So there’s this novel I’m working on, called Munchies. It’s about a weed-smoking, mom’s-basement-dwelling, motivationally-deficient young man named Deek who finds himself dealing with immortal humanoid monsters that hunt and eat people. (They are not vampires. Just ask them.)
It’s a comedy, with dismemberment, cannibalism, and hot vamposters of every gender.
One of the key things about this story, a facet that will likely lead a small few to love it while others use it as a shining example of the decline of western civilization is that, every once in a while, I go there. I cross the line. (The line, it seems, is the border between “here” and “there”.) I know I’ve got the scene right when a reader laughs with a hand over her mouth.
So I was tightening up the first act, getting things shipshape for my final assault on the end, when I got an Idea. Yep, a big ol’ capital-I Idea. A you-can’t-even-see-the-line-in-the-rearview-mirror idea. It turns out we’re not done with Bill’s penis yet. Oh, no. It has work to do.
This sequence must be in the story. Simply no choice. The only problem is, it’s a major change to act two. There’s the big everyone-in-the-room scene that puts the good guys on the run. After discussion with my wise and noble friends in the Kansas Bunch, I concluded that the good guys could not return to the scene. I wrote the novel accordingly. Now Advika and Deek will go back to the basement. It’s a pretty big change.
I thought I was on the home stretch with this adventure. I’ve been planning what next I might inflict on the Kansas Bunch when it comes time for summer camp, but now I’m not nearly as close to done with this draft as I thought. But damn, it’s going to be funny when I get it right.
