Writing At the Edge of Dreams

More on the challenges of writing serials and what writers need most

If you’ve read How (Not) To Write A Serial Story you may have noticed that I was struggling with At the Edge of Dreams. The serial is now complete and this is a short commentary on some of the hurdles I encountered.

Writing At the Edge of Dreams should have been easy, after all the complete story was there: I’d published it as a book under a different title. The problem was that the original publisher had suggested several rewrites to fit his house style. This meant the story had a lot more romance in it than is usual for my stories and lost some of its darker themes. Simple, I thought, rewrite closer to the original and publish as a serial.

I need three things to function as a writer; tea (I’m English), red wine (I’m part French) and feedback. The first is consumed during the writing process, the second after a writing session and the third comes later.

In the physical world, I often say, “When you give feedback I don’t want to hear ‘nice’ or ‘I didn’t like it,’ without hearing why.” Comments that start ‘I loved this because…’ or (even better) ‘Great story but I am not quite following/seeing/understanding what is happening when…’ are nectar to a writer.

I am fortunate to have several talented people who comment on my work, including

John A. Brown

and

Posy Churchgate

. They have dutifully followed each episode of the story and offered praise and encouragement when appropriate but are equally willing to offer constructive criticism which inspired some of the edits.

I also have several off line readers who do not pull their punches. The negative comments on the original book centred around; confusing, jumbled and Kate’s motivations ????

I faced two major challenges when writing, At the Edge of Dreams. Firstly, it is about two of the most complex characters I have ever created. Lucien appears devious and manipulative. He is solitary by nature and lacks empathy; if he lived in this dimension he would probably be classed as a geek. He has an honour code, but it’s the code of his world, not ours. He was difficult to write as so much of him is concealed, hidden in the mists.

Kate was difficult for a different reason; she is not the most likeable person. She’s a slut (not a negative trait in one of my stories) but beyond that, she is ruthless, self-centred and doesn’t give a fuck about anyone else. If she was male she’d probably be termed a ‘ladies man’ and made CEO.

I wanted Kate and Lucien to both have good and bad traits: the sort of people that you admire one part of but then you realise that their mindset has dark corners.

Danika was easier; she’s an archetypal bad girl and fun to write. This did lead me to gloss over some of her motivations which Posy pointed out when she asked why she does what she does at the end of the story.

The second challenge was that I like to sketch out characters and settings, add relevant details and work with the reader to let their imagination create the rest of the picture. Working with complex characters, in a multi-dimensional setting, with twisting timelines, this is difficult to get right.

Readers come to different conclusions about the characters and themes of my stories. This is one of my motivations for writing in the style that I do. It is great when readers see my creations slightly differently from the way I had imagined, but they can also point out any parts where I haven’t added enough detail to the sketch.

In case you are wondering. If I had to choose between Lucien and Kate I think I would side with Lucien. I might decide to push them together again for one last standalone story.