As I finish the first draft of my WW2 thriller You Can Hear Chopin from the Attic, I reflect on the story I’ve written thus far and consider the re-drafting process ahead…

In case you hadn’t heard the news, the first draft of my third major work, You Can Hear Chopin from the Attic, is now completed. I couldn’t believe it when I discovered it had taken nearly three years to finish, with well over 600 pages and 220,000 words written, not to mention a lot of self-doubt and deliberations over whether to start from scratch.

It’s with all that in mind that I’m facing the upcoming re-drafting and editing process with a mixture of excitement and dread. On the one hand, it’ll be fun to read through it from start to finish. But on the other hand, if it took that long to crack out one draft… how long will it take to analyse everything, monitor character arcs and development… to do everything you used to do in GCSE English? To say nothing of the amount that’ll need to be reduced or cut completely.

Synopsis (as it stands)

Young hotelier Heinrich Oeunhausen is in charge of The Heinrichstürme, one of the last luxury hotels still standing in 1943 Berlin. While he himself remains apolitical, he serves the war effort by accommodating a number of officers in the Nazi Party’s employ, including his family friend, the Minister of Hospitality, Standartenführer Leopold Upfauer, who pressures Heinrich to join the Party when the hotel’s finances begin to dwindle. Heinrich is reluctant, not least because upstairs, he houses two secret guests. His wife Sofie, a schizophrenia sufferer, is confined to their suite on the third floor, often heavily sedated. Above her hides the temperamental Jewish pianist Itzhak Zylberman, whose music has a mysterious but calming effect on Sofie’s condition.

The arrival of Cordelia Knesebeck stirs up trouble, as she is repeatedly caught snooping around the hotel, and ultimately becomes deputy manager, with the connivance of Upfauer. Cordelia discovers Heinrich’s secret, but she has an agenda of her own. Knowing what the other knows, Heinrich and Cordelia form an uneasy alliance — Cordelia to help protect Sofie, and Heinrich not to stand in her way. The subsequent events affect staff and customers alike, including the concierge Alois Seyẞ, Heinrich’s reprobate brother Konrad, and Upfauer’s sycophantic second-in-command Hoesch.

Major characters

• Heinrich Oeunhausen — 23-year-old hotelier, owner of The Heinrichstürme hotel.
• Cordelia Knesebeck — arrives as a guest, but later buys half the hotel to become deputy manageress. Has a secret involving Upfauer.
• Sofie Oeunhausen — Heinrich’s 20-year-old wife, suffers from schizophrenia.
• Standartenführer Leopold Upfauer — Reichsminister of Hospitality, family friend of the Oeunhausens and a close confidante of Hitler. Something of a father/uncle figure to Heinrich and Konrad.
• Itzhak Zylberman — Polish-Jewish pianist in his 80s, prone to bad temper and bitter moods. Reputed for Chopin recitals.
• Alois Seyẞ — The Heinrichstürme’s cynical and intelligent maître d’ and concierge.
• Konrad Oeunhausen — Heinrich’s younger brother, something of a playboy and gambler.
• Franz Verschuer — Accountant and lawyer for the Ministry of Hospitality; also controls the purse strings of The Heinrichstürme.
• Irene Ginze — Alois’ best friend. Works at the hotel as both housekeeper and waitress.
• Hauptsturmführer Hoesch — Upfauer’s sycophantic, overzealous aide. Jealous of Heinrich’s close relationship with his employer.
• Frau Belinda Elberfeld — Head housekeeper at The Heinrichstürme, and staunch supporter of the Party.

Sounds pretty okay so far, right? Next stage, however, is to deal with some potential weak spots.

1. Root out the repetitions

When you’re writing the first draft, the priority is just to get it down on paper. So, when it comes to action, I may over-repeat myself. I know there are far too many instances of my characters walking down hallways and knocking on doors, not necessarily doing anything too important. This will be one of the first things I’ll look for and whittle down.

2. Strengthen and reinforce characters

Even with a comprehensive plan, it’s easy to lose track of characters over a period of nearly three years. Traits and behaviours I may have established in the earlier chapters may be non-existent by the end of the novel, purely because I forgot. Another one of the top priorities in the re-drafting process – a study of all the main characters, ensuring nothing important gets lost or forgotten about. If it’s really important, it’ll be interesting to apply it at other points in the story, to see how it affects characters and scenes.

In addition, there are some characters whose backstories I never really decided on – including my main antagonist, Upfauer. Who, as the writing process has gone on, has become less actively antagonistic. I had him down as outright evil, but I don’t feel I’ve made a convincing case of that so far. So I’ll need to assess how to establish that early on, to make his development more striking as the story progresses. Other characters, such as Itzhak and Verschuer, start out strong but have ended up not serving much purpose later in the story. Again, I’ll look at remedying these issues in the re-draft.

3. Vary the vocabulary

At any point of the writing process, I try to give at least 80% of my attention to variety in words and phrases. I’m a language lover – sue me. But, tying back to my first point, there are a plethora of points at which I use the same word for the same thing, the same adjectives and verbs to describe the same characters and actions. I can’t have that – I need a bit more colour to the language. I always keep a list of words I’ve heard or read. And if there’s a natural place for them, I’ll make sure they find their way into the work.

4. Strongly consider – are the protagonists working?

It’s not the first time I’ve brought this up in a blog post. The more I overthink it, the more I convince myself that I may need to change my main protagonist. You Can Hear Chopin from the Attic really follows two main threads – Heinrich primarily, and Cordelia secondarily – with a few chapters dedicated to the viewpoints of Alois and Upfauer. There are plenty of reasons why this should stay the case. Heinrich and Cordelia’s own relationship, and those they have with Konrad and Upfauer… they’re the focus of some of my favourite parts of the story. But they wouldn’t get as much attention if I changed the main protagonist to Alois, which is what I’m currently thinking.

