Old Pansters Never Die…

…they merely loosely synopsize and leave room for the magic to happen.

It’s an evergreen debate, pantsing vs. plotting, meaning: going in with a bunch of vibes and no plan, versus setting your course step by step.

I’ve seen the light as far as synopsising goes, but still manage to surprise myself when things drop into my head out of the ether or I come across something in passing that not only gives me a foundational aspect a story has been missing, but also justifies a thing I did that I didn’t think too much about.

Case in point: O’Mara, the Omega of the Lowell pack. She simply showed up, Irish and wearing men’s clothes. The former due to her surname being a perfect fit to align with her role as Omega, and the latter due to… er, half-formed ideas about woman in a man’s role and maybe non-binary?

That was that, and that was what I was going to work with… until it became apparent that her fated mate was Irish, too, and that they were very likely going to have to go back to Ireland.

Ireland in the early 19th century? Really, Suse? How was I going to manage the actual harms of colonialism and keep my spicy English duke world?

I let it be, I didn’t fight it, I laid some groundwork, and then the magic happened: I came upon a TikTok from @ssgbooktok about how the banning of traditional clothing is tried-and-true weapon of colonialism, as stated in Making Empire by Jane Ohlmeyer, and the Brits started it all with the Irish mantle.

Not to spoil, but even though Irish women wore them too, I’m making a very specific mantle the symbol of the status of an Omega in Irish society, and how it’s never been worn by a woman, and how O’Mara is the first woman Omega ever in Irish versipellian society –

And there’s me away in a hack. As we say in Ireland.

---

Is this really pantsing? Or is it merely leaving room for inspiration? I did a bunch of things I was going to pay for later, for sure, and yet it all worked out in the end.

Look, when I started writing dukes it was because that was what the market wanted, and I liked dukes, and I liked dukes, which was fine, and I got the title, A Wolf in Duke’s Clothing, dropping into my brain out of nowhere, while sitting quietly on my sofa –

And it took me ages to realise my duke was using his power and influence to support the so-called lesser beings in his pack, so I wasn’t really writing a ‘proper’ duke at all –

This is all to say that The Shifter’s of Lowell Hall is taking even more shape (HA HA): I was meant to be finishing the servant’s version of the vera amoris (fated mates) legend, and it was meant to be a novella, and it is entirely out of control, so I’m going to leave it alone to sort itself out maybe in my sleep.

I’m now onto O’Mara’s story, mainly because I let that sort itself out, and when the magic presented itself, I recognised it and jumped in.

Maybe that’s the thing: leave room for the magic, in any part of your life, and whether or not it’s on your schedule, respond and maybe take a different path… which is probably going to lead you to the same place anyway, but on a more scenic route!

---

Here’s the link for that TikTok if you’re interested.

And more on the cloaks here.

Aaaaand here’s one for The Shapeshifters of the Beau Monde series!