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Debra talks about an 'abandoned' WIP.
About a year ago, an idea for a story popped into my head. It came from a line in a song (a country one of course) which referred to something along the lines of a princess and a cowboy. For some reason that line stuck in my head and I thought it would make a great title for a story.
So I started writing "The Cowboy and the Princess".
The cowboy is pretty much literally that. Cal Rogers owns a ranch - somewhere out west - that provides livestock (bulls mainly) for rodeos. Tessa McCormick plays the role of a princess on stage at a theme park. She's looking to break into theatre on Broadway, so this gig is pretty much a paying her dues type of thing.
They meet when Cal brings his daughter, Sarah, to the show at the park. She has been traumatized by the fairly-recent death of her mother and is very shy and reserved. However, she forms a connection with Tessa almost immediately.
Cal and Sarah's mom have been divorced for ages. She chose a career as a news anchor over him and Cal is still bitter about it. Sarah had been living in Texas with her mom. Her life has been totally disrupted by the passing of her mom and the move to her dad's ranch.
Our conflict comes in as there is an attraction between Cal and Tessa (duh - it's a romance!), but he is reluctant to get involved with someone else chasing such a similar dream as his ex. And although he's pleased that Sarah is forming a bond with Tessa, he doesn't want it to get too strong when Tessa will up and move to New York if her big break comes through.
I got about 4000 words in. And then got stuck. The story seemed to be dragging and going nowhere. I have a sort of idea in my head as to where I want the story to go, but it just seems to be meandering along the way.
So, I set it aside. Instead, I've been working on stories for my Holidays at The Corral series, which are coming along nicely I have to say.
Will I pick up "The Cowboy and the Princess" again? Probably. Overall I like the idea for the story. I'm enjoying the characters. So it's definitely worth revisiting at some point, even though I have no idea when that point will be. It's been out of my head for so long that in order to write this blog I had to open the mss to remind me what the characters' names were.
I had a similar experience with Family Secrets . I wrote it. Put it away. Eventually came back to it. Made some major revisions before submitting, and in the end it became my fifth full-length novel.
Have you ever set aside a work and come back to it? Whatever happened to the project in the end?
Until next time,
Happy Reading!
Debra
www.debrastjohnromance.com
I have had to set aside a story. My time travel is atypical for the genre, and I am not yet confident enough to finish it. If I were a big name author, I could break the rules. But as a newcomer? I believe in the story, but... I don't yet know how it will end.
ReplyDeleteI hope you do go back to it, Ana. I'm all for breaking the rules for a good purpose no matter who you are! :)
DeleteI love stories with kids in them! I have a whole file of ideas that I've started and then put aside because I either can't get past a stumbling block or haven't fully fleshed out the idea yet. I keep telling myself I'll get back to them and hope to some day!
ReplyDeleteI always have to be careful that the 'cuteness' of the kid doesn't take over the story. :)
DeleteIrish Intrigue was one I set aside, because I kept getting stuck with it. Over a year later, I went back to it, changed the location, changed the heroine's name - and it became a very different story from the one I originally thought of!
ReplyDeleteI love how changes to a story can be subtle or major by the time we get to our final product.
DeleteThanks, gals. You've inspired me to definitely make sure I dust this one off someday. :)
ReplyDelete