Over the read-through, I really need to consider whether Heinrich and Cordelia’s viewpoints are the more entertaining. Or could Alois’ cynical, almost satirical view of the story prove better?

With this in mind, I have actually written an alternative opening to the first chapter from Alois’ POV. A preview will be coming soon for dedicated followers.

So there it is — the current state of play for You Can Hear Chopin from the Attic. I definitely need to take some time away from it. But come 2024, let the re-drafting process begin. Let’ see if it’s recognisable by the time we’re done!

Thank you for reading. Let me know what you think. And if you want to know more about my new book, leave a comment or follow my Facebook and Instagram pages. And read further posts out more about this novel. 

As the weary first draft battle continues on, I’ve already learnt a few things about my new book that I’ll need to address when I’m finished…

Retrospect is a cruel thing. And overthinking is even crueller. They’re both my bedfellows at the moment. Especially when it comes to this new book, You Can Hear Chopin from the Attic. As I mentioned in previous posts, including my latest update, writing my new World War II thriller has been a labour of love. At one point I considered starting the whole thing from scratch, despite reaching the 100,000-word mark.

The key takeaway with any first draft is to just get it down on paper. Don’t look to please your beta readers or whoever you turn to for feedback. It’s highly unlikely they’re going to say it’s perfect. Your characters will be inconsistent, and your plots will have holes in them. However, it’s good to be mindful of these possible issues. Here are five from my own work-in-progress.

1. We may be following the wrong protagonist

I took you through my main characters in my new book more than once, so I won’t do it again. Least of all because the hierarchy might shift in the re-drafting process!

The main storyline in You Can Hear Chopin concerns Heinrich Oeunhausen, the owner of the hotel where most of the action takes place, and his wife Sofie. As a schizophrenia sufferer, Sofie would be considered ‘unworthy of life’, or words to that effect, under the Nazi regime. And so, to protect her, Heinrich conceals her existence from all but a few close allies, yet hides her in plain sight in his own hotel. He exploits the trust of his family friend Standartenführer Upfauer to keep the hotel’s Nazi clientele from throwing their weight around. In essence, keeping Sofie relatively safe.

However, the emotional and developmental journey I’m taking Heinrich on might not be that interesting or thrilling when told through his eyes. Like my other books, there’s more than one point-of-view character in You Can Hear Chopin. Heinrich and the other major protagonist Cordelia Knesebeck make up the bulk of them. But the one character that observes their actions and decisions the most is the concierge, Alois. A character I happen to enjoy writing a great deal. Not least because he serves as an outlet to satirise even present-day attitudes towards hospitality workers. He says and thinks all the things I would have loved to have said to customers in my hotel days! I have half a mind to rework the story and tell it all through Alois’ eyes, which will (hopefully) add more suspense and mystery. Undecided yet, but there’s a good chance I’ll give it a go.

2. This new book is too long

Can imagine looks of horror and astonishment when I say the plan for this new book is, currently, 73 pages long. That includes all the notes I made during my research, links to relevant articles and so on; a list of dishes that could potentially make up menus for the hotel, plus whatever cocktails and other drinks were available; extensive character bios, and, most notably, an in-depth treatment for plot and character for each of the 110 chapters.

Yes, you read that correctly. 110.

BUT!

I have already decided that what I considered the final quarter of the novel can be cut. Not necessarily forever. It would comprise a courtroom drama, prison turmoil for certain characters, and missing crucial evidence with a ticking clock to find it. Arguably the most thrilling part of the book. But it’d take place two years after the main action. Half the major characters wouldn’t be involved. In my opinion, it would serve just as well as a potential sequel.

3. Repetition, repetition, repetition…

As we don’t change settings all that much in the course of the story, I often find myself repeating phrases and words. Even some that, when I first used them, seemed quite fresh and clever. There’ll be three questions I’ll ask myself when I do my editing and redrafting in these cases. A) Can I shift the action elsewhere, to a different setting? B) Can I touch on another storyline in between and break this up? Or C) Can some of these scenes in the same setting be condensed down into one?

Plus, I keep a trusty list of unusual or uncommon words in my phone that’s proven useful in the past. We’ll turn to that again in due course.

4. Some characters need more attention

I came into this new book with a very clear idea of which characters are major and which are minor. But over the course of writing, some have proven much nicer to write than others. And indeed others just haven’t featured as much in the story as they should. It’ll be one of the first things I make a note of in my re-drafting process. Where could we pick these characters’ threads up earlier or more often?

5. Some characters seem familiar

This one actually came from a follower off the back of another post. A truly invaluable bit of feedback. It was pointed out that the character of Heinrich seemed to bear similarities to another character from one of my other books! Namely, George Whitlocke, butler to Lady Vyrrington in Lust & Liberty and Sin & Secrecy. And while I can’t confirm or deny whether or not it’s correct yet, it definitely had me wondering. How many of my other You Can Hear Chopin characters have the same voices and personalities as the Berylford cast? Is Standartenführer Upfauer a National Socialist analogue for Abel Stirkwhistle? Could Mrs Urmstone have been reincarnated in Cordelia Knesebeck by accident?

I like to think I’ve created enough of a disparity between them. But at the same time, on paper, maybe there are dangerous similarities! It’s something I never thought to look at before. A cracking piece of feedback, and sincerest thanks go to that follower.

Thank you for reading. Let me know what you think. And if you want to know more about my new book, leave a comment or follow my Facebook and Instagram pages. And read further posts out more about this novel.