Herding cats. That's what it's like sometimes, trying to get your characters to follow the trail of breadcrumbs you've laid out for them to wade through the plot to some predetermined ending. Hell, sometimes I'd be happy if I could just predict where they're going.
The initial write of the story had to make 50k words in 30 days, so it's forgivable that it was a little contrived. Now as I refine it and make the story line less contrived, more believable and more interesting to read, the protagonists forget that there are scenes yet to write that must be set up, and they get carelessly rambunctious, and start wandering of on their own.
It's a common enough complaint, but I must say, it's funny to watch, like seeing your children scream at the cold as they jump through the sprinkler and giggle in the summer sun. They don't care; they just do it.
People say that the idea is silly, that the characters do what I make them do, and that is true enough; but the characters behave second to second, each word and action flowing smoothly from the previous scene. Unlike me, they do not know what is supposed to happen, and to drag them toward the end goal by the nose makes the story again very contrived. For them to be natural and believable, I must let them respond naturally. That makes it a little trickier to guide them where I want them to go.
It also makes it much more fun to discover that I've added pages, and in doing so managed to create a situation where the contrived pages begin to fit in smoothly.
My babies are growing up. :)
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Paul herds his cats while mine refuse to come out of the box! I know what they ought to be doing, but they insist on dozing. Maybe I'm going about this the wrong way...or maybe I'm trying to goose them while they run in fear from these pregnancy hormones.
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