So… upon closer contemplation of my current draft, I discovered a huge, gaping, truck-swallowing hole in my plot.

One that, like the last time, could derail the whole novel.

Can’t tell you what it is–it’s not yet time to give away all my secrets–but I can tell you it’s so obvious that you no doubt would have spotted my problem immediately. “Well, why wouldn’t Lyra just do this?” you’d shake your head, and your entire suspension of disbelief in the book would crumble.

And so would more than two and a half years of work…

But I am optimistic (ok, desperate) so I amped up my creative brainpower to see how I might be able to dig myself out of this crater I created.

I realized that all I needed was a simple counter-argument, one that, when someone asked why Lyra didn’t choose the obvious path, I could have my knowledgable characters reply with full credulity. “Because of this reason…” and both the questioning character and readers would reply, “ah, I see.”

I did it!

I think I found that one simple answer. It’s not foolproof, but the reason I came up with fits the mindset of the characters and propels the plot forward.

So for the moment, disaster averted.

I worry about the last 100 pages or so that I have to revise, but then I remember a comforting quote by the late Leonard Cohen, “there is a crack in everything; that’s how the light gets in.”

Potholes, cracks… it’s all the same thing. My novel won’t be perfect, but I aim for it to shine.

Everyone needs a break. I realized I should give Lyra one, too.

The idea comes from an online post I read that was written by Divergent author Veronica Roth on her website (www.veronicaroth.blogspot.ca) about her writing process for the wildly successful YA novel about a futuristic world where teenagers have to choose their “factions”–societies based on certain characteristics (i.e.: bravery, selflessness, intelligence, etc.). There was a scene, she explained, that her editor suggested she include:

Many of the bigger changes came from a single question: if Dauntless [the main character’s chosen faction, which prides itself on bravery] is so awful and brutal, why on earth would Tris [the protagonist who chose it at the expense of her family] stay in it? Isn’t she brave enough to defect and be factionless, if the Dauntless environment is that bad?

That was where the ziplining scene and the ferris wheel scene came from, as well as all the interactions with Uriah, Lynn, and Marlene. I needed to show that just like every other faction, Dauntless was a mixture of good and bad, and had veered from its original intentions– but its original intentions were still there, in certain members and activities.

In all the darkness that Tris has to cope with, Roth added light. The moments she mentioned–the ziplining and ferris wheel scenes–were brighter, more hopeful. They were a breather from the drama and intensity of Tris’s experiences.

I realized that’s what Lyra needs, too. I have set her up for an incredible amount of suffering, to the point where she wants to quit. She won’t, of course (not much of an ending if that were the case), but how do I give her a reason to go on?

By showing her there’s some good in the world, some fun, some life.

So I’ve added a new scene. Not yet sure it reflects my final vision, but I like the concept: David lays off Lyra about her role as saviour  and shows her an interesting part of Rahma, the new city they’re in. There are parallels to the market scene from Stone Town, but now I keep all religious discussion out of it. I decided, for once, to give Lyra a break.

David escorts Lyra from the beach up a set of wooden stairs to a small boardwalk, thinner, narrower, than in Stone Town, more like a stage above the harbor, framed by the mountains like a natural coliseum. Along the edge of the boardwalk closest to town is a series of stalls and easels, each overflowing with paintings and prints, all in the care of an eclectic mix of people: a skinny woman in a grand, elaborate, African-print turban, sits in front of banners of vivid block mosaics, an old man, wrinkled like a hangdog, paints a pointillism seascape, a young couple, whose close-cropped heads and wide eyes are so much alike, their genders are almost indecipherable, work with shards of brilliant glass.

“They’re all street artists,” Lyra notices. “You said we’re going to a museum.”

“It is the most natural of all museums,” David says, with a gleam in his eye. “Here, you do not have a stuffy expert telling you what is or is not art. Here, you choose for yourself.”

David lets Lyra guide them now and she drifts, like a song on the wind, from one vendor to another, picking up a small painting or running her fingers over sculpted metal. Though it is early, they still encounter other tourists, early risers returning from sunrise cruises and families setting off for a day at sea. David explains they are moving into the summer high season and before long, these wharfs will be unrecognizable for all the people.

It’s not much–Lyra will still have to make her choice about carrying out the mission–but I’m happy for Lyra that she gets at least a few calm, peaceful minutes to herself.

She deserves it.

… Not the post–no, “untitled” is the title of the post, since I am bemoaning the subject–but the novel. After more than two and a half years, I still don’t have a title for my book. I’m nearing the end; I’m starting to think about beta readers and query letters and literary agent submissions.

