I took an unintentional sabbatical from Synthetic Empires over the weekend. Life decided to be a pesky little kipper and got in the way of my plans. I’d hoped to get back to it by Monday evening, but life butted its nose into my plans yet again!

I was beginning to panic. Was this the moment of inevitability I’d been bracing myself for? Had my writing stamina finally run out of much needed road? It’s a familiar pattern I tend to exhibit. I write and write and write until I’m blue in the cheeks, then the next thing you know, I stop dead in my tracks. By this point, enthusiasm turning to fatigue had become a tale as old as time for me. But no, not this time. I refused to let Synthetic Empires become yet another fanciful, unachievable dream floating about in the back of my mind. I told myself I’d break the cycle this time, no matter what life threw at me.

Fortunately, Tuesday evening did just that. It broke the cycle clean in two. My stamina returned with a vengeance, baby! It all started with a handful of epiphanies I felt that afternoon concerning the opening chapter. It had been bothering me for weeks now, causing me to second guess my fiction writing capabilities. Despite shifting to a third-person narrator, it still wasn’t working. I was certain moving the lens from Quinn’s point-of-view to an external perspective would fix the issues. Try as I might, the darn thing continued refusing to gel. It was too sluggish and explanatory. I couldn’t figure out what on earth this chapter was actually trying to say. What was the point in its existence? Quinn learning about the Albion Crown Government was pure exposition. Plus her relationship with Izzy felt like a shaggy dog story. It was one big dead-end that ended abruptly. The tone, pace and feel refused to match the rest of the story.

Which is when the realisation hit me like a brick to the ear; I could just gut the chapter. Instead of opening on Quinn, I could jump straight to the day she arrives at the Roberts’ household. We could start with Michelle, learn a little bit about her life, then watch her life get flipped upside down when Quinn quite literally lands on her family’s doorstep. Once this chapter is all done and dusted, we can jump to the happy, curious, happy-go-lucky servant droid! That could be Chapter Two! Quinn could simply reflect on her time learning about the Albion Crown at the learning block throughout the duration of the novel, saving readers from pages of having to sit through mind-numbing presentations. I could rip the prelude up and scatter its remains throughout the main bulk of the novel.

I gave it a shot. I dragged chapter one into my Shelved folder and retooled the entry formally known as chapter two. I opened with Michelle’s return from a summer in a detention centre. She’s done something dreadful in the eyes of her society. During this chapter, she is attempting to navigate the shame and confusion that dominates her upon her return home. Her childhood best friend is furious to see her. Meanwhile, her parents are being suspiciously lovely to her. This messes with her head. How can Cathy hate her after all they’ve been through? All the same, how can mum and dad forgive her after all that happened at the start of summer? This scenario gives me a natural way to introduce readers to her world, all whilst adding a sprinkle of drama into the mix. She’s re-exploring a familiar place to her, yet now with the fear of how her actions have changed everything.

There’s also the lingering mystery of what on earth she did to earn such scorn. Intitially, I‘d quite foolishly considered revealing her “crime” right at the very start of the chapter, yet upon last night’s rewrite, I discovered that the longer I withheld the details, the more intriguing it became. 

Starting with Michelle makes more sense than the original plan. Although Quinn will still serve as the novel’s audience surrogate, what with her discovering this world for the first time, it’s ultimately Michelle’s story. The more I consider her journey throughout, the more I realise she is the beating heart of this world I’m creating. Quinn is the catalyst who ignites change within Michelle, helping her see the world through new eyes, but as pivotal as Quinn might be, it’s Michelle who is the one who will by steering this narrative. I absolutely must open this story with her. The robot can wait for chapter two. The fact I hadn’t considered this from day one almost feels foolish to me. 

It’s fascinating how easy it is to get obsessed with keeping elements that simply just aren’t working. I get so caught up in a single chapter that I become blind; failing to see how it isn’t serving the wider story. Having Quinn waking up in a ‘learning block’ was an effective way to teach the audience about Britain in 2090, but it wasn’t interesting. It was also boring trying to have her describe every room, item and person without any context to what it was she was meant to be describing. Trying to describe a prison cell from the perspective of a character who didn’t know what a “prison cell” was isn’t entertaining for anyone. It was also repetitive, especially when you consider that we’ll be spending a boat load of time throughout this novel in Michelle’s sixth form; a setting that will (hopefully) be far more dynamic and fleshed out than the transient one existing in the original opening 5,000 words. I was so fixated on making it work, I was blind to the fact it was a waste of time and energy.

All of this has me thinking about the purpose of chapters. Each one must move the story forward. It needs to both entertain the reader and achieve something important for the plot or character development. If a chapter fails to meet either of these criteria, something is wrong. Sometimes, a few rewrites can fix it. But if the problem persists, it might be time to ask: what is the point of this section of my novel?

A part of me feels guilty for taking 5,000 words I’ve rewritten countless times and hurling them into the digital dustbin. It feels like squandered hours, trying to perfect something I’ve now abandoned. That’s never a fun feeling. Then again, maybe it wasn’t a waste. Every draft, rewrite, and creative decision is part of the process. While I have an idea of where this story is going, it’s still taking shape, and snipping away pieces is part of that. Making these tough decisions, even after hours of investment, is surely a good thing. I’m “killing my darlings,” as they say.

As much as I loved writing about a curious, toddler-like droid roaming a vast prison complex, this isn’t the novel for such a scene. Plus if I love the idea so dearly, perhaps I can repurpose it into a short story or something later on down the line. For now, however, off to the virtual trash can it goes.