Recently I put out a call for help in my reader’s group: I was having trouble putting together my WIP into a cohesive story. The saga is different from the Cullen/Bartlett one in that so many of the children and grandchildren in the families have such interesting tales. It is impossible to connect them all so that their stories make sense alongside each other.
I thought I was being clever, and used my grandmother as the conduit, with her having conversations with the writer about her memories and how the different characters related to each other. However, I wasn’t happy with the way it was going, hence the call out to the group. I asked for opinions on the grandmother as conduit, or the possibility of a collection of short stories.
The short stories won. I am now working my way through the WIP – Empty Beds – and watching it morph into a collection of short stories about the Allan, Darby and Murray families. This has given me so much more scope and opportunity to explore family contributions more thoroughly. I was going to leave out the Murray family because they moved to Rockhampton in the 1860s, but the contributions they made to the community there have made their way into history books about the area. They must be included. Now I can do just that 😊
Thanks go to the members of the group who gave me feedback. 😊
