Plot Tangles Detangled!

Finished! I forget if this is Draft 3 or Draft 4, I just know that this draft is in the bag. All plot tangles detangled. I ran into two scenes that required major tweaking, one that I knew about and the other that I compeltely forgot about. So it's a good thing I read the whole thing again. And I added a short scene to the end.

The scene that required major tweaking was interesting. The scene had to have the same outcome that it had originally, but my first attempts really made one of my characters look like a jerk. And he is not a jerk. It made me think how fiction is so different from reality. In real life, people act like jerks every now and then and we generally forgive them, unless it happens on a regular basis. But when I encounter it in fiction, I tend not to forgive the character. I never forgave Jondalar in The Valley of Horses and I eventually lost interest in the series because of my antipathy toward Jondalar. Since I don't want my characters to encounter a similar fate, I don't want them to look like jerks.

So I rewrote the scene. And it was ok. My character no longer came across as a jerk. He even came across as a the sensitive and thoughtful dude that he is. But it was only ok. In fact, it was downright ho-hum. A real yawner.

So I thought to myself, it needs some action. So I had my bad guy turn up. And instead of Tory trying a dangerous form of magic for the first time in a nice, safe environment, she must try it while on a carriage chase through the city.

Much better.

Because, you know, my novel really was missing a carriage chase. Since the novel is partially inspired by James Bond and Dirty Harry movies, it must have chases. So now it does.