Lessons From Lexie #4

First: good news! Lexie has been getting some attention from Wattpad itself, readership is going up, and I am having more fun than ever hanging out with my girl Lexie Baker. So, yay!

In this post, I want to talk about an unexpected pleasure and challenge that has come out of writing a serial story in real time: current events. I’d always said I’d be telling the story in “real time,” but what I’d meant by that initially was how Lexie would be interacting with readers as they connect with her, as well as tweeting and responding to things on Twitter. But when the Supreme Court ruled on gay marriage, any plans I had for the chapter the following week had to be scrapped. It wasn’t enough just to mention that it happened: Lexie’s brother is gay and both Benny and his partner Matt are a big part of The Lexie Project. So, obviously, they all had to take a road trip to San Francisco. I happened to be in San Fran at the time for a conference, so it was pretty kismet.

I had originally planned to have a big, splashy premiere happen in that chapter—Lexie was going to get the real red carpet treatment. And I suppose I could have still done that, but then the ruling would have been an afterthought and I felt the new law—and Benny—deserved more…