difficult choices

I have sat down three Sundays now into the new year and have written no more than two paragraphs in the current manuscript drafting - about a third of the way into the story for the third and final part of the Peitho series - the Peithosian Legacy. 

One driver of the writer's block has been a demanding day job - the last few years have drained both my time and energy to focus and this doesn't look like subsiding any time soon this year.  But another driver has been the self-doubt over whether my inner-voice centric narrative will actually work for this third and final part of the story.  I've moved from six to three POV characters as the drafting has progressed (two are characters in their late teens), yet even that feels like it isn't working.  It probably doesn't help that the fiction I have been reading, which I cannot help but measure myself against - a mixture of contemporary and speculative genre offerings - just reminds me that my weakest skill as a writer is drafting realistic dialogue.  Even my youngest characters talk far too much as if they could teach English rather than in everyday vernacular.  There simply are not enough Gen-Z friends in my life for me to hear normal chatter of these types of youngsters and no amount of viewing of teen movies will give me a perfect sense of that language. (Although I do think I'm capturing well the heightened anxiety of this group as a prevailing feature of this generation.)

I am starting to wonder if I should just start again on the third part but take a completely different take on the way to present the story. Inspired by the approach in recently read Sea of Tranquillity by Emily St John Mantel. Very non-traditional structure within the parts of the narrative. It was a much easier read than my intense earlier parts to the Peitho series.  And it was speculative and exploring philosophical themes, which I do in spades, so I was able to see what "really good" writing looks like.

But I've also gone several months without much drafting of the third part of the Peitho story, so , also starting to wonder if I should just park it indefinitely and start a new project.  I had a similar stall when I was writing the Panopticon series. There were four parts in that story, although I have only written three. The fourth - the Helotry - has a story board prepared but I never started drafting it. At the time, when it came to start, I was tired of "living and breathing" the family in that series and I needed a break from them. It is possible to grow tired of characters and narratives.  I will one day return to finish that story, just not any time soon.

The third wildcard in my contemplation on what to do is an urge to return to writing in the contemporary fiction genre for a breather from dystopian speculative fiction (which the Peitho series certainly is). Conversations with one of my mentees over the last few months has taken my mind to the idea of a story about two characters generations apart and all the challenges a friendship across that divide brings. I have already been inspired enough by our conversations to have written three poems and the start of two short stories so I feel there may be a long-form novel somewhere in the mix. This is how I have been spending my Sunday writing time instead of working on the third part of the Peitho series.

And there is the still to be finished play - the Manor - which has been in my writing goals for the year at the start of the year for the last four years.

Definitely struggling with some difficult choices. Should probably go for a walk to clear my head.

For the record, the third poem (the other two appear in recent blog posts) is called my wish for my friend and is reproduced below. It's already getting a lot of praise in the iPoetry epublication on the Medium website (for which I am a contributing writer).  Have already decided my next poetry compilation will be based on the theme of friendships so yet another idea to add to the ones above on choices for 2023 writing focus.

My friend telegraphs
their near life experience trajectory
of getting bogged down
with partner and kids and mortgage.
The ultimate yardstick
of expectations
gone awry.
It fuels a need
neither wrong nor right
to illuminate my wish for my friend.

Wanting them 
to meet someone
in the future
who will spark
such a raging wildfire
in their aching flesh and bones
that any semblance
of set paths
burns away.
So inspired
by the music
in its flames
that bonding will not be a burden
but rather a euphoric adventure
brimming with laughter and love.

A measure of hope
for me
is to see my friend
experience such joy.