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I have outlined my novel!
I have an outline! I wrote it over the last few days. I'm super excited to see this story taking shape.
I was writing with a mind to scrub, so I got rid of as many TAB specific references as possible. I have a brand spanking new plot with Sir Eustace as a factory owner dealing with striking workers, and Emilia as an ally. I have Janine as a labor organizer! There is a murder. And Holmes comes to investigate the case.
I've also got a slow burn enemies to lovers arc going on with Hooper and Holmes. They start as adversaries, with Holmes investigating Emilia's murder. They gradually learn to respect and then develop affection for each other.
The second half of the novel is an adaptation of the Charles Augustus Milverton. 'Lady Eva' Blackwell, the proprietress of a molly house Holmes occasionally visits, is being blackmailed by Milverton, who is demanding the names of the establishments patrons. Holmes and Hooper try to negotiate with him. Mycroft promises to take care of the situation if only they will do the respectable thing and get married.
Finally, I decided to simplify Hooper's gender identity, and just make him transmasculine. I know far more people who fit this description than I do people who are genderfluid, and I feel like I have a better chance of getting this right.
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With Hooper's gender identity, I wonder if it would make sense to similarly choose whatever gets you most motivated to write -- I can't tell if that's the thing you've currently decided or not. "Getting it right," whatever you choose, could be part of the scrubbing/polishing process.. if whatever you try doesn't work, you could edit back to something easier. Of course if you've decided to simplify because the more complicated thing doesn't get you feeling inspired to write, totally ditch it.
I'm looking forward to seeing what this grows into!
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The second issue is regarding the subplot with Mycroft. Mycroft thinks he's being supportive; his stance on queerness is 'do what you want behind closed doors but for god's sake keep up appearances.' And he thinks Hooper would make a good wife for Holmes. Hooper actually considers Mycroft's proposition, mostly out of guilt because the blackmail is ongoing and he knows he could stop it. It's Holmes who says "no, we're not doing this; it isn't you." So the idea of marriage is vaguely tempting to Hooper even as a man. Another one of my betas suggested that if he were genderfluid, it might be more logical for them to get married; I know multiple afab enbies married to cis men who sort of "round themselves up" to female, at least outwardly, and keep their real gender private. And while I think there probably were lots of Victorian lavender marriages, that isn't what I want for Holmes and Hooper.
So yeah, I do think it will be easier to write Hooper as transmasculine, but that's not the only reason I wanted to write him that way. If I were super convinced writing him genderfluid was the story I needed to tell, I'd do it.
But what's most important to me was to reconsider the narrative that the afab people who presented as men in past eras were cis women in disguise. I just wanted to challenge that idea of "woman dresses as a man to make it in a man's world" and make it a story about a trans man finding his place in the Victorian London queer scene.
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