Daddy Broke the World

I am well under way with book 3, tentatively titled Daddy Broke the World. If you've read Friendship Games, then you'll know where the working title comes from.  I am okay with sharing the working title because it will more than likely change, and probably more than once.  It already has. 

When I say that book 3 is "well under way," I mean with the outline.  It is getting longer.  I have an opening few paragraphs that I am pretty happy with and that kicks things off, but I can't really move on yet.  The story is still developing.

The trouble is that the story is developing at a global scale.  Country A invading Country B; troubles in Countries C, D, & E.  Twenty-First Century empires emerging, and America at a crossroads both globally and nationally (more like continentally).  A new world order replacing the old.

It is all fallout from Friendship Games.  But you can't really tell a story with a God's eye narrative.  The story must be told through characters on the ground.  You learn as you write, and I had learned that basic rule of writing as I worked through Alter Road.

The challenge now is to bring the global scale down to the local through characters on the ground - with action and dialog - and not a hundred of them scattered around the world.

I remember having a similar challenge with Friendship Games, and here I am again.  I pulled it off with both Friendship Games and Alter Road, but it seems like a bigger challenge this time around.

This is a challenging stage of writing.  It is full of thinking through situational rabbit holes - and self-doubts - until something starts to vaguely take shape.  And when it does, that's when you close yourself off from the world as best as you can and get to work.

Soon.

Wish me luck.