Jennifer Crusie's Blog: Argh Ink

I finished the first scene of Haunting Alice and sent it to Jen yesterday (Tuesday), and then I sat back and thought about what I’d done. And, to quote Opus, “Lord, it wasn’t good.” Sunday night we watched Hitch for PopD which I’ve also been thinking about a lot. Both stories have led me back to the Grail Cup of fiction writing–Character is Everything (plus its coaster Don’t Write the Parts People Skip)–which has made me realize FINALLY why it takes me so damn long to write a book. We’re talking Epiphany Territory here. I’d have sat up and shouted “Eureka,” but it upsets the dogs. So . . .

(eureka)

I can’t make a book work until the characters are alive in my head. But if I waited for that to start writing, I’d never get anything done, so I go ahead and start writing, and I know the stuff isn’t right, I know it’s not there yet, but I keep going anyway. And I discover great stuff along the way like Kimberley and Oingo Boingo, and plot threads pop up and it’s all good but it’s not soup yet, it’s just a bunch of ingredients floating around in uninspiring water. There is no steam. The carrots, to extend a metaphor, are still crunchy. It’s the Damp Carrots Stage.

This stage is worrisome because everything feels so wrong, but it’s a process, so I keep going. And going. And going. And it still isn’t right and I get a little weepy. I think about my career. Twenty books. Twenty published books is a damn good career. With the reprints, more than half of them have been NYT bestsellers. In some circles, I am considered a success. I could quit now. No shame in that. Well, except that I quit in the middle of a book. That’s horrible, to just leave those carrots sinking to the bottom of a cold plot. That’s a Frankenstein Mistake: if you create something, you are honor-bound to see it through and take care of it. So I have to finish the book. But after that, I can quit if I want to. Back to work.

The problem with the Haunting Alice first scene is that I kept adding ingredients but I couldn’t get it to cook. Alice was just bitchy. Ethan wouldn’t even come on the page so he was just an empty army surplus jacket. Isolde refused to say a word. They knew it was wrong, but I kept shoving them around. And then it was Feb. 1 and it had to be in and I sent to Jen and felt huge relief for about a nanosecond and then I realized what I was doing. So at six AM this morning, I’m still awake, staring at the ceiling, trying to figure out how to fix this and I cannot think of a way. But twenty books is a career . . .

Then Jen e-mailed me and said the scene was fine but that we didn’t need to use it if I didn’t want to, and I said, “Yes, please, let’s not use it.” And she said, “No problem,” and I heaved a sigh of relief. Which is when I saw the Hitch connection.

Hitch is a movie about a man who understands women so well that he can teach other men how to get over their nervousness and connect with the girls of their dreams. I love Will Smith, and the client he’s working with for the majority of the movie is Kevin James who is excellent, so I had high hopes. But what emerged during the movie and especially during the podcast afterwards, was that we (Lucy March/Lani Diane Rich) didn’t give a damn about Hitch and his girl but we were all over the secondary couple. Albert and Allegra were worlds apart, but they were both vulnerable and both real and as they struggled to put a relationship together, the story arcs their conflict in wonderful small moments that make you root for them every time until the climax of their subplot when Albert suddenly throws his inhaler away and kisses her and then dances in the street. I’m telling you, THAT’s a romance story. And then in the climax of the main plot, when Allegra says, “He threw his inhaler away before he kissed me!” and you know that she knew he was a geek the whole time, well, your heart melts a little. These two crazy kids are gonna make it work. Especially after that wedding dance. We loved Albert and Allegra.

But Hitch and Sarah? They have no problems. They mill around the plot looking like raw vegetables next to the bright and steamy Albert and Allegra. If the main plot needs romance, Hitch and Sarah kiss. If the plot needs conflict, they fight. Or she cries. Or he has an inexplicable food allergy. Or the writers throw a Big Misunderstanding at them. There are so many WTF? moments in the Hitch-and-Sarah plot (they throw vegetables at each other? Really?) that I stopped listening to it and started thinking about other things, like how bad Alice and Ethan were and how twenty books is a career. Then Albert and Allegra would show up and I’d forget all that and think, “Come on, Allegra, he’s darling, get a clue.” (The parts with Hitch and Albert were also brilliant, which leads me to the conclusion that Albert is the heart of this movie. Albert is one well-cooked carrot.)

So here’s what I think. I think the subplot was so simple, the characters so diametrically opposed (he’s an overweight schlub of a junior lawyer in her investment firm; she’s a beautiful, famous socialite) that writing a plot that flowed from their inherent conflict was a natural thing. What will happen if Albert and Allegra go to a party with all her famous friends? He’s the only one who will really listen to her and then defend her again the morons, and she’ll think he’s great. What will happen if Albert and Allegra go to a game? He’ll get mustard on his jacket and teach her to whistle and be really happy for her when she get it right, and she’ll be charmed by what a good guy he is. The characters were simple without being stereotypes: Albert might look like a schlub but he’s smart and funny and he really cares about Allegra beyond her wealth and beauty. And Allegra might look like a sophisticated professional beauty but she’s vulnerable and lonely and warm-hearted and once she really looks at Albert, she’s a goner. The writers knew those characters and wrote a good, simple, basic plot arc for them that was character-driven and real.

Then they got to Hitch and Sarah and knew they were in trouble because they’d created Perfect People.

Hitch is smart, funny, handsome, charming, successful, hardworking, confident, and rich enough to have one of those great NYC apartments you always see in the movies. Also, he never fails. Put him head to head with schlubby Albert in a story and Albert is going to kick his ass every time because we care desperately about Albert while Hitch already has everything, so later for him. Sarah is smart, funny, beautiful, charming, successful, hardworking, confident, and rich enough to have one of those great NYC apartments you also see in the movies. She never has an uncertain moment. Put her head to head with awkward, lonely Allegra and Allegra will walk all over her every time because we’re worried about Allegra while Sarah can do anything, so later for her. The Perfect People romance almost always leads to Dumb Conflicts because if these people are that sharp, there is no impediment to their relationship. Which is when the writers order half a dozen Big Misunderstandings from Amazon because they have free shipping. It’s impossible to stick two Perfect People together because their shiny surfaces make them slide off each other, so I never believed that Hitch and Sarah loved each other. And that killed any emotional involvement I might have.

I think Alice and Ethan were pale, shapeless versions of Perfect People. They were both exasperated at the situation they found themselves in, but they had no stake in that first scene, there was never a moment where they broke a sweat, there was nothing in that scene that either of them couldn’t have handled with their eyes closed. And because they were both shiny smooth generic Perfect People, they were annoying. Everybody in that scene was annoying. I need to write Albert-and-Allegras, not Hitch-and-Sarahs. Which means I have to know Alice and Ethan as grown-ups well enough to show their vulnerabilities, to find out what they want and need that will make them break a sweat. And that scene did not do it.

So I forgot that character is everything and wrote Perfect People which means that no matter how much I turn up the heat, those damn carrots will not cook. Thank God for Jen Enderlin being so understanding. And now I must go back to Liz whose carrots have been simmering for awhile, so now I can turn up the heat and get somewhere. And then when I finish Lavender, I can quit, because twenty books is a career. Except that I already know what the plots of Pink, Peach, and Yellow are, so I’ll have to finish those. And then I’ll have to fix this Alice book and the Nadine book, but then I’m quitting. Because twenty-six books is a career. Probably.

Thought for Today: No Damp Carrots. Thank you.