I kinda need a title.

I’ve always had problems with titles. The pressure to find just the right moniker seems daunting. The title has to not only reflect what the novel is about, but it has to be unique, original and eye/ear-catching. It can’t be too common to get mixed up with other books of a similar name, nor too obtuse that no one–potential readers, especially–will understand it.

I started with Death Wish. That’s when all I knew of Lyra is that she had super cells–in my very first incarnation, she had always known she’s had them, and therefore always pushes herself to the limit–trying to find her limit. But my focus shifted over time; that’s not who Lyra is these days.

I have been banging my head against the proverbial brick wall ever since. My working title is the none-too-original name of the protagonist, Lyra. It worked for Shakespeare with Macbeth and Hamlet, but then, he was Shakespeare. But maybe the name Lyra is not common enough that it could actually work. But does it say anything else about the book besides that it’s named after the protagonist?

I think of the titles of books I teach. To Kill a Mockingbird is an insightful, lyrical, perfect title for a book about the symbols of innocence and the themes that illustrate the dangers of prejudice. The Great Gatsby, like the Shakespeare plays, is also named after a main character, but Gatsby isn’t the protagonist and the narrator’s perspective of Jay Gatsby–that, despite all his flaws, he turns out to be the most genuine, hopeful person in the novel–goes a long way in understand the novel’s themes about the illusion of the American Dream. I think of The Book of Negroes, a title based on a real historical document that caused controversy for its author Lawrence Hill, who had to change it to Someone Knows my Name in the American market to address cultural and racial sensitivities.

The power of a title.

So I think, what is my book about? Who is my character? I have answers (accepting religious differences without fear; an insular girl, the product of her culture, who learns more about the complexities of the world through intense circumstances), but how do I get a snappy, attention-grabbing title out of that? My story deals with religion; Lyra is asked to save the world. The Saviour or other derivatives came to mind, that’s too overtly religious.

Recently, my daughter traced a gorgeous drawing of a phoenix. That got me thinking: a creature who rises from the ashes, reborn anew. That may describe Lyra, who can survive the impossible. She rises up–literally–from the ashes and debris of her bombed out school. Yet nowhere have I referred to Lyra as a phoenix. It’s possible I can go back and add in clues, but even still, what would I do with “phoenix”? That word alone is too common. (And, for us Canadians whose lives are affected by the new, dysfunctional federal government public service payroll service, the name “phoenix” has anything but positive connotations).

So Lyra’s story remains unnamed for now. When my YA masterpiece hits the shelves and is flying off said shelves, however, then you’ll know I’ve cracked that nut.

“Nut”, “Nut”… Hmm…

Nope.

I got nothin’.

” When something can be read without effort, great effort has gone into its writing.” — Enrique Jardel Poncela

You walk into a bookstore; you peruse the shelves, the tables, the displays. You pick up a book and flip through it. Nah, not for you. You set it down and move on, impervious to the blood, sweat and tears the author–well-known or unknown–devoted to the book.

But why should you think about it? If I do my job right, you shouldn’t see the hours, days, weeks, months, years of effort, of toil and tumult and tears. You should only see (and read) a polished, smooth, quality product (mine, of course, the one you do pick up and purchase. 🙂 )

I cling to this notion, as a reminder that all the books I read and all the authors I admire didn’t have their pages magically “poof” into perfect existence.

“A good style should show no signs of effort. What is written should seem like a happy accident.” — W. Somerset Maugham

Here’s to my own contented collision.

It’s what all good stories have. We want to see how a character can develop and change, otherwise the story and its whole purpose is stagnant.

As an English teacher, I’m always pointing out how a character, especially the protagonist, changes. There are clues throughout a novel that indicate what the character is learning.

Turns out it’s a lot easier to point it out than create it yourself.

I know what Lyra’s character growth will be–how she’ll be different in the end than she was in the beginning. What I have to think about–more than I realized–is where those signposts are. Maybe that’s why I’m finding writing the beginning and the end of the novel so much easier than the middle. I know where Lyra starts from and I know where she ends up; it’s how she gets there, that I struggle with.

For example, I have Lyra meet David, her guide in the Second World. He is a dedicated religious believer which, of course immediately alienates Lyra. She’s stuck with him for their journey, though. At some point, (I think it’s obvious to say) Lyra will come to respect and depend on David.

