Birth of a Novel - Chapter 1

This is the second entry in my Birth of a Novel series of posts, where I talk about the development of my new YA urban fantasy.

I've added another 750 words and written chapter one to its conclusion. It ends with an action-oriented cliffhanger and a bit of humor. The reader gets some hints about Zydeco's past, and get to see his reaction to an embarrassing situation. I'm loving his sidekick, Blaine - he's the comic relief of course - a former gnome - he's quite short and with dark leathery skin. He's got himself an English accent, and no I didn't overdue it for those concerned over such things.

I'm going to move on to chapter two, but here are my concerns over chapter one. Did I develop Zydeco enough or did I spend too much time making Blaine hilarious and Octavio colorful? Octavio, by the way, is a former cockatrice and the fussy leader of the "Mythical Creatures Support Group".

I can't rely purely on first-person POV keeping me from the initial trap I fell into with Elliot Hanson in The Children of Midian. At first, he was just too intense and rash, and not really interesting enough to sustain a novel. Zydeco has a way more interesting background. Hmm, maybe I should go back to my character notes on Zydeco, and spend some more time on him - flesh him out even more. I need to make darn sure I'm in his head.

I'm also not sure if I've done enough with the setting. Time will tell.

You can scootch over here to read about chapter two.