That Old Black Moment

Want some GOOD news from the SFWA front? Really, there are so many amazing, talented members of the organization and I'm honored to be part of it. Several of us have put books on sale this week. A great opportunity to check out some excellent writing! See more here.

I've been working hard on the third book in my Covenant of Thorns trilogy, ROGUE'S PARADISE. I'm right at the midpoint and I knew what I thought should happen. In fact, I had a very strong idea of what the next chapter's events would be - which is not often the case for me.

And, it turned out, I was dead wrong.

Things did not go smoothly at all, and my hero and heroine, Rogue and Gwynn... well, let's just say they hit a Big, Black Moment right when I thought they had it all handled. Gwynn was devastated and I was devastated right along with her.

I retraced my steps, to find out what went wrong, but no - everything had happened exactly as it should. Except that it all turned out so badly.

So, I did what one does in these instances: I complained on Twitter.

Several people who also love and cheerlead for Rogue and Gwynn to triumph chimed in immediately with support, among them the lovely Eleri Stone who sets up our weekly Here Be News posts. Their hand-holding really helped.

Along with their faith that things would work out.

That night I watched Thor: The Dark World and, not something I usually do, I stayed for all the special features after. (This might have been prompted by the desire to soak in as much Tom Hiddleston's Loki as possible - but that's neither here nor there. *cough*)

One of the features analyzed why a certain shocking and very sad event had to occur. Because Thor and Loki had to hit rock bottom, to have incentive enough to make a change in what they'd been doing. It hit me then that this was why Rogue and Gwynn had hit this particular wall.

They needed to make a change.

The black moment feels black indeed when you're in it. But it's also when things can turn in a new direction. This is true, not just of fiction, but of our lives.

That old black moment fate weaves so well.