Thursday, April 10, 2014

A to Z Challenge: I is for India

This year, I'm participating in the insane awesome A to Z blogging challenge, which entails posting EVERY SINGLE DAY during the month of April, except for Sundays. Each day's theme corresponds to a different day of the alphabet: 26 days, 26 posts. I'll be blogging each day this month on some aspect of my current work in progress (WIP).

I is for India

...well, maybe. Yes, I'm doing that again. But that 'maybe' is looking more and more like a 'yes', because the basic plot I'm working out for this lifetime, if it is in India around 1890 (although I may change the year), is looking like more and more fun. So E very likely is going to be for Emma, and I really might be going to India. Metaphorically speaking only, unfortunately. I really need to find that rich, generous patron one of these days...

Anyway, my concerns about researching and accurately writing about India - and Indian people - during the British Colonial Era haven't gone away, but the plot is getting...well...too delicious to ignore. Yes, Ava, you were totally right - the whole situation is rife with conflict. Emma, I think, will be engaged to a proper British gent, chosen for her by her beloved dad, and although she's not in love with this fiance, she's happy to be a dutiful daughter, and he seems like a nice enough bloke, and everyone keeps telling her she'll fall in love with him over time, and so on and so forth.

Yes, it's the perfect engagement, and the wedding plans are so lovely and everyone is so happy, and then along into Emma's house comes this strange, compelling, mysterious Indian servant-woman, who doesn't act like a servant at all, is far too beautiful, and who seems much more interested in Emma's father's military plans than she does in cleaning the house.

And poof, now we have all the makings for a truly complicated forbidden love story, between two people who absolutely should not and cannot and must not fall in love - for every conceivable reason you can think of, and then some - and yet who find themselves inexplicably and inexorably drawn to each other, almost as if they'd known and loved each other in a previous life, or even lives...

Now come on, how fun is that?

20 comments:

  1. Nothing better than a complicated forbidden love story. :D

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  2. That it TOTALLY fun! Forbidden is my favorite of all the romantic tropes.

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  3. Don't we all want a rich, generous patron? ;) I like the "arranged marriage for political reasons" aspect, because I obviously use the same mechanism in my works, but forbidden love is definitely the best.

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  4. Oooh, goodness, where will it all end?? I like the thrown in bit of past lives, after all, Hindus do believe in reincarnation.

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  5. This is going to be GOOD. You have such amazing ideas! :)

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  6. That's quite the romantic setting at that time period, India. :)

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  7. Hmmm...now might be a good time for you to take a trip to India. It would be tax deductible, since you're researching!

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  8. Oooh. This sounds too good!

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  9. There really ought to be more travel grants for writers. Just saying.

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  10. That sounds spectacular (hey look, I chose a different word than awesome!). The forbidden love really works, especially for Emma's time frame.

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  11. Probably all kinds of things were forbidden between a British girl and a native servant. This story line will give all kinds of plot ideas.

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  12. This story must be so engaging and enjoyable for you to write! I love all of the layered complexity. I also worry about properly portraying people in other eras/cultures--but so long as you do your research and try to portray them in the best light that you can Im certain you will do them much justice!

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  13. This sounds very interesting and I hope you will see who I write about for the letter O:) I am intrigued by your story

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  14. Oooh, yes, that does sound deliciously fun! (Also, I think I'd like one of those rich patrons, too--probably the only way I'll ever get the funds to travel everywhere I want :)

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  15. Almost as if they'd known each other in another life.... Liz is that a hint that they were lovers in another life and will that be part of the book too, that could be interesting!?

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  16. Forbidden - my favorite kind of love story.

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  17. This is going to be interesting. :)

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