Seek Alternative Route

A, T, C and G is progressing well but I've also gone off at a complete tangent and started writing another new short story - this one tentatively entitled Seek Alternative Route.

Strange the way the mind works. Writing (for me anyway) starts out with some rush of ideas, scraps of conversation, a central conceit, whatever it may be, which have to be madly jotted down before they are lost. This is the "free" bit - free in that it comes without effort and free in that I don't make any effort to censor, edit or organize what I write (or, more often, type). Then comes the actual work of shaping all the notes into a working story. There has to be a beginning, a middle and an end. There have to be characters that ring true. And so on.

This was the stage I was at with A, T, C and G and I'd hit a few snags over the order in which certain events should appear in the narrative. There comes a point sometimes where you start to feel you are "forcing" a story onto the page when you still haven't got it quite right in your mind. At such times, it's often best to set it aside and work on something else. And so I found myself writing this new story without really even thinking about it. It just started out as a sort of doodle that has grown into a more complete picture. And the interesting thing is that it's the complete opposite of the story I was supposed to be working on. Seek Alternative Route is mainstream, "realist" fiction, largely about character and with no aliens or dragons anywhere in sight. And not a whole lot happens. Which is cool.

So, I'll work on both at the same time and if I get stuck on one I'll just work on the other ...