I wouldn’t dream of placing my efforts anywhere near Charles Dickens, of course, but I’m thinking that my approach to this Prequel is reminiscent of the serialised writing popularised in high Victorian times by the great man.
Having finished the first chapter, and well on my way through the second, I’ve not really plotted the whole story yet, though I know where I’ve got to get to. I can see, already, some of the new challenges arising for the sequestered community of Biome NE47, as the inhabitants deal with the matter of the impenetrable bubble walls. Of course, the main event, the novel Biome NE47, is set some thirty years after the bubbles have been erected, and as I’ve mentioned throughout this blog, that novel is finished. My challenge is to write something fresh, while not invalidating any of the concepts of the main event.
So what happens in the initial phase of the bubbles? How do the folks cope immediately after the walls go up? On the one hand, it’s a daunting prospect to write sequentially, though the process does concentrate one’s mind!
I can’t guarantee that the final draft of Prequel will faithfully follow the installments (I see even Dickens had to revise and edit his first efforts), but I can expect that the process will be dynamic, that there will be challenge, hubris (of course!), catharsis and resolution. It’s quite intriguing to follow the characters as they develop, as they deal with the inevitable challenges, working their way through.
In so many ways, it’s humbling to experience the odyssey.
Biome NE47 