the one I really want to finish

Okay...so now that I've sent Kat's story off (like a mom who's sent her oldest child off to college), I must focus my attention on my "younger child"...the unfinished but pretty darn close to being done one.  That's Lizzie's story, and it is completely unrelated to Kat.  I know I should have used some stick-to-it-ness and finished the next story in the trilogy, but Lizzie and her friends just came to me one day.  

I started the story when I was living in Arvada, CO, and it was my second year out there (2003-04), and I just started writing.  Like When Broken Sparrows Fly, the beginning of this is largely the same as when I started.  Though some of my original ideas have been somewhat altered from that first vision.

I had this idea that I wanted to add some untraditional romance to a story, and so I thought, how can I turn the idea of boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love, boy and girl get married, on its head.  My idea was, what if all of that happens and suddenly girl leaves boy and they have to start all over.  

Like every other story, I take some cliche and tired old plot device and try to re-work it.  In this case it is a nasty case of amnesia.  But it's not the "getting bumped on the head" type, no this is more sinister.  What if someone did it on purpose?  What if someone caused Lizzie to lose her memory?  And what if, she's been missing for 2 years?  What happens to all involved when she returns and doesn't remember who she is or who the people, people she's known for years, around her are?  What if the person behind her mysterious memory loss is close and doesn't want her to remember?

That's the origin of the plot.  I got to about 34 chapters when I realized something needed to change.  The motivation of the bad guy.  Why would he do this to someone?  What could cause a "good" man to go bad and hurt people he loved?  I think I've figured that motivation out, but it's been a bit of work going back to the beginning and re-working the whole thing.  

It's not like I haven't done it before.  Heck...I've personally edited When Broken Sparrows Fly at least 7 or 8 times, plus I had a co-worker who completely edited it for me several years ago.  Editing isn't a new thing...it's just tedious and can lead to a little thing I like to call writer's block.  

I can see the end in sight for Lizzie's story, and I feel really good about it in general.  I really like the characters, and I feel like I managed to get some good dialogue going in different places.  So, it's really just a matter of stoking the fires of my imagination and pushing the self-motivation button a few more times so that I can finish it.  I really want to finish it...I want to see how Lizzie's story is resolved.