And When I Write The Book

I'm in between stories now, kinda, which isn't something I'm used to being. Railway Hotel is one of the short stories I'm most proud of. Mostly because it's not a fanfic and because I really enjoyed the characters in that one. At some time I would like to do something novel length from the point of view of the son, from that story.

A small plot summary for ya.

David Harber is devasted by the loss of his wife Maddy, Madeline, and he finds himself seeking comfort by telling his story to his son Colin and daughter-in-law Laura. His story is a tale of love and learning. And how even death won't keep true love apart.

As David recounts his courtship of Maddy to his family in pictures and in words, the memories flood back to him, some good and some bad, but all of them make him remember the bittersweet time that was the summer of 1967. The summer of love and the summer of his love.

In only 30 pages I really became attached to these characters. Maybe it was because the song that inspired it was so vivid. But the song really only plays into the last small portion of the story.

I'm really trying to work on a story about vampires. I started it many many moons ago. Seriously, some parts of the story lurk in the archives of this blog, making it at least 2 years old. The problem for me with this one, is I'm not feeling the characters. In MOOT/Broken Dreams, Alex, Tristan, Everett and Jodi and all the rest were like people in my life. I may not have had the easiest time writing it, but they were always there, nagging at me to continue.

Railway Hotel did something similar, the plot of the story jumped into my head and wouldn't let me work on anything else until I had finished it. The stuff I write usually has a tendency to do that. Not My Slave, which is the working title for the vampire story, has not. I'm thinking of adding and removing some characters to this one. Nicholas and Stefan and Angelina are the 3 main characters.

Nicholas and Stefan are both vampires. Angelina is a mortal woman that has a mental connection with the vampire world. There are forces that would like to see her dead because of this ability, and Stefan and Nicholas have taken on the duty of protecting her.

In the original 49 pages I had a character I called Patrick who was to see Angelina safely to England, but I don't think he's staying in the story. There will be a similar character, but I'm pretty much sure that Patrick is not going to be it.

This story is very fast paced, which is probably one of the reasons I'm finding it so hard to write. At one point I think it was moving too fast, and what I'm doing right now is writing from the middle to slow the action down a bit. Not an easy task.

So until another story jumps into my mind, I think I'm stuck with this one. Can you tell I'm not very happy about it?