the same place). If I make the scene too mundane, there’s an equal risk of readers not relating to the main character (Their brother just exploded! Why aren’t they freaking out?).

But the drama needs to increase. I mean, I saw that bell curve graph on rising action in high school English class.

 I’ve tried to avoid the pitfall of protagonist blandness in Mind Blind (even if it requires readers to relinquish some control over the MC). Yet due to the structure of ongoing reveals and plot twists, I often worry about not being able to dial up the action without coming across as melodramatic instead of just regular old drug-store brand dramatic.

It’s a balancing act in which I don’t always succeed! Nick’s temporary radio blip-out in Chapter 12, for example, is a scene that I want to refine so readers have more ways to respond (and each way is more emotionally nuanced). Likewise, I want to tweak Gray’s date so as to better communicate their growing closeness and the sense that they’re almost but not quite at a threshold in their relationship. In those two scenes, I don’t personally think I amped up the drama enough.

(And wow I am using a lot of italics this post. Oh well, might as well lean into it. For drama.)

Compare Gray’s ride with a scene where I worry about having gone too dramatic: Andy/Liz’s car abduction. There can be screaming and potential nose-biting . . . or it can be quite subdued (so maybe the problem is actually that there’s not enough consistent drama?).

My point is this: balanced drama distribution is hard.

. . . And now I sound like I’m giving a lecture on economics.

Don’t get me wrong, there are some scenes that I’m quite pleased with! I think both the hospital introduction in Chapter 4 and Glitch’s revelation in Chapter 12 are good examples of having just the right amount of emotionality. Having reexamined these scenes yesterday to figure out why I liked them the best, I concluded that it’s because of there’s the right balance struck between the sensational and the commonplace. I like that juxtaposition, and I feel that it’s what makes these two scenes work for me in a way that many others in Mind Blind don’t quite yet. 

(But those scenes will work after being given a good edit! Please keep in mind that this is an alpha draft, after all, and right now I’m most focused on simply reaching the end.)

As for why certain scenes work . . . The hospital scene focuses on boring details: the smell of a sterilized environment, the uncomfortableness of the chair, and the fact that Nick is an organ donor. This contrasts to what Button is feeling at the time, granting the scene depth that I think Gray’s motorcycle ride (for example) lacks. Likewise, Glitch discloses their secret before ordering paninis. Paninis don’t seem like they’d have a place in the kind of conversation that they and Button have, but I actually think that the convo so casually moves on from traumatic family history to sandwiches is a big reason why it works for me: it feels real.

Anyway, I’d love to hear your feedback about which scenes you guys think hit home the hardest and which ones fell emotionally flat! It’ll give me insight on which portions to pay special attention to during the second draft . . .

. . . Which should be happening within just a few months!

My original mental outline for Mind Blind had only 16 Chapters, which I can confidentially say will be up by the end of this year (Chapters 13-14 for September, 14-15 for October, 15-16 for November, and finishing up Chapter 16 in December). Whether or not the story goes on longer than that remains to be seen, as things often take me longer to write than I anticipate.

I’ve always intended to keep Mind Blind around 500,000 words, which means that we’re almost 4/5ths of the way done. Patreon has allowed me some breathing room, however (thank you all!!!), so I’m more willing for Mind Blind to end up a longer work if the story requires (although not all that much longer, because Delivery for the Damned is calling my name).