While writing: Do you get in a knot with your chronology?

13th April 2022. Two minute read.

.My problem with writing the final chapters, and scenes, was to get both women, one dead and one alive, in the same room, on the very day of the funeral at Saint Patrick's Old Cathedral, in Lower Manhattan. One has travelled thousands of miles to be reunited with her friend, and must arrive in time.

In this second novel, Daughters in Exile, (due to self-pub soon) the two female protagonists are separated and living on different continents. When they parted, in Daughters of the Famine Road, they both promised they would meet again. One character journeys thousands of miles to be reunited with her friend. Unknown to her, the friend has tragically died. This made the chronology very difficult to plan. But it would produce a dramatic ending. So I began at the ending, and worked back in time.

Reference: Looking northeast at the front (Mulberry Street) side of en:St. Patrick's Old Cathedral, New York on a sunny midday. By Jim.henderson - Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4585865

The new ending, the meeting at the funeral, has changed the plan I had in mind for the final novel, but it has also given me lots of ideas for completing the trilogy. The surviving protagonist has the opportunity to go on alone into the third novel, Home, 1847. She returns home to an Ireland that was still suffering through the Famine years. She will have to work through her own needs and desires to achieve her goals in this final novel. I'm looking forward to finishing the work later this year.

For me, as a writer, I've seen my main characters, and some secondary characters, develop in unexpected ways. They almost demand to have their own input into the novel, the plot and the chronology. It's a great feeling.

Buy Daughters of the Famine Road

https://rotf.lol/Famine-Road