A novel concept that needs to be a novel
This the second installment of a series reflecting on a sabbatical that ended one year ago. It will run each Wednesday through the summer.
One of many charts and diagrams I’ve created over the years trying to get an handle on this novel.
The whole point of my sabbatical, on paper anyway, was completing a novel that has been eluding me for close to eight years now. The problem: the sabbatical application that goal was written down on committed me to actually finishing the thing.
About that…
I first had the idea for the story when I was teaching in San Diego. It’s sprawling and complicated.
Twelve independent voices collectively telling the story without the main character every getting her own chance to do so.
A major incident around which the entire story is built, but that never gets expressed directly on the page.
A secondary story that may or may not draw all the threads—material and metaphysical—together as a coherent singular.
The small question of why bad things happen and whether or not that is even a possible outcome in asking questions about those bad things in the first place.
And doing justice to my hometown that is so often invisible on the literary landscape.
No pressure. But I had six months and a mandate…yeah…no pressure at all.
And in the end, is it done? Of course not. It’s drafted, mostly, and the rest of the stories that aren’t quite there are in process. I think it might actually happen if the sprint that is teaching my classes doesn’t completely derail my progress…which it might. *Narrator’s Voice* It did indeed derail that progress.
I needed the sabbatical because of that barrier in the first place. The problem, though, was that other barriers, good and bad, sprang up in my time away and I’m not where I wanted to be on the story. It’s not ready for others to read what I’ve come up with so I can refine it and get serious about looking for a publisher.
But I’m close. Closer than I’ve ever been with this story. I have hope. Maybe that was the best possible outcome of the sabbatical because before I took it, I was starting to lose any sense of every getting this book done.
Or the three other ideas I have behind it.