I think, though, that I jumped to that too soon. Here’s what I mean:

Lyra and David have just been through a harrowing experience; each thought the other was going to die.

“You saved me again,” David coughs. His voice is reed thin and raspy, but his tone is light and surprisingly bright.

Lyra smiles—how can he make her smile in a situation like this?

“It’s what I do,” she shrugs in jest, her lips curling up. “How are you?”

“I feel like…what is the expression?” David blinks, thinking. “Death warmed over.”

“You almost were,” Lyra says quietly. “Dead, I mean. I thought you were almost dead.”

“I must have nine lives,” he jokes.

Lyra likes that he jokes, but still she can’t shake the fear that he will die and die because of her.

“And you?” David asks. He coughs again and Lyra grabs the cup of water, lifts it to his mouth and helps him drink. When he rests his head, he continues. “You are on life number 10? 12? 100? There is no end for you.”

Lyra knows he teases but still she imagines herself as an old, tottering spinster still hanging on even as the world she recognizes disintegrates. No longer is there anyone alive who knew her as a young girl; no longer is there anyone alive who knows her now. In her old age, old beyond all expectation, she is alone.

“There is no end,” she agrees softly.

David senses the shift in mood. “Are you ok?” He turns serious, the intensity of his one good, open eye burning into her.

“Of course,” she says brightly. “Not even a scar.”

“Scars do not have to be physical,” David reminds her gently.

How does he do that? How does he know her?

This scene happens not too long after they meet. Of course they’re connected because of their shared experience, but is it reasonable to assume that Lyra would throw away all her suspicions about religious people so quickly? After all, she blames religion for destroying her family and her life.

Here’s my rewrite:

 “You saved me again,” David coughs. His voice is reed thin and raspy, but his tone is light and surprisingly bright.

 Lyra smiles.

 “It’s what I do,” she shrugs in jest. “How are you?”

“I feel like…what is the expression?” David blinks, thinking. “Death warmed over.”

“You almost were dead,” Lyra says.

“I must have nine lives,” he jokes.

Lyra feels a splash of irritation, as if he can’t take seriously what happened to them. She stands up from the bed and walks to the small window that looks onto the scrubby side yard. It’s a dirt patch, nothing more and on the other side of it are the skeletal, greenish-brown olive trees. She thinks of Carole’s lush English garden outside Emily’s bedroom window back home. By contrast, the world outside this window is drained of color; Lyra can’t imagine living here.

“And you?” David asks. He coughs again. Lyra steps over to the night table, grabs the cup of water, and offers it to him. Painfully, David sits up, takes the water and sips it slowly. When he rests his head, he continues. “You are on life number 10? 12? 100? There is no end for you.”

She scowls. A joke for him, maybe, but an unsettling image appears in her mind, one of herself as an old, tottering spinster still hanging on even as the world she recognizes disintegrates. No longer is there anyone alive who knew her as a young girl; no longer is there anyone alive who knows her now. In her old age, old beyond all expectation, she is alone.

“There is no end,” she sighs. The small room suddenly seems stuffy, suffocating.

In this draft, Lyra is more guarded. She doesn’t question how he can make her smile, or how he knows her. She doesn’t help him drink. In fact, later in this scene, I show, instead of tell, the reader that David does know her–but it’s better that Lyra doesn’t yet want to admit it. 

“I’m different now. You didn’t know me before,” she insists. The image of her old self hovers at the edge of her consciousness, faint and ephemeral as if it is already long lost.

“I know you now,” David counters.

“You’ve known me for three days,” Lyra says dryly.

“That is not enough?” David smiles through his pain, his good eye crinkling.

“Hardly,” Lyra replies.

“You are a strong, sad girl, who has had to overcome tremendous pain, which makes you passionate and intense and brave and selfless.”

Lyra flushes at David’s assessment, embarrassed. Fidgeting, she smooths out the faded blanket with her fingertips.

David continues, drawing breath, drawing strength. “You are also like those of us who are religious.”

Lyra feels walloped, clobbered by the insult she didn’t see coming. She opens her mouth to object, but David presses on.

“It is true,” he says defiantly. “We are not so different, you and I. You are a non-believer but you hold your non-belief as closely to your heart as I cling to my beliefs.”

Much better.

Now there’s tension between them again.

Because, after all, I wouldn’t want to make their lives too easy 🙂

For years, I lived inside Mackenna Duff’s head. She’s my main character from my first YA novel. I knew all about her love of cooking and all this Parisian, her strained relationship with her dad, and her close connection with her twin brother Ross.

