Act 1 – the narrative tightens

By the end of the week I have filled 5-6 pages of concertina paper sketched out in much firmer detail than the first draft.

I began by looking again at the 5 main (family) characters and I have now written out full character notes. So they are......

NICK, early 40’s, photographer
KATE, late 30’s, journalist
SARAH, 11 years old
BELLA, 9 years old
SCARLETT, 7 years old

I then spent time looking at the opening scene, which lays the foundation for the entire story. This scene runs through Chapter 1 and it needed to introduce the characters, it needed to explain the premise for the story and in needed to make an impact.

At the same time I had to look at the time of year for the setting of the story and that has to be the Spring so that the story concludes at the end of summer/beginning of autumn.

I also started to alter some of the peripheral characters. For example, the ‘retired reverend’ has departed to that cast in the sky and been replaced by a young female vicar and her boyfriend.

One character that I’m not happy with is the villain and I’ll have to deal with this next week. Do I really need a villain!?