Calling Anton

 

I'm finishing up on revisions for A Fox's Wedding and I'm at a scene I really should have realized would be difficult.

It's supposed to be one of the minor revisions. Instead I've been at it all week and I'm still not sure how I'm going to work my way through it.

In the last book, Penny had to stab a guy. She's been dealing with it since, almost not going on the Japan adventure at all. This scene is late in the book and this is the place where she finally accepts that the path she is on is worth it, even if it does lead to violence again.

And I set it up at a gun range. Which was probably a mistake. It makes it far too obvious what is going to happen at the Crisis Point. It also puts the focus in the wrong place. So I'm trying to find a way through to the story beats I really want.

Without changing the chapter count, because I don't want to have to apply for a new ISBN.

This isn't about guns. The problem is, putting guns on the page makes it look like it is.

Incidentally, the Part headings are now "Tatemae, Ganbatte, Kitsune, Honne." I liked the rhythm of "...Makoto" much better but my Japanese translator talked me out of it. "Makoto" is truth, but the sense is more of "the real thing, the true thing" rather than "the hidden facts, discovering the truth." And I didn't really have a good space to explain another word to the reader, not and make it feel familiar and right to the reader by the time they hit the end. Whereas Honne (my translator hit on it at the same moment I did) has been taught and should have been expected...and equally applies to what is happening at the end.

Or maybe not. Because I just ran into the proverb "uso kara de ta makoto" -- which is colloquially translated as "Many a true word was spoken in jest." Because, really, this gets a lot closer to the heart of what is going on. "Honne" is true feelings, and Penny has never had any problem being open with those! As a proxy for the center of the home, the hearth, the privacy of the family spaces, it isn't very good. Native speakers wouldn't think of that first, and that is the audience I care about in doing these language revisions.