Turns out my readers never would have learned all that, had I submitted the draft I thought was finished. Thankfully, I had a writer friend read it. “Not enough backstory,” he said. He explained it was as if Mackenna had sprung to life as a 17-year-old high school senior without a past. “Give us a hint of what her life was like before your story begins.”

I learned from my earlier mistakes and tried hard to incorporate details of Lyra’s pre-explosion life into the narrative of her surreal present.

For example, when Lyra and David travel by car to Rahma, the bad guy’s town, I have her reflect on family road trips:

They ease into the last part of their drive. It’s a regular road trip now, one that, despite the difference in country, reminds Lyra of her own family drives. They were long but Lyra rarely felt frustrated; she loved that her family, all four of them, were trapped together in a car, her mom unable to fly off to rehearsal or her dad stay at work late or Ivy to accept a last-minute babysitting job. They’d play word games and brain teasers and, Lyra’s favorite, “Name-that-Tune.” Her mom would whistle or hum a portion of a song; Lyra, Ivy and her dad would try to guess in the least number of notes. Charlotte’s repertoire was vast, a formidable challenge to overcome, and Ivy and John were formidable challengers, but more often than not, Lyra won. Her pinnacle of success was a one-note victory when she correctly guessed it to be an obscure jazz tune.

“No way!” Ivy protested. “Mom, you’re siding with Lyra. You would have said yes to anything she guessed.”

Lyra knew in no uncertain terms how wrong Ivy was. Her mom, a woman used to being the best at everything and used to getting her own way, would never stoop to give Lyra the edge.

It tells something of Lyra’s family dynamic, especially her relationship with her mom, so I thought it fit well.

Until I started revising it.

That’s when I realized I wanted to focus less on Lyra’s family and more on her friends. There’s more to Lyra’s life than an insular family, so this seemed to be a good opportunity to expand on her life.

The weight of [David and Lyra’s] journey lifts considerably as they return to the highway. Lyra sips her water, only now aware of her thirst and grateful she can quench it. David munches happily on his chips and the playful crunch of his junk food lightens the mood in the car. For a moment, Lyra pretends she is on a jaunty road trip with a cheerful friend she’s known for ages. For a moment, she shoves aside the knowledge that she’s in the Second World—and in a dangerous part of it—and she ignores the fact that she is with a man whose every guiding principle is an anathema to her own. For a moment, she imagines she is on the journey she and Jonah and Emily dreamed up earlier this spring.

     “After graduation, we go!” Jonah bounded into Lyra’s bedroom one day last month when she and Emily were cramming for the next day’s biology test. He picked up Lyra’s binder and flung it into the air; the spirals snapped open and pages of scribbled notes fluttered about them like snow.

     “Jonah!” Lyra cried, scavenging her papers. Emily laughed and helped Lyra sort out her notes.

     “Forget biology and chemistry and information vegetable, animal and mineral,” Jonah cried. He flopped on the floor beside them, rolling onto Lyra’s newly-restored notebook.

   “Jonah, I’m serious,” Lyra said, a line she now thinks, with a pang, she said too often.

     “So am I,” Jonah insisted and Lyra didn’t understand how much he meant it. “We hit the road, Jack, and put the pedal to the metal, and live where the rubber meets the road. You and you,” he pointed to each girl with a theatrical wave of his index finger, “and me and your boyfriend, Emily, we blow this popsicle stand.”

     “I don’t have a boyfriend, you twerp,” Emily laughed.

     “All the better,” Jonah sprang up, an unraveling bundle of uncontained energy. “We find you one on the way!”

     “Where, pray tell, will we go?” Lyra asked. She knew such a trip would never happen, knew her relationship with Jonah would not last the summer, but the fantasy of ditching their real lives for the great beyond was, at that time, refreshingly appealing.

I like this peek into Lyra’s old life. It shows her focus (school) and her friends (Emily and Jonah). It also shows how easy it was for her to miss another sign that Jonah was dissatisfied with life as they knew it.

I’m in the middle of revising this scene; I might still end up changing it, but for now, I think I’m moving forward.

So I’d better get back it it, because both Lyra and I still have miles to go. 🙂

I have no new insight to offer you today. Instead, I am diligently working through my draft with the same focus:

• check “voice”–make sure Lyra always sound like Lyra
• check diction–look for the best word, especially to punch up the language
• check sensory detail–describe what a scene smells like, sounds like, feels like, tastes like–not only what it looks like
• check for suspension of disbelief–will my readers buy the plot line I’m trying to sell them?

