Putting the Pieces Together

Over this past week I’ve been working on a partial for an anthology I’m doing with some of my fave writers. *waves to said fave writers* It’s an m/m, erotic paranormal and I’m really excited about it, not only because of the other writers involved in the project, but because I have fallen hard for the idea.

Until the beginning of last week I had no clue what I was going to write for this story. Well, I had written down a few ideas but I wasn’t thrilled with them. They just didn’t have that spark that gets me really excited. But because I needed this partial done I decided to go with it.

Then last Monday as I sat down to work, my main character (a completely new main character) popped into my head and said, “Ma’am? I’m Cyrus Mallone, the pov character for your new story.”

And I went, Yes!!! You are!!!

And from there the idea took off. In what for me is record time, I wrote the first scene and I’ve drafted a scene every day since that beautiful, wonderful day when Cy made himself known to me. As of this posting I have four scenes drafted and ideas for seven or eight more which should be enough to carry me through at least the first complete draft.

The next step is making scene cards, one per scene, which are index cards with one or two sentences about that scene. I carry these cards around with me in my handbag and take them out when I have a few minutes. I shuffle, reorganize and discard cards until the shape of the story becomes clear in my head. It’s like doing a jigsaw puzzle without the picture on the lid of the box to show what the end result will look like. That I have to figure out on my own.

It’s nerve racking but fun too in that edge-of-your-seat, wonder-what-will-happen-next way that I love.

So that’s what I’m doing today, putting the pieces together. And the picture is finally coming clear.

Written by Kimberly Gardner

As early as the seventh grade, Kimberly remembers slashing her favorite rockstars and reading romance. So it’s not surprising that her two passions, romance and putting pretty boys with other pretty boys, should come together in her writing. Moliere said, “Writing is like prostitution. First you do it for love, then for a few close friends, then for money.” Kimberly is delighted to finally be doing it for money.
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