I’d been writing the second book of a mystery series for the middle grade reader when I began toying with the idea of a main protagonist for an adult series. It’d be a woman, of course. She’d be a detective but, never having considered law enforcement, an unlikely one. And if that was the case, how did this career come to be? Then I had the dream. Three times. You’re skeptical, I know. For what it’s worth, I’d be suspicious too.
In this short, vivid dream, I watch as a woman, early twenties, mascara smeared beneath her haunted eyes, pushes through a heavy, thick-glassed door. The dream returns the following night and, as the door swings open, I see the reflection of sunlight on her forehead, and the rough gray concrete of an exterior wall reminiscent of some sort of municipal building. On the third night, the sequence repeats, except this time I notice her expensive high heels. I’m wide awake and wondering, who the hell is this woman? Is that a police station she’s leaving? And if so, why had she been there? I turn on the light and jot the details in the notebook I keep on the bedside table. The dream never returns, but my questions multiply and the answers to them become the beginnings of a character profile for Andrea Stuart, the main protagonist of The Lost Hours.
Many weeks later, I’m fascinated by a disturbing story dominating the news. It’s hard not to gawk when the headlines involve the very rich perpetrating unconscionable acts. It makes me wonder what would compel someone who wants for nothing to behave in a manner that risks their family, their wealth, their freedom. The answers to these questions circle the fundamental yearnings of every man and woman regardless of economic class. Just like that, my ideas coalesce; I have an unlikely main protagonist, know her backstory, and why she gave up higher education to become a cop. I understand who my antagonist is and what compels them to commit the unthinkable. It thrills me to imagine pitting one against the other.
I outlined and completed a first draft and then a second, but there were problems. The story dragged when the dramatic tension should have been ramping up. With a towering stack of books to be read, boredom is the death knell of just about any book I’m reading. After much furrowing of the brow, it finally occurred to me that my error was in the liberties taken with the novel’s structure. Once again I outlined, this time including what each scene needed to accomplish and the specific piece of information each would deliver and, most important, that the major plot points arrived at the right place within the narrative. Reviewing these bullet points with the corresponding chapter helped eliminate extraneous material that didn’t move the narrative forward and dragged the pacing. This process also helped identify what was missing and to tie up dropped threads. It wasn’t the most efficient way to write a novel, but as I work on the next book in the series, the lessons learned are gratefully paying off.
The Lost Hours by Lynn Tavernier is published by Crooked Lane Books.
