I am god of my own universe

I recently met up with old schoolfriend and fellow author, Mark R Brandon. Ever since we made contact again after 40-odd years, we've been supporting each other in our writing and often end up chatting about plotting/editing/publication. 

Mark has inspired me to market myself more effectively (exciting things happening soon!) and has also been patient enough to listen to my current problems writing Tilda #4.

On this occasion, over tea and lemon drizzle cake, while trying to explain why I was so frustrated with the current WIP, Mark said several things that really stuck with me and helped me to see a way ahead.

Lemon Drizzle Cake and lots of writing chat over a cuppa

If you've been reading the Scribbles for a while, you'll know I have written in the past about various workshops I've attended on plotting, and how difficult I find following structures - even though they make perfect sense to me. Mark is my complete opposite - he thrives on having the structure to follow. 

One of my main issues with Tilda #4 is that it is the penultimate in her series; I know where she's come from in the three books up to this point, and I know where she's going to finish in the fifth. Although I have lots of ideas I want to include in #4, I have this voice at the back of my head, telling me I've got to make this particular book work hard to become the successful link I need it to be, and something about what I've created to date just isn't achieving that. 

As a result, I've become frustrated and - dare I say it? - bored with writing this particular story. 

And Mark 's initial response - pretty blunt - was that if I was bored writing this story, it was going to bore the readers, too. 

True. 

We delved into why I might be bored a bit more, and in doing so, he suggested I apply a five-act structure approach across the five books; that helped to explain why I was in a slump with #4, as without giving too much of the plot away, my antagonist isn't present enough to give the required build up of conflict this story needs. The fact that I have stuck to Tilda's POV in these stories was also limiting me... 

As Mark reminded me, 'you are the god of the universe you have created'. I could do anything I wanted in it, including using multiple POVs when it's not something I've done - yet - in this series. (If you've read StarMark, you'll know it's something I have done before though. There were at least three POVs in that...)

He threw a few ideas my way, (when you read Tilda #4 eventually, the credit for the crab scene is entirely his!) and I threw a few back at him, and when he'd gone, I sat and wrote solidly for three-quarters of an hour, because suddenly, I could see how I could change Tilda #4 to give it the conflict it needed AND lead into the finale in Tilda #5.

All I need to do now is print out 'I am the god of my own universe' and leave it somewhere prominent to remind me of the thing I tell people during my author talks whenever I sit down to write more Tilda; it's your story, you tell it how you want to, and you make whatever you want to happen, happen.

I need to listen to my own advice!