Writing Next Heart of Shadow Chapter

[unspeakablehorror]

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.