My narcissist: inspiring the rewrite of my old novella

The ideas are just streaming in as I work on a mass revision of Unwilling Time-Traveler.  I’ll keep posting the original version so you can see what it was like, and the original version is a basic template for what happens in the revision.  But I’m coming up with some new directions.  (I won’t tell you all of them, because that derails the creative process.)

I read the first few revised scenes at Writer’s Club on Monday, and they elicited laughs in the proper places, lots of interest in Madge and Herr, and curiosity over what Herr Bismarck is really up to.  This is promising, giving me reason to keep going.

Part of the inspiration is altering the character of Herr Bismarck: No longer a white-haired old guy, in many ways he’s an older and much thinner version of my ex-friend Richard.

Not the same person, of course, because Richard is not a time-traveling Nazi or even a scientist.  Herr Bismarck is a totally different person, with different family, background, etc.  He’s inspired by Richard, but is not actually Richard, and does different things.

But he becomes Svengali to Madge, manipulates her, uses her, then devalues and discards her.  This inspires a mixture of hate and regret in Madge, who then must work to keep him from changing the course of history.

So finally I found a way to take the experience with Richard and turn it into something quite useful in my fiction.

Will it be a novel or novella?  Will I try to publish it traditionally, or on my own?  Heck, I don’t even have it all written yet.  We’ll see.  🙂

But hey, Richard (if you ever come back here again), guess what–You’re my muse.  Thanks for that.  😉  LOL