Writer's Block

Am I not supposed to be very free at the moment? Yups, and that's what I've been telling everyone, so it makes me not-so-free instead. Talk about paradoxical. Stir in the sudden feverish fit I had on Sunday night and wholesome nutritious laziness, and you have a golden brown reason to forgive me for my six-day absence.

Anyway! You must be wondering why that bit of pointless fluffery would warrant an entire Writer's Block. "You mean you're NOT going to update the story? Oh mannn..." Or wait...did something important happen in my life? You bet! Everyday's an important day when you're me, but that's not for you to find out.

Actually I realised that I've yet to do a "story analysis" for The New Girl, which is quite a pity really. Story analyses make good speed bumps on the highway of writing-just-for-writing's-sake. So bear with me will ya, as I slam the brakes at a most inappropriate time...

See, we're now at Chapter 21 (at this point I just realise that Chapter 21 has been mistakenly titled Chapter 20 for over a week), and okay, okay, nothing too bad so far. Meloves the ambigiuty of who's the bigger evil between Jean and Saras still being played out, and your unconventional playground of horrors in the beautiful garden. Everything's like a bubble puffing up just waiting to burst and leave a splatter of dishwashing liquid on your indignant faces. =p

I would play out more of the uncomfortable relationship between the odd trio of May, Jean, and Saras, but Ghostopia has taught me a thing or two about milking the cow for too long. There are, in my mind, two things which make a story good - compelling characters you love and hate, and interesting things to happen to them or for them to do. Take either one away, or worse, both, and you have the storytelling equivalent of a bad joke. However with the very limited space Twisted Tales has to offer, I can't really do both at the same time. Notice how practically nothing "deep" has been said yet of Misha at this point, and how it was a teeeensy bit too early for Jean to do her disappearing act.

It's a good thing that The New Girl is the sort of story that draws you to the climax based on sheer curiousity of what the characters are about, rather than what they are going to do, which means the lack of understanding of the characters could work to the story's advantage instead. And would it be surprising if I confessed again that I don't have a concrete ending in mind? Hehe, guess not. I even had the idea of not making this scene the final scene (which explains why Jean has yet to show up), but that could turn into a major anti-climax. Let's just get this baby over and done with and move on, I say!

And lastly, can anyone tell me please where this getting-older-by-the-minute plot has been done before? The best I can recall is an episode of The Outer Limits I saw recently, but that was more like "transferring" age, not making someone age rapidly. Of course there was this Stephen King book-slash-movie called Thinner, where you had this dude growing thinner rapidly after he angered some...um, gypsy? Can't be too sure. Pst...make sure Mr. King doesn't hear about this, but I actually got the idea from that. Now you know.

And that brings to an end the latest edition of Writer's Block which you didn't ask for, and most likely didn't read every word of! Trust me to know dirty little secrets like this...I'll see you people around for End Game of The New Girl.