The Dark Pit of Despair

I’m on the verge of typing “The End” on book #3. Of course, it isn’t really the end. I still have a number of drafts to go. But somehow finishing the FIRST draft is the sweetest.

In the meantime, however, there’s nothing sweet about the final pages. I’ve thrown Zoe into a deep pit of despair. She’s on the brink of losing everything she holds dear. And I do mean everything.

The problem is I also hold some of these things quite dear, and I don’t know yet how it’s all going to turn out. Not entirely happily-ever-after, for sure. There will be loss. But how much?

Even I don’t know until I write it.

One of the first lessons I learned when I started writing seriously was “torture your characters.” Emotionally. Physically. This time I’m doing both. And I’ve put her smack in the middle of one of my darkest nightmares. She’s there right now, as I write this post. She’ll be stuck there, frozen in time, until I get back to her tomorrow.

I admit, I might have been able to pound out a few more pages and pulled her out of this mess today, but I needed a break. Me. The writer. So I have stepped away to let my blood pressure come down.

Since this is my phobia that I’m playing out on the page with Zoe as my proxy, I’ll probably have some bona fide nightmares tonight as my subconscious works through my fears.

My writing muse is also my psychotherapist. 

Practicing without a license.

One thing I do know: Zoe will be a changed woman by the time I type “The End.” Maybe I will be, too.