The Helldesk - Author's Note - 07/18

I wanted to write a quick note to apologize for falling off the literary face of the planet. Please be aware that there are minor future plot spoilers (of a sort) contained herein as I outline what's been going on, and where I've been thinking of taking things. Continue at your own discretion!

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It's been a year since I banged out four Chapters of The Helldesk, flush with an enthusiasm for making public my own words for the very first time. What was intended to be a little harmless smut suddenly became a couple of chapters, and then three and four. It wasn't supposed to be deep, more an exercise in channeling thoughts and ideas I'd never entertain in real life - giving a voice to my darker side, and morphing it into someone I felt might actually behave like that. It was Emma that threw a wrench into the works. She was never supposed to be fully human, at least I don't think I originally intended to flesh her out. It was more like she was supposed to be an empty vessel, a sexual and masochistic sponge ready to soak up everything my anti-hero dished out, and to provide stimulating responses and emotions as a counterpoint to enhance the reader's perspective.

But as the plot thickened, the story lengthened, and the Admin got himself in deeper and deeper, things changed.

Initially, I was surprised but extremely grateful for the many positive words I received. I also quickly realized how unhoned my writing craft was and immediately wanted to do better. I went back over my original postings and made some minor changes to fix a few continuity errors, and to correct a few of the more egregious errors, but as I did, I realized I wanted to write better characters. I knew that I wasn't worried about the Admin. He was (and is supposed to be) a superficial shit - cocky and self-involved, with few cares for the idiots around him. It was Emma who had captured my interest. Somewhere along the line she had gained a voice, had come to show how strong she was on the inside, and how she wasn't going to let the Admin break her if she could help it. There's a speech she gives in the restaurant, about how she was introduced to the world of kink, which I honestly don't feel like I should take credit for writing. It sounds silly to say it, but I don't feel like it came from me, more that I was giving voice to someone else's feelings and thoughts. And no, I'm not saying I plagiarized it, or that someone else contributed it to me for submission, more that the inspiration or words seemed to come through me, not from within me. By that time, the course of the plot was pretty firmly set - I'd already written Carlo's despoiling of Emma, and most of the rest of chapter 4, with ideas and pastiches thrown together for how the Admin was going to ramp things up in Chapter 5.

But things were going rotten below the decks of the good ship Helldesk. Doubt was setting in, and after I published Chapter 4 and received a lot of negative criticism for how badly Emma was being treated, I stopped. It wasn't that I didn't like the things people were saying - they were entirely correct with how they felt a real person should or should not be treated. That wasn't what bothered me - I have already mentioned how this was supposed to be a channel for things I wouldn't normally consider doing, even with a consenting and informed partner. It was more that I had come to a fork in the road and couldn't decide which path to take.

On the one hand, I still planned to go through with the Admin's threat of leaving Emma to try and make her way back to the hotel on her own, naked and distressed. If people had enjoyed a vicarious thrill from the wrongness of what was being done to her, it made for a logical conclusion to the anti-hero's treatment of the heroine. It also very squarely fulfilled my desire to avoid a trite and wholly unsatisfying Hollywood/Disney ending where they both live happily ever other in their kinky paradise. But it didn't feel emotionally fulfilling to me. Having become invested in Emma's strength and vulnerability, and how she had almost become a real boy... sorry, woman... I didn't want to completely despoil that and laugh in her face (and those of an increasing number of commenters).

My alternative was to have the Admin recant his threats, and give in to her tears and have them walk off into the sunrise. Bleurgghh. Nope, sorry, not happening. It would be too out of character for the Admin to suddenly grow a fully functioning heart and be at one with his beautiful, compassionate new self. Fat chance of that happening. He *is*, however, becoming aware that all is not as it was, and that Emma has done something to change him. As things currently stand, I want to be able to start to feed that a little bit, and also to work with the fact that he has been an unmitigated shit towards her and there is no way in hell that she would really trust him at this point. Certainly not to the point where she would walk off, hand in hand, into the rosily, dreamy future.

But those aren't the only issues. As with a relationship gone sour, and the way that time works to widen the gap between erstwhile lovers and to make reconciliation an increasingly distant possibility, so I've found it more and more difficult to continue this story. After spending too much time last summer focusing on The Helldesk, and ignoring real world issues like work, and friends, and mundane things like groceries, laundry and cleaning etc, I suddenly found that two months had gone by, and I was feeling a significant case of writer's block. Anything I tried writing seemed clunky or artificial. Nothing felt appropriate and I started to have problems finding the right words to sum up how I, or my characters, felt. Not that I'm looking for any sympathy - I'm sure that most anyone who writes has been there at one point or another. It was just a frustrating situation to be in, and the core of why it's been a year since I posted anything.

By January of this year, I had decided I would try a few creative writing classes. Those didn't go well - I wasn't looking to be a sounding board for other people's efforts, I wanted to know how to write better stories. I did, however, pick up a few pointers, and stepped back to look at the bigger picture, to try and put down what my characters' motivations were, and to write a basic storyboard for how to complete the next chapter.

That's still currently a work in progress. I'm also feeling like the words come a little more readily to express myself, but I'm still not entirely ready to continue with The Helldesk.

And that's the main reason I'm posting now. I've always had a particular lack of patience for writers who start a story and then can't be bothered to finish it before starting something else (yes, Robert Jordan, I'm looking at you in particular). So... I would like to apologize to anyone who has been waiting for the next update. I think I'm going to try writing something else first, something that has captured my current thoughts, before I attempt to wrap up the tale of The Admin and Emma. I want to flex my fingers again and try to regain a little of the flow I felt I had before I stopped. If that second project feels satisfying, I think I will be ready to try and bring this tale to a vaguely believable and (hopefully) satisfying ending.

As always, I would love to hear any thoughts and comments you may have - either regarding what I've written here, and what you have thought and felt, or about the story itself and how the characters therein have developed. I enjoy experiencing the reactions of others to what I've written as it often highlights aspects and thoughts I hadn't considered, and helps to improve my own understanding of what I'm writing and where I want it to go.

Thank you all for your time and for your patience!

HH