Toffee is like Writing

I’ve been making progress on my novel. Re-read all drafted chapters and I could actually see the development of the story. The best comparison I have for it is toffee.
- Write up the ingredients (the basic idea) one or two lines per idea.
- Simmer by lengthening the ideas and drafting each scene.
- Take off the stove to sit for a bit by backing away from the project for a brief time (from a couple of weeks to a few months)
- Stretch the toffee by lengthening the drafts into full chapters.
- Cut into smaller manageable bite size pieces, by cleaning and polishing your chapters making sure your ideas ring clearly and your characters behave accordingly, that’s there is a smooth consistency and continuity.

I’ve added a couple of chapters and found that I had to flesh out a couple of characters in the process. My original plan didn’t quite make the cut, but the basic idea remains the same. There’s a death in chapter 4! I also noticed that the novel suddenly changes direction midway through – focusing more on the main character as oppose to focusing on the event surrounding the main character.

Inspiration in Old Pages

I’ve stumble across some inspiration! DC Comics version of Batman! Though he’s always been my favourite of the DC heroes and I knew that his story was far darker than what was portrayed in the films.

The inspiration really isn’t Batman himself (despite his coolness), it was the story that I was reading. It really was dark. The illustrations were dark, the colours were dark, and I found myself thinking:  “I’d like to do something like that”. To create a lead character who could be just as easily seen as a villain just as much as a hero, yet the reader can’t deny that world needs saving – and sometime it just takes a different kind of evil to do the trick.