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Oct. 19th, 2004 12:40 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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nanowrimo_ljOK, OK, I finally get it -- even though I started out writing early. I just got so excited.
Here's my chapter outline (roughly -- it's all up for grabs) and plot. Help Me! I need feedback!
“Chasing Alessandro Safina” is a novel about obsession, restlessness and the search for more meaning and deeper life experiences. When the story opens, 26-year-old American Isabel Cahill is in a bedroom in Siena, Italy’s most medieval town. Something is amiss. Her eyes are wild, her thoughts strange and she’s clearly gone as she rubs olive oil into her skin in an attempt to “be more Italian.” Only this will open the secrets of joy and true living she believes she hears in the voice of Alessandro Safina, a young opera singer whose star is on the rise.
Chapter 2: Isabel chases Safina all over Europe, attending his concerts to learn what she thinks he knows about passionate living. This is her attempt to banish her own suburban upbringing, which Isabel views as mediocre and superficial. She has little money and goes to great lengths to get into the concerts. We see what brought her here in the first place.
Chapter 3: While refusing to answer her mother’s increasingly frantic emails, which provide some insight into Isabel’s psyche and situation, Isabel experiences Europe; she decides to spend two nights on the street so that she might afford to stay in Safina’s hotel in the next city. Drama on the streets. What does she see? Joy? Despair? What does she learn? A new character is introduced here, someone who will follow Isabel through the rest of the story.
Chapter 4: Isabel receives a letter from her parents containing a plane ticket home. This chapter includes a long flashback on "home" and how that plays into the story. At the same time, she believes she is being watched and followed, she thinks by someone with Safina’s camp, while also refusing to answer her mother’s increasingly frantic e-mails. I mean, on a whim, Isabel sold her car, relinquished her apartment and headed for Italy. Some of Safina's people have started to notice Isabel at all the concerts.
Chapter 5: Isabel bribes a hotel worker to let her go into Safina’s room; she gives the worker the plane ticket to America. In the hotel, she just misses Safina. She decides to take singing lessons in an attempt to understand opera.
Chapter 6: Now really destitute, Isabel takes some menial work while figuring out what to do next. Does she give up on this and return home? The experiences she had and the people she meets in doing this will play into her search for self and meaning. One of them will reappear in the story later as a reminder of this period in Isabel's life and search.
Chapter 7: A comback from Chapter 6, not sure what.
Chapter 8: Now in Siena, the singer's hometown, Isabel learns things about the city, the way of life and Italians. While sitting in a touristy Sienese café, Isabel learns that a new cook is coming to the Safina household. Isabel wonders why it can’t be her and takes action to make sure it is. By a “strange” misunderstanding, an aide to the singer mistakes Isabel for the new chef and takes her to Safina’s house, although the singer is away on tour.
Chapter 9: Isabel explores the house, her obsession and Alessandro’s secret. We meet Nico, who runs the Safina household. Isabel’s cooking takes off and she begins to experience Italian family life; she is blending in, or thinks she is, by the time Alessandro returns, does a benefit concert and Isabel is forced to attend incognito.
Chapter 10: More adventures -- I have no idea what. Probably the drama of the Palio, a huge, rowdy, tradition filled festival in Siena. Some change will take place in Isabel through this experience. I don't yet know what.
Chapter 11: Nico takes Isabel to a party where Safina is due and Isabel encounters opera’a past through an intriguing invitee, Francesca Majorano, the great, great granddaughter of one of the last Italian castrati. The intriguing tale of the castrati only makes Isabel love, embrace and yearn for Italy’s passion more. But there is a twist to why Francesca is there.
Chapter 12: Isabel explores Siena with Nico, seeing other sides of it -- and herself. We meet a 16th century saint and I don't know what else. The saint is a metaphor for Isabel herself, how what she wants from life fails to fit in with the prevailing thought of her contemporaries, in this case other Americans.
Chapter 13: We are back in Isabel’s room, where the story, the prologue, began. Nico is at the door. Nico finally understand's Isabel's obsession and has to make a decision. Isabel faces a decision as well.
Chapter 14: The end. All pieces come together. Or don't.
Because this is about pop-opera, each chapter - Capitulo Uno, Capitulo Due, Capitulo Tre - includes an actual musical notation that somehow captures the mood of the section. As in, Capitulo Uno, Melancolia.
