“Love you,” he said, kissing my forehead as he stood to leave. The Jay and Kae version of “those three little words” had always been shortened to a mere two words. It was as if we were afraid adding on the personal pronoun upfront might force us to own the emotion in a way which neither of us was capable. “Love you,” I said.
I put together a (kind of long) query thingy for this new project that I can't get out of my head. It isn't a query for agents or anything. Just for me. The story itself is not yet fully formulated in my mind, but the characters are so, so complex and intriguing to me. I want to write them SO BADLY.
One of the problems is that I'm not sure if this story will have teen appeal. Or if it sounds interesting to anyone. Or if it has a strong enough hook. Or, or, or!
Okay. Here it is:
Kae Roberts is only seventeen, but she feels about one hundred. Her life changed—and not exactly for the better—after she hooked up with Jay Avery, a college student she met at a concert last October. In a few short months, Kae went from being a predictable good girl to a pregnant, married, high-school drop out.
Now, the summer before what would have been Kae’s senior year, the baby arrived stillborn. Kae is depressed to the extreme and uncertain about what to do next. Going back to her old life is out of the question—she’s estranged from her parents, and has vowed to stay with Jay until death do they part—but she’s beginning to realize that she has little in common with her husband. In fact, she barely knows the guy.
Then, things get even more confusing when Jay’s younger brother, Travis—whom Kae had never met—shows up for an unexpected visit. Kae learns that Jay didn’t tell anyone in his family about the baby, their marriage, or even of Kae’s existence. When she probes as to why, Jay gets defensive and refuses to explain. So, while easy-going Travis comes up with wacky schemes to help Kae get out of her funk and to make her act and feel like a regular teenager again, Kae decides to find out what else Jay is hiding—even though she suspects her discoveries will call everything about their relationship into question.
P.S. In case you wonder, I have researched the whole teen-marriage thing. I have it all worked out how my character can be legally married while under the age of 18.
In aught-five, my first MEOW SISTERS draft was written in alternating-first-person viewpoint. I had way too much going on with the characters. There was enough for Kat and Neko each to carry a full (crappy) novel on her own. I never finished a full first draft, but it would have been a enormous if I'd managed to get that far. Back then, my execution and plotting were so poor that it got to the point where I got overwhelmed and gave up, promising myself that I would choose one viewpoint or the other if I ever came back to it.
Three years later, here I am. During the past several months, I've made a ton of changes to my story idea in order to use a more commercial hook I came up with. Hooray! The problem now is that I've had no desire to write the characters. To distract myself from this tragedy, I've been focusing on JK&L whose characters might be some of the most complex and interesting I've ever created. (Naturally, I have a weak hook and only a vague story idea for Jay and Kae.)
It seems like a shame to have two projects going with each of them missing huge and important components. So, yesterday, I spent time thinking about MEOW, which I believe is the one I should be pursuing right now. (I just have no business putting another year plus into a project that might never sell because it doesn't have a hook. You know?) But it always feels like when I try to write MEOW from Neko's POV that there is something missing with the story. And when I try to do it from Kat's, there is still something missing.
Yesterday, I realized that in this version, the main plot is the sisters' relationship with each other. If I went back to my original alternating-first- person format, it might actually work this time. Not only that, it will also make better sense and strengthen my hook. All good stuff.
Lightbulb moment! Maybe the big thing that's been missing with this story lately has been... the other sister.
Suddenly, I can again see myself wanting to write this! But I admit to being intimidated by the alternating first person format. It isn't the differing voice aspect that scares me, though. I'm just not sure what to do to keep the subplots and such from getting huge and out of control like last time.
I can think of a few novels I've read with alternating first person formats, but they've mostly been boy/girl stories. (NICK & NORAH'S INFINITE PLAYLIST, TWO-WAY STREET, ANYONE BUT YOU.) I also read a draft of GETTING CAUGHT by
&
which had two girls.
Any other book recommendations that might help me?
Also, does anyone have any general writing/plotting suggestions that might help with putting together a story like this, too? (I know; that's a vague question. I just don't know what I need to know because I don't know it yet!)
I might call my new ms JAY, KAE & ELLE. Or SHOTGUN WEDDING. Or something else I haven't thought of yet. But for now, I will call it JK&L. Because that's what the first title sounds like phonetically, and I like it very much.
I had to fill in at work for a coworker yesterday. Yuck. But! I got to spend some downtime making notes in my journal. I worked up a complete character profile for Jay and a partial one for Kae. It was all very exciting to me.
I don't know why I started with Jay when Kae is going to be the first-person protag. (Because he's a boy and that POV feels more natural to me simply because I once wrote some other boy for 1.5 years?) But it was interesting to do so. I don't think readers are going to like him since he's a manipulative, pathological liar who will cause much angst and confusion for the MC. It was weird, though. As I was writing up the backstory that shows how he came to be like this, I really got him and started thinking, "Wow! He would be a facinating character to carry this story if I wanted to go that way!"
Which, I don't want to go that way. It was only a passing thought. But it is satisfying to know that my villain has enough depth that he could be some kind of bizarrely tragic hero if this were his story.
![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)