I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: when I started the first book in The Fellowship Dystopia, My Soul to Keep, I planned for it to be a standalone. Until I wrote “the end” on that novel. My writer brain kicked into high gear, suggesting that Miranda’s story didn’t end there. It didn’t take long to rough out an outline for two more books. By rough out, I mean I had two awkwardly stated themes I could explore in the next two books.
Why Start from Themes
I read a lot of books before I even dreamed of becoming a writer. They were an escape from my life.
I was an introverted kid who moved a lot. Meaning, I went to seventeen different schools before I graduated from high school. That’s 17. Why? We moved a lot when I was a kid. Sometimes it was a move to a “better house,” but nearly every move meant a change in school districts. That meant letting go of old classmates, neighbors, and neighborhoods. It also meant new classmates, new school rules and routines, new neighbors and neighborhoods. All extreme challenges for an introvert that led to a lot of lonely hours. Hours I spent at libraries, nose buried in the pages of books.
Early on I discovered I responded best to characters who were like the person I aspired to be. Eventually, I realized the stories I loved best were the ones where the characters learned something about themselves or their world. I was a deep thinker, even back then, so those stories stuck with me. They taught me things about the people and world around me.
As I got older, I learned what themes were in English class and wrote lots of essays on the topic. You may have done that in school also, but the dictionary can give you a quick refresher.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary says the word theme has three meanings that pertain to fiction writing (there are also two other meanings).
1a. A subject or topic of discourse or of artistic representation
1b. A specific and distinctive quality, characteristic, or concern
1c. The particular subject or idea on which the style of something is based.
With that information, I figured out what kinds of books I liked and why. I needed heroes. Not superheroes, though those stories were fun to read; I needed everyday heroes. They taught me that personal growth could overcome almost anything. They gave me hope I could dream bigger than my small, restricted life. I didn’t have to be a shy, lonely introvert hiding from herself, her trauma, and the world forever.
How Themes Show Up In Life
Humans seek meaning in everything. It’s an unquenchable part of our wiring. We feel a strong need to understand how everything in the world is connected. Psychologists link this need to the fact that humans are the only creatures on earth who can plan for their distant future and for their immediate needs. To do that, we look at our lives, our relationships, and the obstacles in our lives and ask why, what’s the reason. We interpret those answers in themes like identity, roles, life purpose, belonging, legacy, struggle, triumph, and cultural.
Themes can add depth and emotional connection and universal resonance to an individual’s stories about themselves and their world. Not surprisingly, themes show up in fictional stories.
In fact, writers unintentionally include themes in their stories all the time. Some of us choose to develop certain themes in our work.
A Note About My Writing Process
While I reference making outlines below, know that I am not a strict planner. My outlines start as lists of things that need to illustrate one part of Robert McKee’s Forces of Antagonism. Sometimes sections of the outline get more refinement before I write, and sometimes, I just write based on the things on that initial list. During the writing process, the characters grew more real to me, and they added personal twists and turns. All the while, the compass direction of the forces kept the imperfect movement of the story going in the desired direction. I write knowing that the first draft is for me to explore my story. I approach revising a story as a time to refine the story for the reader. The word choices and plot action get refined to more clearly move the characters toward an ending that makes sense to the reader. I may remove some chapters and add some new chapters if I believe it will work better for the reader.
Discovering the Theme of My Soul to Keep
When I began writing My Soul to Keep, I wanted to write a story that would give at least one reader hope the way books gave me hope when I was a child. I didn’t think I chose a theme. Yet, I did. From the start, it was a story about how a person can become a victim and struggle to discover their own agency.
It took a long time, but over the years I continued to develop the story. I refined the book’s primary theme to surviving and thriving after gaining knowledge of abuse. I used the Forces of Antagonism as a kind of compass to guide me in creating the story’s action and emotional arcs. Using that compass made the story I wanted to tell blossom on the page.
Refining the Theme of If I Should Die
In writing book two, I had a lot of information to guide me from My Soul to Keep. Meanwhile, like many of you, I witnessed Russia’s escalating war on Ukraine on television. Since my cover designer lives in Ukraine, I felt a special vested interest. On top of that, my husband and many of his friends were of the Vietnam War era. Each of them had psychological scars from the choices they had made during that time. In my mind, I connected My Soul to Keep and the fight against the Fellowship to the impact of the violence of war on soldiers’ and everyday people’s lives. My very rough idea for a theme for the second book of the trilogy was that violence is sometimes necessary, but if you keep your humanity and compassion and forgive yourself for what you had to do, you can move forward to a nonviolent life. From that, I developed the book’s Forces of Antagonism. The development and writing of this book took much less time. From the theme and the Forces of Antagonism, I developed the plot and character arcs I wanted, story questions, characters, and outlines. And using the Forces as a compass, I writing chapters felt easier.
The Theme of And When I Wake
I did not explore the theme of If I Should Die as completely as I had hoped. So at first, its theme extended into the third book in the trilogy.
With two books as backstory for this one, I hit this outline with a lot of knowledge about the characters. And yet…
The ongoing issues my husband and his friends had, the horrifying pictures from the war in Ukraine and other violent events, refined the questions I had and how I wanted to explore them in my story.
I realized that in Miranda’s timeline, she and her country had been in a guerrilla-type war for years and that experience had to affect her and everyone around her. Just as violence in real life affects real people’s lives today.
In And When I Wake, I explore how violence affects each character. It’s a complex story about complicated people, their motives, and the challenges of the world around them. It’s a fight for—perhaps it would be better to share the book’s description than to give any spoilers here.
About And When I Wake
In the epic conclusion to Lynette M. Burrows’ The Fellowship Dystopia Series, Miranda must find a way to break the theocratic Fellowship’s iron grip on 1965 America while protecting her real identity. But Miranda wants more than the end of the Fellowship—she wants justice for the deaths of her first love and her beloved mentor.
Meanwhile, her sister Irene uses deception, threats, and the Angels of Death behind the scenes to regain her status as wife of the Fellowship’s Prophet. Unless she is stopped soon, she will lead the country more ruthlessly than any before her.
And When I Wake is a searing exploration of whether the fight for justice and the fight for freedom can coexist when everything you love has been taken from you.
If you love morally complex female leads and freedom-from-tyranny stories with deep emotional stakes, you won’t want to miss it.
And When I Wake will be published in just 31 days. Preorder your copy on Amazon today! On Apple Books. On Thalia. Or on Vivilio.
My Hope
From beginning as an uncertain standalone novel years ago, my story about a girl in a repressive society has grown into a trilogy. My journey as an author reflects Miranda’s journey. Miranda grows from a victim to an agent of change, and my writing has grown from an awkward groping for a story to a more and more confident use of the Forces of Antagonism—the compass that keeps my story close to my vision of it. With the help of that compass, the Fellowship Dystopia is now a completed trilogy.
My greatest hope is that what works for me as a writer gives a reader or two hope they can be the hero of their own lives. And maybe, just maybe, share hope with someone who needs it.
And When I Wake launches on January 14, 2026.
Resources
Featured Image by StartupStockPhotos from Pixabay
I admit I have not read your trilogy. That said, this post has me intrigued enough to pursue it. I also appreciate your words on theme, something I’m struggling with in this novel I have been carrying around for years. Thanks!