Do your characters ever unfold in ways you never imagined?
Do you ever start out with a clear plan for how your heroine will develop, only to find that she has other ideas, and you end up scrambling to catch her as she runs off in her own direction?
This applies to heroes too, of course - it's not just female protagonists that insist on a life of their own!
I always start my characters off with a clear idea of what I expect to happen in their lives. I'm pretty sure I know who they are and where they're going, and in most cases, I do end up with more or less the result I was aiming for. But I'm NEVER prepared for the random and sometimes extraordinary additions to the plot lines that unfold along the way.
Sometimes, when I 'get into my groove' the story takes hold of me and drags me off in a direction I'd never even imagined at the start. I feel my characters taking on a life of their own, and saying and doing different things, and going to different places, that were not in the original plan! Its occasionally baffling, often unpredictable, but it's always exciting.
That's when I'm at my happiest - when the hours are flying by and I'm in my writing element, 'chasing my little mice' as they gather momentum, and holding on tight as they lead me where THEY want the story to go!
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