Q&A: Why Am I Rewriting The Pirates of Sissa?

Q&A: Why Am I Rewriting The Pirates of Sissa?

A while back, I found that as soon as I opened my manuscript in order to work on it, it wouldn't even be a few minutes before I'd give up and call it a day. I felt overwhelmed and intimidated and simply didn't know where to continue working on the novel. Now, I love working on The Pirates of Sissa, so this was something that definitely concerned me. I knew that it wasn't about how motivated or inspired I was - I'd done a lot of work up until that point and I honestly felt that I was on a roll with the story. I even passed the 100,000 word mark, which was a big deal for me! And yet, there I was, staring at my open manuscript, not writing, and putting it away again. 

I thought about what the issue was. What was keeping me from writing? I finally settled on a few reasons. The first was complexity. The book had gotten so complex, with so many characters and subplots and so much happening in parallel that it was a bit overwhelming to keep up with everything. This book is kind of a behemoth with regards to that. I've got an entire cast of characters, each with their own agendas, motives, and goals, and each with their own subplots and parts to play in the story. But that's normal Hyba, to be honest. I always write like that. My stories often have a lot happening at the same time, and I enjoy that. Within that same vein, though, is the fact that I'm wondering if certain characters are really important and if they should remain in the story.

The second reason I came up with was the fact that the book deals with some pretty heavy themes and subjects. As you might remember from either blog posts or previous podcast episodes, this book delves into themes of discrimination, forced displacement, imperialism, and so much more. I want to make sure that I'm writing something readers will appreciate, will understand, will benefit from reading. As a result I want to make sure that I approach all of these subjects with care. Unfortunately, these have been big issues in the past couple of years as well and have really come to the forefront of our attention as an international community, and I do feel a lot of pressure because of that as well. One of my biggest concerns is that I won't write something that people will believe is an authentic representation of something that a great many individuals and communities experience on a daily basis.

The last reason, which is something I figured out when I finally decided to create a plot diagram for my books, is that I don't actually know what the main plot points of The Pirates of Sissa are. It sounds weird, because I've got over 100,000 words, but here's what I realized after successfully plotting The Fall of the Black Masks and unsuccessfully plotting The Pirates of Sissa. I know the starting events - the plot events that set the story in motion - and I know the end events that wrap the story up. But everything in between is this murky swamp. Much of what I've written are scenes and smaller events that take place within the overarching plot, without realizing that I haven't been guiding my writing towards that overarching plot itself. Does that make sense? I hope it does.

In any case, I'm basically back to the basics. I'm tacking the plotting of The Pirates of Sissa, because apparently I have no idea where I'm going with this story, despite having a beginning and an end. I also have to re-evaluate every character's role in the story and how necessary they are as characters with their own perspectives in the book. As a result, I'm thinking I may have to do a total rewrite of the story, start a completely new draft, and try to have a better-controlled manuscript from there.

So, there you have it. Those are some obstacles and challenges I've been dealing with with The Pirates of Sissa that have made it a bit difficult for me to continue writing the novel. I'll try to be more consisted posting about it and recording podcast episodes about this book, so look forward to hearing more cool worldbuilding!

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Update: I've finally settled on a new, cool plot and plan to start work on it in August!