1. FIRST ASSIGNMENT: Story Statement
An indentured servant adjusts to life amidst the rich and poor in the multi-cultural 18th century Mohawk Valley as she earns a plot of land, attracts a husband, and learns the importance of female friendship.
2. SECOND ASSIGNMENT: in 200 words or less, sketch the antagonist or antagonistic force in your story.
Dorothea’s main antagonist is patriarchal 18th century beliefs and customs. She defies the wishes of her foster father, a conservative Palatine German farmer, moves to the very different world of the wealthy, Irish, womanizing Sir William Johnson, British Superintendent of Indian Affairs, learns to negotiate the world of the powerful, slave-holding Johnson family, overcomes the difficulties of a young woman starting a farm on her own and the suspicions of her newly arrived Scottish Highlander neighbors. The other antagonist is Patrick Fitzpatrick, the man she finally falls in love with. When he first arrived from Ireland as the serving boy to Sir William’s long-sought for blind Irish Harper, she and Patrick soon became good friends, but she thought he was too young, too fun-loving, and too eager for adventure to ever become the hard-working, responsible farmer husband she seeks. She fends off all her unsuitable suitors until she overcomes her own reluctance to acknowledge the man she really does want to share her life with.
3. THIRD ASSIGNMENT: create a breakout title
Mansions on the Mohawk; A Farm for Dorothea;
4. FOURTH ASSIGNMENT: - - Develop two smart comparables for your novel.
The genres are romantic historic fiction and biographical historic fiction.
Two series which are set in the same era as my book and continue to have a big readership are Dana Gabaldon’s Outlander series, and Sarah Donati’s Into the Wilderness series. I’m not trying to compete with Gabaldon, but her books vividly depict frontier life during the colonial period, as do Donati’s in the post-revolutionary War in upstate New York. In both series the heroine is well-educated and determined to improve the lives of others. In contrast, my heroine is an illiterate servant who is determined to better herself, and we see all levels of frontier society from her point of view.
I’ve found stand-alone historic fiction novels set in this time and place, but none with a similar protagonist, nor that I am enthusiastic about. I keep hoping to find one.
This book is the first in a four book series that I have outlined, but, of course, must stand out on its own.
5. FIFTH ASSIGNMENT: write your own hook line (logline).
In upper New York before the Revolutionary War, a determined young woman, jilted for lack of a dowry, risks her reputation to work for the most powerful family in the Mohawk Valley in order to earn a plot of land, becomes part of a multi-cultural community of friends and neighbors and discovers unexpected love.
6. SIXTH ASSIGNMENT: sketch out the conditions for the inner conflict your protagonist will have.
Dorothea believes she will not be happy unless she can attract a sturdy, responsible, young, German-speaking Palatine farmer who will be her partner in running a farm and raising a family. Once she serves her indenture in a mansion belonging to members of a powerful, wealthy family, and earns a lease on a plot of land, she has changed so much that her farm boy suitors all bore her. Unlike Patrick Fitzpatrick. She first met him when she was eighteen and he was only fourteen, so she thought of him as a younger brother and she ignored his love for her. After four years, however, he grew up and her feelings changed. They marry. But he does not turn out to be the reliable farmer she wanted. Indentured to the same wealthy family, he still spends much of his time working for them, at tasks that feed his adventurous spirit. Meanwhile, Dorothea begins to worry before the birth of their first child, knowing her biological mother died in childbirth. Dorothea’s low point comes when Patrick does not return from Philadelphia in time for the birth of their first child, but female friends and neighbors help her greatly.
Sketch a hypothetical scenario for the "secondary conflict" involving the social environment.
Dorothea becomes a nurserymaid at Guy Park Manor, home of Sir William Johnson’s daughter Polly and her husband Guy Johnson. The Johnson family employs many enslaved people. Dorothea does not approve of slavery, but she benefits from it because the slaves do all of the hard and unpleasant manual labor. She makes an effort to become friends with an enslaved maid of her own age, but she can’t do much for the girl until she gets her farm.
7. FINAL ASSIGNMENT: sketch out your setting in detail.
Dorothea is raised by a German-speaking Palatine foster-family in the Schoharie Valley of New York in the years after the French and Indian War. Her brother-in-law, from an old Dutch family, encourages her to become a maid in the newly built Guy Park Manor, further north, on the banks of the Mohawk River. Guy Park is one of four Mansions in the Mohawk Valley occupied by members of the Irish-German-Mohawk family of Sir William Johnson, British Superintendent of Indian Affairs, who is one of the wealthiest men in the colonies. Three of the mansions are still standing today. The Mohawk Indians (the Onkwehonwe) have shrinking amounts of land and settlements in the area where they coexist with the Palatines, the Dutch, newcomers from Ireland, and the most recent influx of Scottish Highlander refugees whom Sir William recruited to settle on his vast estate.
