End of Week 1
Jan. 6th, 2007 11:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marfiskWell, I didn't get as much read as I'd planned to on Selkie, and I suffered a bit when the darker part started, but I'm still entranced by the novel. Of course it has no meaning since I'm the one saying this, but I hope some of my feelings will be shared by other readers.
What's interesting is the timing of all this. On the OWW listserv, there's a discussion regarding interior monologue. Several people have spoken out against the concept, something that makes me a little nervous and at the same time relieved. I feel as if this novel is one long internal monologue when I sit back and think of all the times that a character is there all by his or her self, or unable to communicate true thoughts because of a language barrier. However, as I read through, I'm hard pressed to find any interior thoughts that last more than a paragraph and few even that long. The scene may last that long, but it's broken up by actions and reactions. Even when one character stands alone on a beach, the sea is a character, the past is a character, the hopes and dreams build up one more side of it.
And then I wonder if anyone else will see it this way. I think this may be the most interesting novel I've written, interesting in a sense of style. It has a lot of dialect (almost if not all done in word choice and word order) because all the characters speak an archaic version of English. It has all these alone times. It has little action of the adventurous type.
Does it work? For me, it does. It's a retelling of a folk song with my own twist on it. I know the story so well that it may color my outlook, but still, these characters come alive to me. Sadly, that makes reading the story harder because I know what's coming, but I still look to see how it happens for these characters and whether they will move past the horrible happenings. At the same time, I remember the big points and know how it works, but I don't remember their reactions and that's what I'm enjoying now.
What's interesting is the timing of all this. On the OWW listserv, there's a discussion regarding interior monologue. Several people have spoken out against the concept, something that makes me a little nervous and at the same time relieved. I feel as if this novel is one long internal monologue when I sit back and think of all the times that a character is there all by his or her self, or unable to communicate true thoughts because of a language barrier. However, as I read through, I'm hard pressed to find any interior thoughts that last more than a paragraph and few even that long. The scene may last that long, but it's broken up by actions and reactions. Even when one character stands alone on a beach, the sea is a character, the past is a character, the hopes and dreams build up one more side of it.
And then I wonder if anyone else will see it this way. I think this may be the most interesting novel I've written, interesting in a sense of style. It has a lot of dialect (almost if not all done in word choice and word order) because all the characters speak an archaic version of English. It has all these alone times. It has little action of the adventurous type.
Does it work? For me, it does. It's a retelling of a folk song with my own twist on it. I know the story so well that it may color my outlook, but still, these characters come alive to me. Sadly, that makes reading the story harder because I know what's coming, but I still look to see how it happens for these characters and whether they will move past the horrible happenings. At the same time, I remember the big points and know how it works, but I don't remember their reactions and that's what I'm enjoying now.
