Writing Olivia's Chapter
Writing about a young author's journey has been both challenging and deeply personal. Here's a peek into my writing process!
I started out with the inspiration of this story when I hoped to craft a realistic fiction novel featuring a girl's complex relationship with her father. However, I soon realized that this girl has another story to tell: how she pursued her dreams and published her novel.
So, with this idea in mind, I began a story interwining between family relationships and personal developments. The main character of this story, twenty-two-year old Olivia Otter, is very close to my heart: she seems quiet and mellow on the outside, but inside she is sarcastic, clever and ceaselessly ambitious. She is also an INTJ, like me!
A lot of major changes did occur to her character arc (and is still occuring!) as I developed the novel. I want her to be honest, witty and deeply relatable, perhaps just a tad reserved. It's difficult for me to balance this character arc with the overall life-oriented plot, so I was and perhaps still am a bit lost upon the storyline.
However, I have found that planning the novel out carefully on paper (using a bubble map/board game-outlined map) is miraculously helpful. Following that outline, I am currently nearly finished with the third draft of this book.
Looking back, I have realized that perhaps I based a part of Olivia on me. And that's not the most important thing. The most important thing is, I have grown with her.
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