Blackmail

Yeah, it's been a long time since I last blogged. Carrie and I got back from New Zealand about a week and a half ago. During our time I read five different books that I'll be posting my opinions on in the next day or so. But that's not what I'm writing about.

We arrived back in town at 6:30 AM, and I was back at my desk at work by noon. But that's not what I'm writing about.

Spent the next several days recovering as much as possible from jet lag, then it was back to the grind of working on the house and trying to plot out a new novel.

That's what I'm writing about.

Carrie is absolutely convinced that I need to continue the Springer stories. And, to be honest, that was the plan. But the story is not growing as organically as I had hoped. Essentially, I've hit a road block with the vilain, which is what happened last time. In my first story, I had a decent plot (I think), but the villain was paper thin and undeveloped, and it ended up really muddling the story for a while.

This time I want to really nail the villain and his or her motivations down before I start, so I can know how they react to a particular stimulus if something unexpected comes up.

Herein lyeth the problem: due to the hero's reticent nature, he doesn't want to get involved in anything and has to be pulled into the larger conflict. That means that the villain has to attack someone he cares for before the hero will do anything about it. So I've been considering blackmailing one of the hero's friends.

However, I can't think of a reason why anyone would want to blackmail any of his friends. They're all a little too perfect I guess.