How long do you wait?

Photo by Taisiia Shestopal on Unsplash

I wake up my brain wakes up.

Even if it is stupid o'clock and I had promised myself today a lie in.

I rarely keep promises to myself

I fumble around in the semi-darkness for the clothes I arranged to wear today yesterday and at least put on a pair of knickers as I don't like the cats seeing my bottom.

I am sure that they see it when they follow me into the toilet and watch me, as cats do, but to voluntarily show them my bottom seems to break some secret etiquette

Or is that just me?

Anyway, I did not come down so early to write about my cats and my bottom.

I had an idea whilst lying in bed all warm and snug under the duvet.

It was that the story of the princess' return is not really the whole story, the meat, and bones of the story.

So how long do I wait to serve you the main meal?

I am reading a book that is quite a famous fantasy trilogy (not one that has been made into a film or TV series) that will remain unnamed.

I have tried to read it many times over many years, but something always makes me put it down, incomplete.

I stopped my bad habit of reading the last line of a book before reaching it after I had read the last line of this book; I thought at first that was the reason that I had put this book down so many times unread.

But the last line does not tell you anything that happens, it just makes you aware that a lot has happened.

So, it is the perfect last line to read before you read the book.

And then the moment of clarity hits me. It is exactly because this last line is so perfect that I am finding it hard to finish the book.

It promises so much; adventure and intrigue and life-changing moments for the characters involved... and then it takes so long to get there.

I am now further in this book than I have ever been, and I am losing concentration and interest.

I even just lost interest in this blog and wandered off to Amazon to look at sugar-free chocolate, wondering briefly if that is a waste of time like the book.

If there is no medical need for you to have sugar-free chocolate then have the real stuff.

So, I need to get over the first back story, which is the reason for the real story, quickly enough to keep you interested and slowly enough to make you read more.

This book what I wrote is not going to be something you read quickly and forget or fling across the room in frustration (I fling books and teaspoons a lot).

I want to hold your interest enough to want to keep going but not try your patience too much that you give up.

In the last. draft the whole messy backstory comes out in one go. Then it's gone and barely referenced again. And it is a messy, horrible, and sickening story where none of the characters come out particularly well but at least some of them go on to better things.

I'm not doing that now.

I'm going to make you wait.

You will get just enough to understand the players and their motivation but just too little to ensure that you want to read more.

And so the editing begins again.