Warm and fuzzies!

I argue with myself from time to time over the nuances of the process. Particularly because I spend such a large block of time on character development. The actual writing seems to fly by. It's the preparing to write that brings me to linger. I'm not one to use outlines, but I have to have most of the characters completely fleshed out and the dark corners of the plot illuminated before I start to write.

That's not to say that characters don't surprise me, or that I don't occasionally fall for the old vortex-hidden-by-rug move while everyone laughs... I enjoy the little surprises that writing brings when three-dimensional characters are involved. They will refuse to do what you want, sticking to their own agendas and changing your opinions of them... or refuse to die when that was the really fun part of the whole damn plot! (It's okay, Boppo the clown is in holding until he's ready to die properly. I'm playing a lot of The Wiggles for him, I heard that might sway him to my side.)

But no matter how long it takes, I really love my personal little process. I get little warm and fuzzies in the pit of my stomach, or occasionally my bowel depending on the time of day, when my characters begin to take on their own voices. It feels good to suss out the little details of their lives preceding the story, to be able to ask them questions and have them answer in ways that hadn't made it fully out of my subconscious until moment.

Exploring plot makes me feel the same way. There are trap doors at every corner for the first little while, and I don't mind that... the first step's a doozy and there's always a monster at the end of the drop, but we're generally on good terms. Sometimes there are secret doorways, rickety bridges across black spots in the plot. On the other side, things that might have seemed unrelated before fall into one another perfectly, explaining away the holes and traps. The monsters don't eat as well, but hungry monsters make more stories!

It's hard for me to decide that it's enough and start hacking away at that blank page.