I know what I gotta do–now I just gotta keep doin’ it.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

I’m on page 165 of 370.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Lather rinse, repeat…

I’ve ventured beyond my comfort zone: someone has actually read (part of ) my novel.

My first reader is a literary critic of the most fundamental kind: a 12-year-old girl who devours books faster than I can read the blurbs on the back. She is also a confident consumer: she knows what she likes and if she doesn’t like a book, she knows there are plenty of others out there she can choose from instead.

She also happens to be my daughter.

Which means her opinion is entirely honest. (She is not afraid to tell me what she thinks. She is almost a teenager, after all.)

While my target audience is young adult (often considered teens), many younger readers “read up”.  I honestly don’t care who likes it–younger readers, teens, adults–as long as they like it. 🙂

We have a tradition in our house–no, not so much tradition as habit. Both my husband and I continue to read with our two kids at bedtime. We take turns each night with each kid (four books on the go, one for each combination of child/parent). When my oldest daughter and I gave up on the last book we were reading together, I boldly suggested I start reading my own novel. I warned her it’s still in draft form, but she readily agreed. After all, she’s been hearing about my (snail’s-pace) progress for years.

I held my breath.

A page in…

A chapter in…

A cliffhanger.

“I like it, Mama.”

Yay!

Now, I know that one child, especially a family member (and one who relies on the author for food, clothing, shelter and access to electronics), is far from a consensus that I’ve written a bestseller, but I’ll take the praise wherever I can get it. 🙂

We’re only a quarter of the way in, but I still have my first reader’s attention. I haven’t yet had to explain beyond what’s on the page. I might have to eventually–we’ve read lots of other YA books together where I help her understand the context–but so far, I’ve done ok.

That’s not to say there won’t be changes.

But how heartening that, after 2+ years, someone else has now met Lyra.

My daughter flips ahead in my 370-page print-out. She catches a glimpse of another name. “Who’s David?” she asks. “You’ll have to wait and see,” I say, playing it cool.

But inside, I’m shouting triumphantly. Yay, yay, yay! She wants to read on!

Here’s hoping you will, too, when it finally gets published.

We’ve come full circle, you, dear reader, and I.

I’m at the point in my new draft where I’m revising sections that I’ve already posted here. Sections that I told you were better. Sections that I led you to believe were good.

My mistake.

“The Market”, posted Aug. 19 walked you through my process of trying to describe a street market in Stone Town, in the Second World, an experience wholly foreign to Lyra.

Here’s what I wrote:

I started over:

The market does not disappoint. It is a carnival, a street party, a kaleidoscope of sights and sounds and smells—cinnamon and saffron from the spice sellers and sweet mangos and papayas from the fruit sellers and fresh bread and croissants from the bakers. She and David are shoulder-to-shoulder, stepping sideways through the boisterous crowd, an uneven assortment of vendors, sellers and tourists, who, Lyra notices, are very much like her. She watches a wrinkled old woman, her eyes sunken by her loose skin, prod a tall, white First World backpacker to examine a handcrafted blue beaded bracelet; Lyra sees a sun-beaten middle-aged man, his food stall almost empty, retrieve crates of black olives from his dusty farm truck and replenish his supplies; she smiles at a gangly brown pre-teen who, over the yap of a mangy mutt beside him, bargains loudly with a reticent shoe seller for a pair of brilliantly yellow-neon soccer cleats. The boy must have prevailed; he skips away with his prize, his dog trotting happily at his heels.

I like that I’ve focused on individuals (the wrinkled woman, the sun-beaten man) and I like my specific detail (neon soccer cleats). More importantly, I feel it’s now in Lyra’s voice.

Meh.

That’s the generous version of my reaction to this passage–yet I was all for this description only a few months ago. Now, I see it doesn’t fit Lyra’s reaction to this strange new land. (She’d be more jaded, more guarded of the new experience).

So here’s what I have now:

She’s never been to the Second World before; never wanted to. Why would anyone want to, when they have so many diverse and expansive cultures to experience in their own First World? Her mom has been here with the Orchestra, but always Lyra would leave the room when Charlotte regaled the family with travel stories. Lyra hated that her mother rubbed in her face how much fun she was having away from home. As a result, Stone Town seems to her as foreign as the moon.

