The Story So Far...

Two guys walk onto a bus.  Sounds like the beginning for a joke, huh? It is, but this joke’s on me, and it’s not really funny.  Not yet.

It’s not anything just yet.  It’s just two guys a bus and a parking lot. They’re all part of this chapter in my latest book.  You know, that YA thing I’ve been talking about? The thing with the stuff in it?

Yeah, that one.

So I’m working on the set-up chapters.  For me they’re always the most difficult, because I’m, well, setting everything up.  I’m establishing a voice, introducing characters, and giving those characters a place to be.

My characters, if you haven’t guessed, are on a bus. Or, more accurately, they’re getting on a bus. The writer’s trick is to make that bus-getting an enticing process.  Oh, I could use lexiconical magic to elevate, walk or throw the two guys onto the bus, but that’s only part of the trick.  In the boarding I need to reveal a little bit of who they are and how they interact with their world to make them real.

It's the detail that creates the story.

And that is my bus-sized problem. I’ve got two guys boarding a bus, who need to do it in a manner that blows the doors off the bus, or nobody will read it. That’s a lot of pressure to hang on two guys, let alone their creator, who hasn’t gotten past the fact that they are in fact two guys, and they will indeed attempt boarding a bus.

Don’t get me wrong.  This bus isn’t insurmountable. This bus isn’t even an important location. It’s just a vehicle to get my characters from point-A to point-B. And I’ve taken this bus around the block a few times. This is what I do—and what I have been doing for the past two weeks is driving to get this bus boarded. 

It shouldn’t take two weeks to board a bus, no matter which charter service you use. And yet if you’re chartering “RobBook Travel,” it’ll take you that long, and even longer if you want to see that bus go somewhere. I’m thinking that might not happen until chapter three.

In the mean time, the pressure mounts on my two guys.

“Got any Pringles?”

“Ya, no. I thought I had a backpack, but it hasn’t been in written in yet.”

“I’ve got a towel.”

“That only helps if you were written by Douglas Adams. Unfortunately, we’re not.”

Two guys lean against the bus waiting to board.

What am I doing, in the meantime? 

Blogging.

Yeah, these two guys really appreciate that. 

Two guys give in to despair, waiting to board a bus.

Luckily I didn’t give them any weapons. This is a kid’s book.  Their weapons are their minds.  For that, they rely on my mind.

Two guys give up in despair, waiting to board a bus.

That’s ok.  They can give up. I have hope. And as long as I have hope, they’ll make it onto the bus.  See, for me writing is more than finding the perfect words that get them there. It’s more about the process we take along the way.  Sure words are the tool, but any tool can put two guys on a bus. It’s a writer that puts them there and creates a story. And for me that story is all part of a very big plan, and that plan takes patience and timing.

And begins with two guys climbing onto a bus.