12. Fixing the story I didn’t know was broken

Picking up from last week, I had some large shifts I needed to make to make this book cross the finish line.

The first was World Building! There were several large holes that I had been blind to for a while. Now, several people who had pointed these out to me in the past had noticed them already - I just had no idea how to fix them! Without any spoilers beyond the free first chapter, a big issue was that Cecilia didn't have anyone close to her. She just kind of waltzes right into the graduation ceremony, puts on her pendant, and that's the end of the chapter. There were no personal connections to our protagonist and the rest of the city. So I needed to give her a close friend. It just so happens that was an easy fix as a little while later there are some of her classmates she encounters that would make for great candidates for her close friend.

Another big one was the overall POV changes. Throughout Aether Guardian, we follow closely behind Cecilia from a close 3rd person POV. But all throughout, Cecilia's exact thoughts and internal dialogue interject in almost every scene. Something like:

"You need to train harder," Lady Elise said.

"Yes ma'am!" Cecilia blurted

I hope I can pull this off, Cecilia thought to herself.

"Right, Let us get started," Lady Elise continued.

It was a constant interjection with Cecilia's inner thoughts that were to distracting for the reader and constantly brought them out of the story. So instead I shifted it just ever so slightly to a close 3rd person POV.

"You need to train harder," Lady Elise said.

"Yes ma'am!" Cecilia blurted, hoping she could pull this off.

"Right, Let us get started," Lady Elise continued.

See? Says the exact same thing, tells us what she was thinking, without taking a side step out of the story just to immediately jump back in.

There were also a few scenes that were from the perspective of an omniscient narrator. Basically, Cecilia was no where to be found in this scene, and instead we got to listen in to two or three other characters on the other side of the city. To fix this, I actually had to get Cecilia to be present for conversations like these. This was actually one of my favorite changes! It really rose the stakes for her and her development while making the antagonists feel even more against her. Let me know if you can spot that scene ;)

This final adjustment I had saved for last before the final big hurdle.

World building. Overall, George said the story had a solid skeleton, but if I really wanted it to shine, I needed to answer some key questions that were left unanswered. Without spoilers, again, we have Cecilia doing protagonist things, and the antagonist doing antagonist things. And basically, the whole city hates Cecilia because the antagonist is doing antagonist things. But I forgot to answer the question "Why?" Why does the city hate Cecilia? It's just kind of assumed that everyone doesn't like her, but the story never actually came out and said "they found her repulsive because blah blah blah."

Oops! So just gonna fix that real quick!

There are lots of other examples I'd love to share with you once the book is released. So more on that later!

It was all coming together. After about two straight weeks, all the tweaks and changes were made and it was time to get started on the next leg of the journey!