This sounds so stupid now. Is it stupid? I wanted to explore obsessions. Please, tell me.
Here's my chapter outline (roughly -- it's all up for grabs) and plot. Help Me! I need feedback!
“Chasing Alessandro Safina” is a novel about obsession, restlessness and the search for more meaning and deeper life experiences. When the story opens, 26-year-old American Isabel Cahill is in a bedroom in Siena, Italy’s most medieval town. Something is amiss. Her eyes are wild, her thoughts strange and she’s clearly gone as she rubs olive oil into her skin in an attempt to “be more Italian.” Only this will open the secrets of joy and true living she believes she hears in the voice of Alessandro Safina, a young opera singer whose star is on the rise.
Chapter 2: Isabel chases Safina all over Europe, attending his concerts to learn what she thinks he knows about passionate living. This is her attempt to banish her own suburban upbringing, which Isabel views as mediocre and superficial. She has little money and goes to great lengths to get into the concerts. We see what brought her here in the first place.
Chapter 3: While refusing to answer her mother’s increasingly frantic emails, which provide some insight into Isabel’s psyche and situation, Isabel experiences Europe; she decides to spend two nights on the street so that she might afford to stay in Safina’s hotel in the next city. Drama on the streets. What does she see? Joy? Despair? What does she learn? A new character is introduced here, someone who will follow Isabel through the rest of the story.
Chapter 4: Isabel receives a letter from her parents containing a plane ticket home. This chapter includes a long flashback on "home" and how that plays into the story. At the same time, she believes she is being watched and followed, she thinks by someone with Safina’s camp, while also refusing to answer her mother’s increasingly frantic e-mails. I mean, on a whim, Isabel sold her car, relinquished her apartment and headed for Italy. Some of Safina's people have started to notice Isabel at all the concerts.
Chapter 5: Isabel bribes a hotel worker to let her go into Safina’s room; she gives the worker the plane ticket to America. In the hotel, she just misses Safina. She decides to take singing lessons in an attempt to understand opera.
Chapter 6: Now really destitute, Isabel takes some menial work while figuring out what to do next. Does she give up on this and return home? The experiences she had and the people she meets in doing this will play into her search for self and meaning. One of them will reappear in the story later as a reminder of this period in Isabel's life and search.
Chapter 7: A comback from Chapter 6, not sure what.
Chapter 8: Now in Siena, the singer's hometown, Isabel learns things about the city, the way of life and Italians. While sitting in a touristy Sienese café, Isabel learns that a new cook is coming to the Safina household. Isabel wonders why it can’t be her and takes action to make sure it is. By a “strange” misunderstanding, an aide to the singer mistakes Isabel for the new chef and takes her to Safina’s house, although the singer is away on tour.
Chapter 9: Isabel explores the house, her obsession and Alessandro’s secret. We meet Nico, who runs the Safina household. Isabel’s cooking takes off and she begins to experience Italian family life; she is blending in, or thinks she is, by the time Alessandro returns, does a benefit concert and Isabel is forced to attend incognito.
Chapter 10: More adventures -- I have no idea what. Probably the drama of the Palio, a huge, rowdy, tradition filled festival in Siena. Some change will take place in Isabel through this experience. I don't yet know what.
Chapter 11: Nico takes Isabel to a party where Safina is due and Isabel encounters opera’a past through an intriguing invitee, Francesca Majorano, the great, great granddaughter of one of the last Italian castrati. The intriguing tale of the castrati only makes Isabel love, embrace and yearn for Italy’s passion more. But there is a twist to why Francesca is there.
Chapter 12: Isabel explores Siena with Nico, seeing other sides of it -- and herself. We meet a 16th century saint and I don't know what else. The saint is a metaphor for Isabel herself, how what she wants from life fails to fit in with the prevailing thought of her contemporaries, in this case other Americans.
Chapter 13: We are back in Isabel’s room, where the story, the prologue, began. Nico is at the door. Nico finally understand's Isabel's obsession and has to make a decision. Isabel faces a decision as well.
Chapter 14: The end. All pieces come together. Or don't.
Because this is about pop-opera, each chapter - Capitulo Uno, Capitulo Due, Capitulo Tre - includes an actual musical notation that somehow captures the mood of the section. As in, Capitulo Uno, Melancolia.
This sounds so stupid now. Is it stupid? I wanted to explore obsessions. Please, tell me.
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