Writing Next Heart of Shadow Chapter

Am working on Chapter 20 of Heart of Shadow.  I really like this one a lot, but I also think it gets rather... intense.   When I'm writing Palpatine, I do try to explore some of the more uncomfortable parts of his character.  I think it's easy to end up filing a lot of that off when he's written, but I feel like a lot of his character is lost when those parts are overlooked.  And for me, I think a redemption story *needs* to be able to look at that kind of thing.  If we're going to look at a character who transforms what is evil in themselves, I think that we need to be able to see what is being transformed for that to be satisfying.  A redemption story isn't "I wrote this character as a good person to begin with" or "I wrote this character as evil but they're sad so it's justified".  No, a redemption story is when a character starts out evil but resolves to change their course.  Those other stories are indeed stories that one can choose to write, but that doesn't make them redemption stories.  A redemption story is about positive change.  So we need to show both the start and endpoint.

Thoughts on Reading

When an author deals you emotional damage because they don't know what they are doing: Terrible

When an author deals you emotional damage because they know exactly what they are doing: Wonderful