Hello Writer Bees!
Whose dish is on the chopping block? Apparently, my mystery WIP.
This week has been a massacre. Spent most of the week trimming unwanted tidbits from my story. Chunks of paragraphs are being considered for removal. When I’m editing, I underline sentences to mark that they will either be moved or cut altogether. Looks much better than a scary red pen scratching words out. And I’m seeing a lot underlined, starting to get a little nervous. Despite some self doubt, I continue to march on and eat my feelings in Chinese takeout.
Someone once gave me the advice to not delete words of the story. Instead, to set them aside in another word document. They called it the ‘graveyard’, a place to store material that could be used in future works. Some smaller plotlines and inconsequential sentences are being moved to the graveyard, for safe keeping. Maybe they aren’t right in this story, but they may be useful in another story.
Writing and editing has its ups and down. Last week, I felt great about my WIP. In good spirits. Felt like my work was decent, at best. This week, however, I asked myself ‘who would read this trash?’. Yes, the creative process may be a rollercoaster. But if you ever feel like I do, please, keep working and just hold on for the ride. It’ll all be worth it in the end, I’m sure.
In other news, I have a question for you guys. I’ve considered changing the name of two of my characters. As I looked through potential names, I realized a name I really liked is the same name as a notable real person. Then that got me thinking. Is that alright? I mean, I guess this was bound to happen, since I’m using realistic human names. So, I’m opening the floor to you. What do you think of characters that coincidently share a name with a real-life person? How do you go about that? Curious what you all have to say on the matter.
Let’s s see what week three of Camp NaNoWriMo has in store for me. Hope everyone participating in Camp NaNoWriMo is making good progress on their work.
Happy Easter and Passover to anyone celebrating!
How are your creative endeavors coming along? Talk to me in the comments!
Write with heart,
Lady Jabberwocky
Lady Jabberwocky 
I feel like if you’re using realistic human names, you’re going to use one that’s either super common or just one that makes everyone think of a well-known person. It’s totally fine. I mean, in the real world, you don’t just not name your baby because all names have been taken, many people have the same name and that’s the same in books. Totally okay! 😀
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Sounds like my edit of my book, Camp NaNoWriMo rebel, we’ll get a good book at the end. Jill
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I never thought to save what I take out, I might have to try that. Also I’m the same way when I go to revise. I’ll read a sentence and I’ll be thinking how terrible it is and why in the world did I write that. I honestly end up laughing at my self in a good way.
As for the name I say keep it if you love it, but if you think it will do more harm than good then maybe you can change the last or first name. I ran into the same problem once with the name of a place for my book was an actual place so I decided to change it around a bit and I loved it. At the same time this is also why there’s also that note at the beginning of books about names and places being a coincidence.
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I’ve had that happen a couple times, including once recently. Since DLTDGB is mostly based on actual people, I will often choose names that have some connection to the person’s real name, to help me remember names: same initials, similar sounding names, or a common theme (Pete Green, for example, his name in real life is also a New Testament first name and a color last name). I chose a name for one recurring character over a year ago using one of these methods, and then a few months later the Summer Olympics started and an athlete with the same name as that character was in the news. I just left it, since DLTDGB is a continuing story, but if I ever compile it into a book someday, I might change it. Or I might not, since it isn’t that uncommon of a name (over 700,000 people in the US with this last name, at least, and it isn’t that uncommon of a first name), and the real person might not be in the news anymore by then.
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