Unexpected Float

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

It takes time to write a book; it just does. I learn that newly each time out—have learned it again over these past few years as the novel I've been writing takes its shape. Three voices. One day. A tapestry of flashbacks and collisions. The deeper in I get with this book, the more I disassemble and reassemble, the better I come to understand that scenes don't make a book. Seams do. The unexpected float from one thing to another. The power of a recurring detail, an operative refrain. The care one must take to avoid needless repetitions, blatant explanations, false exultancies.

(and sometimes you make up a word because it fits)

Something is coming together at last, something that feels as if someone else, not me, has been at work, by which I mean, that this book that I am working on has the power to surprise me.

A good, essential thing.

4 comments:

PJ Hoover said...

So glad your writing is going so well. There's no feeling like it.

lib said...

....scenes don't.....seams do
Thank you Beth. I'm working on a play and have been a bit stuck going from scene to scene desperately seeking a way to hold it together....seams do.

Beth Kephart said...

Try to transcend it, Libby. Try somehow to float above....

Toby said...

Beth - i love the way you weave words to create images and concepts that are bigger than a+b+c+d ... Looking forward to your next work.

  © Blogger templates Newspaper II by Ourblogtemplates.com 2008

Back to TOP