Image from Tonoharu: Part One
This is the third post in a series describing the creative process behind my graphic novel Tonoharu. This installment deals with writing the early drafts.
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The more I write, the more I’ve come to appreciate the subtle nuance that is a well crafted story.
The old saw “they make it look easy” applies; a well told story flows forward in such an honest and natural way that it’s easy to forget that it had an author in the first place. That behind that timeless tale of love & death was some poor schlub who struggled over countless dead-end drafts, debated with himself over what events to keep and which ones to lose, fretted over settings, timeframes, character histories, dialogue, etc., etc…
The real world doesn’t have an author (well, probably not, anyway), and a good story does such a good impersonation of Life that it’s easy to forget that there’s someone behind the curtain, pulling the strings. The more skilled an author gets, the more invisible his touch becomes.