I want to thank Angie for letting me take over her blog
today. In keeping with Angie’s theme of “The Things I’ve Learned” I wanted to
talk about some story decisions I made while writing Hereafter—specifically things I let go (things that were cut from
earlier drafts) and things I held onto (things that people wanted me to change
but I ended up keeping) and the reason why I made the decisions that I did. For
writers, I think this is one of the biggest struggles—to know when to let go of
something that we really love about our story but which just isn’t working, and
when to hold onto our vision, even when others (including agents and editors)
are pushing us to change it. Warning—there are some light spoilers in this
post, so if you hate that kind of thing, best to come back after you’ve read Hereafter. J
Things I Let Go:
1.
At first, Jonah was a walk on, bit player. Irene
meets him at the beginning of the story, he informs her that she’s dead, and
gives her enough information to get to the city. Then he was out of the story
completely. Jonah, however, had much different ideas about his role, and pretty
quickly, try as I might to prevent him, he wormed his way into a co-starring
role. The interplay between the characters was just too good to let go
of—whenever Jonah and Irene were in a scene together, the scene basically wrote
itself. At the same time, it was the dynamic tension between them that pushed
the plot forward. People notice right off how much Irene bullies Jonah, but he
bullies her right back quite a fair bit. If it wasn’t for Jonah, Irene would
still be sitting in her living room drinking screwdrivers. Out the window went
any idea of leaving Jonah behind. Of course, this decision was created all
sorts of problems—see #1 below—but it was clear from the beginning that this
was the right way to go.
2.
Originally, the story concept was that Madame
Majicka was a kind of gatekeeper of the tunnel to the other side, and she gives
Irene a list of six items that the dead need to have in order to cross to the
other side. The original concept was much more of a treasure hunt/epic fantasy
odyssey. Pretty quickly, I realized this wasn’t going to work. Irene wasn’t
having it, first of all; she pretty much plopped herself in the bar and sat
there, refusing to participate. It was too much work and she didn’t have to go
through the tunnel, so what was the point? I realized Irene needed a reason to
seek out the tunnel and want to cross over; her first choice would always be to
stay on earth—it’s familiar, it’s what she knows, and it’s safe. I began to see
that the “real” story was Irene’s personal, inward journey—her growth as a
person. The original idea of an outward odyssey was relegated to being the
framework for the inward journey.
3.
I had planned to have Irene confront LaRayne and
Alexia at some point—though the point kept moving around from the beginning of
the story to the end. However, there were all kinds of problems with
this—LaRayne and Alexia couldn’t see or hear Irene, so the confrontation was
really one-sided and didn’t have any resolution. Irene would get to call them
out as bad friends, but since they couldn’t hear her, what would the impact of
that be? Perhaps cathartic for Irene, but it would mean she would also have to
face up to the fact that she was in large part to blame for her death as
well—the blame doesn’t entirely rest with LaRayne and Alexia—and that would
require a lot more self-awareness on Irene’s part than she really had at any
place in the story. By the end of the story, where she has developed enough
self-awareness, she has both moved on mentally from her life to the point where
she doesn’t really care about them anymore and also at the same time is still
refusing to face up to some harsh truths. She’s not in denial, per se; rather
she’s avoiding doing the hard thing (okay, let’s just say it: she’s being a big
baby), and so a confrontation with LaRayne and Alexia didn’t seem to gel here
either. In the end, the quieter self-confrontation at the funeral over the
depth of friendships and her choice of friends was much more in line with
Irene’s character, where she was mentally, and also seemed more realistic. How
many of us have kicked ourselves for not dealing with something at the right
moment? For not speaking our mind, for not facing a situation head on, for not
putting on our “big girl pants”? I think we all have, at one time or another,
and so, my final approach was a reflection of this.
Things I Held Onto:
1.
The number one thing I was pushed to change was
Jonah’s age. Everyone almost universally hated his age at first; most wanted
him to be either much younger, so there was no “squishiness” about his
relationship with Irene (some readers found it highly inappropriate for a
thirty-six-year-old woman to be hanging out with a fourteen-year-old boy), or
much older so there could be a romantic relationship. One agent urged me to
make Jonah a “nineteen-year-old college hottie that Irene cougars.” Several
agents (including the “cougar lady”) felt the mixed ages of the main characters
made it unclear what market this book was intended for—as one agent put it,
“kids don’t like to read about adults and adults don’t like to read about
kids.” I dug in and absolutely refused to move Jonah’s age. I didn’t want to
write a romance and absolutely did not want to write a story where the hero
swoops in and saves the woman, or even a story where the woman changes in order
to make the man happy (sort of passive saving from the man, if you will). I
wanted a story where the woman saves herself. In this case, she needed a little
push—which she gets from Jonah. She changes not to please him and not because
she’s in love with him, but because she doesn’t want to let him down. She wants
to protect him and take care of him, not the other way around; one could say he
makes her want to be an adult. However, if he was too young, the story wouldn’t
work because Irene isn’t maternal in the least. She would have no use for and
no urge to protect or care for a very young child. Once I realized that story I
was telling was about a woman’s personal growth, I knew Jonah had to stay
fourteen, no matter what—he had to be old enough to help her grow but young
enough that he’d need some taking care of.
