For Act 2.5 of Defiant, I’ve dealt a little with Mackenzie and now with Teresa.  They both have more to say, and I was planning on wrapping everything up about (two, three?) months hence with Joe’s diagnosis, say, two months before Nichole & Gil play out Act 3.

But… it seems too episodic:  here’s side character #1, here’s side character #2….  That may work in a seasonal show, but not so much in a novel.

I need a theme for this arc, and I’ve got nothing. I thought it might be family & loss (suggestive of a book title) what with Mac’s dead brother and Teresa’s missing, presumed dead, mother (and I know some of Nichole’s siblings were ‘failures’).  I might even find out more about Gil and Joe.  I did have one of them say or think, “everyone has lost someone in the Breakup.”

Episodic’s fine for blog posts; not a coherent novel.  I guess this is one of those retro times when I wish I had a traditional editor to tell me to get my shit together!  I am not writing one more word until I understand what they want me to say.

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Suggestions welcome.