What is no one decided to pick up the first book?
What if the first book gets picked up, but it tanks?
What if you somehow get picked up, but are only given a contract for 3 books?
What if... What if... What if
Honestly, I never really intended the story of a couple of rogues who get thrown into opposition with the Dark Lord to ever be a big epic. Frankly, I'm not the kind of guy who wants to draft things into big epics. I tend to like the characters and situations that don't lend themselves to big and sweeping, and when I'm put into a situation where I have to think big and sweeping, my ideas tend to get a little weird (think multiverse collapsing around a single being who is made of the very essence of the universe).
But, brainstorming this story, it just kind of got bigger and bigger as I kept thinking "well, I can't make it too easy for these people" and "if that's going to happen, they have to earn it by going through something like..". Before I knew it, I had a big picture that I knew wouldn't fit easily into a trilogy, especially given what I knew had to happen right in the middle (not like at the end of a second book, which would be the end of Act 2, but dead in the middle to literally change the entire story for it's second half).
Once the notion of how big the story had gotten made itself at home in my mind, then I started fretting over exactly where I should begin. I mean, really the story could have the same long line as Lord of the Rings (Average person comes into an item of power and must go one a physical and person journey to use that item in destroying a great evil). The difference is that I'm not writing an epic quest.
There aren't really any take charge heroes in this story. No one comes upon the item, instantly knows what it is and then decided that they must take it and destroy it. They, like so many of us, get the item and need to be pushed into taking every step. They don't want to take on an evil overlord. They don't want to be superior or idealistic. They just want to survive, stay fed and stay warm.
No take charge Randian heroes in this bunch.
So this creates a bit of an issue. How to you initially spur these characters into that first action? How do you build that first piece of the puzzle that lets every other piece get built around it? How do you not only set up the plot and world of the first book, but build the plot like a machine that, once wound in the first book, plays out to the end (or at least the dramatic middle thing I mentioned earlier).
Let me tell you, I don't think I have EVER outlined a story this much before. Normally I'm much more of a discovery writer. I like to just have an idea and see where it takes me, but this time that seemed completely impractical. I keep think that if this isn't mapped out perfectly that I'll end up with the sort of continuity issues that have plagued the major comic book houses for years (I will NOT be doing Crisis on Infinite Eastgates!).
The problem is that I could theoretically just sit and outline the series for years. There's no end point when you decide that everything has to be mapped out. How much is too much? How much is not enough? (Didn't I ask that about background info?)
Eventually I've just kind of decided that I'd sketch out the big events, give myself a roadmap into, but not through, the first book and let NaNo do the rest.
Of course that means that this could all turn into some sort of literary IED, and blow up in my face before I type the words "The End".
Maybe I can fix in in rewrites?
All I know is that I'm crossing my fingers, rereading Stephen Kings On Writing and counting the days until the storm begins (which is ironically only a day or two before we get hit by a real storm... a Franken-storm).
Anyway... wish me luck.
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