Back in the saddle

Last week I wrote for the first time in six weeks. It was all of two pages--the prologue for my alternate history. But it felt wonderful to be a storyteller again. I'm all for taking breaks between books or to deal with major transitions like moving, but six weeks is at least twice as long as I like to go without writing. I get all restless and depressed.

I haven't done actual writing since I finished the prologue, which takes place 25 years before the main action and introduces the change that makes my history alternate. (The prologue is the butterfly flapping its wings; Chapter One will be the hurricane. Hopefully a Category 5 by the time I've got it polished.) I'm in research mode now, but I'll be writing again within the week.

Last night I idly wondered what would've become of the characters from The Inconvenient Bride and The Sergeant's Lady in the alternate reality--what would they have done, would the couples have even met, etc. I realized that there was every chance Jack and Anna from The Sergeant's Lady would meet, but under VASTLY different circumstances. At first I thought there was no way for them to be a couple in the alternate world, but I kept poking at the idea and eventually got them paired off, and it's all very lovely and poignant and starcrossedly romantic, if I do say so myself. I feel like I'm fanficcing my own work. It's tempting to make them major secondary characters in the alternate reality, since they're closer to my heart than any other characters I've created, somehow...but it's probably a Bad Idea. If nothing else, Jack's superficial resemblance to a well-known character in the same basic genre would be a lot more pronounced in this version, and while I don't claim to be the most original writer on the planet I don't want to get TOO derivative. But I might write their story for my own pleasure.

I do so love to tell stories.