2.
The second thing everyone pretty much
universally pushed for was for Jonah to have a deep, dark, tragic secret. I’ll
talk more about this in my guest post on bullying at From the Bootheel Cotton
Patch (http://fromthebootheelcottonpatch.blogspot.com/)
on September 10th; however, I will say here that this was a “never
gonna happen.” I felt VERY strongly about this—too many of us, especially our
teens, live lives of “quiet desperation,” and I felt that was compelling in and
of itself. Jonah didn’t need “and the kitchen sink” to re-enforce his feelings
of isolation, loneliness, and depression. What I loved about my publisher,
Eternal Press, was that they never once asked for any changes to Jonah’s age or
motivations—everyone at EP “got” the story that I was trying to tell. That was
such a relief!
3.
The one thing that never changed was the core
world-building concept, which was to create a version of the afterlife in which
every culture’s and religion’s beliefs are true in a very literal sense. This,
of course, meant I had to do a lot of research. There were times I wondered why
I was doing all this research or would think “you’ve got plenty, just go with
this.” However, I would end up going back and doing just “a little bit more,”
which usually ended with me finding some totally awesome little factoid that I
just had to incorporate into the story. So far, readers have identified the
world-building in Hereafter as one of
their favorite parts of the book, which thrills me to no end and definitely
makes me feel that all the research was worth it.
So there you have it—a little bit of insight into the
behind-the-scenes negotiations, both internal and external, that I went through
with Hereafter.
HEREAFTER
By
Terri Bruce
Why let a little thing like dying get in the way of a good time?
Thirty-six-year-old Irene Dunphy didn't plan on dying any time soon, but that’s exactly what happens when she makes the mistake of getting behind the wheel after a night bar-hopping with friends. She finds herself stranded on earth as a ghost, where the food has no taste, the alcohol doesn’t get you drunk, and the sex...well, let’s just say "don’t bother." To make matters worse, the only person who can see her—courtesy of a book he found in his school library—is a fourteen-year-old boy genius obsessed with the afterlife.
This sounds suspiciously like hell to Irene, so she prepares to strike out for the Great Beyond. The only problem is that, while this side has exorcism, ghost repellents, and soul devouring demons, the other side has three-headed hell hounds, final judgment, and eternal torment. If only there was a third option…
EXCERPT
She wasn’t sure what to do next. The house seemed quiet and still—in fact, almost dead. She listened hard. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but somehow the house, her house, seemed foreign and strange. The house seemed to be holding its breath, almost as if it was waiting for something. She felt the thick, gathered pause pushing around her. Irene shivered. She crossed her upper arms, trying to smooth away the sudden goose bumps. How could she get goose bumps if she was dead? The phone rang, causing her to jump. Her drink crashed to the floor. She stared at the phone stupidly for a moment, and then, recognizing LaRayne’s phone number on the caller I.D., she grabbed the receiver.
"LaRayne?"
"Irene?"
"Yes! It’s me!" Relief flooded through her. LaRayne could hear her!
There was a pause and then LaRayne said, "Hello?"
"LaRayne? Can you hear me?"
"Hello? Irene?"
Relief fizzled away. Disappointment washed over her, so strong her knees buckled and she grabbed the counter for support.
The line went dead. LaRayne had hung up.
Slowly, Irene replaced the receiver, numb with shock.
The phone rang again. Irene let the answering machine pick up this time.
"Hey, Irene. It’s LaRayne…I’ve left you some messages...well…you know…call or whatever."
Irene cleaned up the spilled drink, sweeping the broken glass into a dustpan and dumping it in to the trash, and then mixed herself another one. She wandered back to the hall and then back to the kitchen and finally to the living room where she dropped heavily onto the couch. She sipped her drink, not really tasting it. Then she spied her laptop across the room on a chair. She fetched it, firing it up.
Email. Yes, that’s it—email. I’ll email everyone and tell them what happened, she thought through a fog of mounting hysteria.
Even as she thought it, dully watching the computer scroll through start-up screens, the "drunk emailing" incident of a few years ago—which had led to then-boyfriend Chase becoming ex-boyfriend Chase—came to mind. The part of her that was still thinking rationally pointed out that maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to email anyone until she knew for certain what exactly was going on.
You still don’t know what you want anyone to do, she thought. Call a doctor? Perform an exorcism? What, exactly, was the remedy here?
Book Details
Publication Date: August 1, 2012
Publisher: Eternal Press
Number of Pages: 296
Genre: Contemporary Fantasy
About the Author
Terri Bruce has been making up adventure stories for as long as she can remember and won her first writing award when she was twelve. Like Anne Shirley, she prefers to make people cry rather than laugh, but is happy if she can do either. She produces fantasy and adventure stories from a haunted house in New England where she lives with her husband and three cats.
Contact Details
Email: tbruce@terribruce.net
Website/Blog:
Goodreads:
Facebook:
@_TerriBruce
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