Can my book get any more cliquer than this?

Edit! I typed this whole post misspelling 'cliche'. I look back on it and laugh, but at the time it was soooo embarrassing. Hey, this was a loooooong time ago.

In my book, Sarea (working title, remember) it seems like EVERYTHING'S clique! It begins on a dark and stormy night, it has an evil king that some people are trying to overthrow, and the main character is someone that looks completely under-qualified for overthrowing the evil king, but then finds out that they can use magic.

I didn't realize how clique my book actually was until I was already more than half-way through,
and then the clique-ness had become too important plot-wise to change.

It actually wasn't as bad as it seemed. I'm hoping that with all the tweaks I add, the clique stuff will be sort of countered. I actually have a pretty un-clique demise in store for my main baddie, and I've also plotted out some other deaths for more secondary villains.

And I'm almost done with the second part of Sarea! This part, other than the ever-popular escape through the window of a tavern late at night, isn't clique at all. And the romantic parts, which I was looking forward to with dread, has been going SO smoothly, and I don't think they're clique, either.

I was reading my first draft of the first-third of Sarea, and was astonished at how different it is from the up-to-date draft. My first draft was so much more shorter, and the writer style was more...amateur. It was only about 50 pages long typed up, and my previous draft is 146 pages. I'm hoping to add even more to it once iGirl''s finished her editing.

And iGirl's sister is working on a title for Sarea!! It looks SO awesome! She's an amazing artist.

Dun Zarum and VBS

I am sooooooooooo tired! Two and three year old kids can be so cute and funny, but when they start crying because, well, if you had ever gone somewhere when you were a kid, placed in a room with other children that are laughing and screaming, and then your mom hastily exits the room, you'd understand. I just try to remember that it's really good that they miss their parents so much. Some kids, like one little lad in particular, just sat and smiled all the time (it's so cute) but others would be fine until they notice that their parents aren't there. Then they set up a wail. When you've just finished comforting them, someone else starts crying and it starts them all over again. And then one assistant couldn't make it today. But, I have to admit...this is fun!

I'm on the last stages of editing the technical stuff that my Dad pointed out (punctuation, terms, and so on) of the one-third of my book (this section's called Dun Zarum, for all of you who don't remember), and then my Mom will proof-read for plot problems. I'm nearly half-way through the next section of the book, too! Yipee!

It seems like a long time ago that I started writing my book, but it's really only been about...six months. And I'm getting much better at writing for longer periods of time more frequently, so it won't be long when I'm finished!

Izori

Advice Needed!

I could use a little advice here on romance. The book that I'm writing (Dun Zarum was the name of one third of the book; the actual name for it is 'Sarea'. For people who don't remember, the main character is a 14-15 year old girl named Ehra (pronounced Ee-ruh, although my dad, who's my 'editor in chief' pronounces it Ay-ruh). She's a serf in the land of Sarea, which is ruled by an evil tyrant named Baashil. King Baashil has 10 Sorcerors at his command, and his grip on Sarea is growing stronger by the hour. Ehra is given a chance to change this when a mysterious 'peddler' named Gnomi (pronounced No-mee) shows up at her village. He tells her that she is actually one of five Elashae, humans who can control a respective element as well as other magic. The Elashae were started long ago by one of the good kings of Sarea, and now it's up to the five current ones (no older than sixteen), and Gnomi, an Elashi of Earth of a former group, to stop the Sorcerers and get Baashil off the throne so they can put the rightful ruler back on.

I'm at the point now where the Elashae have defeated the Sorcerers and 'sunk' their castle. They are now traveling up to the land of Songaia to try and convince the Elves to ally with them to overcome Baashil, who's going to be even more powerful then the Sorcerers.

I'm hoping for Ehra (Elashi of Water) and Maki (Ma-key, the Elashi of Fire) to get married at the end of the book. And I don't want it to be no warning and then poof, they get married, but I don't want the romance leading up to Maki's proposal to be...well, something my dad would raise his eyebrows at when he reads it. I really like the romance in the Redwall Series, but I'm not sure exactly how to write it. My mom suggested that I could have it that Ehra and Maki are just friends, and then something happens that makes them realize their true feelings for each other. Does anyone have any other suggestions? If you do, please share them with me.

Thanks so much,

Izori

P.S. I almost forgot! The notebook which I wrote the first draft of Dun Zarum in and also part of Songaia has been filled up, so we went to Walmart and bought a new one! Yeah, I know, only an author would be excited at the prospect of a new notebook.