David steers her into the market, a cacophony of sounds, a kaleidoscope of colors, a frantic swell of people. Lyra feels as if she’s sauntered unwittingly into a circus, a carnival, a street party. She smells cinnamon and saffron from the spice sellers and sweet mangos and papayas from the fruit sellers and fresh bread and croissants from the bakers. Vendors, hawkers, street artists of all shapes and sizes and colors, costumed in all manner of dress, from long robes and skirts to jeans and shorts, shout and cry and cajole potential customers, who themselves look and dress like a jumble of mismatched dolls. She has stumbled into a storybook, walking among the vivid creations of a wide-eyed author and illustrator, whose bright, cheery ideas of a cosmopolitan world have suddenly sprung to life. In one corner is a dog—of course there is a dog—yapping at the heels of a boy, maybe 10, who throws money at a mousy merchant and races away from a shoe stall, a pair of neon green soccer cleats slung victoriously around his neck. On the other side is an old crone—of course there is an old crone—a thin, stooped woman, her eyes sunken like craters into her wrinkled skin. In the center of it all is an outsider—of course there is an outsider—a tall, lanky, white First-World backpacker, grinning childishly at the boisterous chaos surrounding him.

Lyra recoils from the frenzy, overwhelmed by its unruly energy. She longs for the calm, the order of her world and only with a great strength of will does she remind herself that she has to put up with this chaos to protect the rightful order of the First World.

This description is more consistent with Lyra’s reluctance to come to the Second World; it better fits the overall tone of the novel.

So I like it better.

But then, didn’t I say that about the previous draft?

Which makes me wonder what I’ll think of this version in three months…

Which makes me wonder what I’ll think of that version three months after that…

Which makes me wonder if this book will ever be completed…

But then, I remind myself of a famous paraphrase (attributed to many different writers over the years), a book is never finished; it’s only abandoned. 🙂

At some point, I will let this story fall from my hands, then let the chips fall where they may.

But maybe not just yet…

Maybe just one more draft…

(And maybe just one more draft after that…)

I give up.

Not the book (too much blood, sweat and tears so far).

I give up reading the hard copy. I got a little over half way through and I had to stop, because my penciled comments were overtaking the printed page.

I like the first part, the section where Lyra is in the First World, where she learns about the death of her family, where she learns about her super cells, where she learns about her value on the mission to rid the world of Simon Moto, the evil villain.

Then… then… Not so much.

The fundamental flaw is how quickly I have Lyra accept the Second World. Here is a girl who grew up in a culture without religion; all she’s been taught about religion is that it causes death and destruction. That her own boyfriend succumbs to the perils of religion in a violent and tragic way confirms everything she’s believes. It’s why she accompanies Annie to the Second World–to eradicate the threat religion poses to her world, to her world order.

But what do I have Lyra do? Oh, this is a cool market. Go to church with you? I won’t like it, but sure, why not? These are bad people who detain us, but of course I easily see how religion is only a pawn in this power game.

Ok, I oversimplify. I exaggerate. I don’t have Lyra accept the Second World, its religion and the attendant risks quite so easily. Still, I don’t have her resist as much as she should.

I’ve lost her voice.

“Voice” is that ephemeral, intangible something about literature that is essential to an audience’s emotional appeal. A character’s voice is more than her words and actions. It’s her world view, outlook, and philosophy encapsulated in the words the author chooses. It’s impossible to dissect–you know it or you don’t (to paraphrase U.S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart when he was describing his threshold for obscenity in a 1964 pornography case, “I know it when I see it”.) A reader knows it, feels it. It’s what makes the character believable and real–no  matter the incredulous plot (like super cells). A character’s voice is what makes you fall in love with Anne Shirley or Scout Finch, what makes you distinguish Bilbo Baggins from Holden Caulfield.

So if I can’t define it, how do I know I’ve messed up with Lyra?

Because when I read it, I roll my eyes.

That’s the technical test. 🙂

If I roll my eyes as the creator, you can only assume what you’d do as my reader.

It’s not “back-to-the-drawing-board” (I’ve done that umpteen times as it is); but it does mean rewriting.

Rewriting more than I was hoping to rewrite.

It’s not a surprise from a logical perspective–good writing is rewriting–but it’s still frustrating, ’cause I just want to be done!

Still, I’d rather get Lyra’s voice right than submit a substandard piece of work to a literary agent or publisher. There is just too much competition out there. Agents and publishers, no doubt, are looking for easy reasons to eliminate a prospective manuscript; I don’t intend to hand them one.

So… I leave my thick binder aside (sorry, trees…) and go back to my electronic manuscript.

This time I’ll do a better job of listening to Lyra’s voice.

It’s her story, after all.