I now know disillusionment

Long sigh. I guess rereading the last bit of (still unnamed) Umbrella Story has put me off working on it completely. On the bright side OTDOTS is getting there; I have about a third of the chapter to go.

But on Umbrella. It's a combination of things, I suppose:

First, I feel my characterisation really swung off track very fast very far and it's all become a giant author wish fulfillment deal in which I have a cast of ideal characters interacting with their world and with each other in the most ideal way. I throw in plot events without warning just to fulfill objectives; I stumble into the trap set for only the most amateur.

Second, my writing is boring. Indulgent, sloppy, boring. It became an encyclopedia; that explains the gargantuan word count. 350,000 words of what? Things no one would care to know because I haven't hooked them, haven't given them reason to root for the world and the characters.

Third, after finally seeing past my own bias, I think the characters aren't that interesting. Or likeable. Sure their dialogue and interactions were fun to write, but I feel that part of that - and part of what made me think the characterisation worked - was an illusion born of love.

Fourth, (plot related) changing the personality of the main character via plot-induced character development, in order to avoid "Mary-Sue" or "Canon-Sue" accusations, made her harder to enjoy writing. Well, too bad. She sucks as a character then. Goddamnit.

Get it yet? I think my worst fear has been realised. I'm bored of it. I'm bored of them. Passion drives my writing, and once I'm bored of the concept, once I find I can reap no joy from writing it, I no longer feel any desire to. That's what has happened with dozens of other stories I began.

Part of it can very definitely be blamed on my newest-conceived project, for now called Revolving Door (hah another nonsensical one). Another part on all the anime I watched. They make it look so dull.

And my declaring that one of my stories is dull is its death knell.

I think this is all partly because Umbrella Story was born of a whim, a wind, a spark. Like I told so many friends, I knew that once that wind was gone I'd lose the story completely. That's why I hurried to finish as much of it as I could before the A's. That's why I insisted on finishing it before returning to OTDOTS - because some part of me knew that turning to another story too soon could well make me lose the wind I'd caught. I gave up holding OTDOTS off mid-December, and it looks like that's exactly what happened.

Another part can simply be attributed to the fact that I created it two years ago. It was rich and pretty to Sec 4 me; I thought it was the best my Muse could find. Now it's found better, and I have something richer, prettier, to wrap my heart around.

Maybe it's something to do with reading right before falling asleep.

Either way, all ways, I should be glad I only have two epilogue scenes to go, and hope it comes back to me, the way it suddenly did when I finished the Leviathan trilogy. Let me drag myself through these two final scenes, and see at the end if I still feel like proofreading.

/dejected