Clarity

Clarity requires sleep, which thankfully I've had a bit of the past three nights. I think there are stages in writing where you can make progress even if you're extra tired. However, when you run into a brick wall and start deleting entire scenes, even whole chapters, change up point-of-view characters--that requires brain cells that actually bump into each other. That's basically where I was a month ago when I stopped sleeping, so working on the Marks of Repentance revisions has been close to non-existent in the meanwhile. I've opened (yet another) new file this week and am writing the first chapter from scratch (again). I know the information that needs to be in it but there were parts of the previous setting that interfered with moving ahead. We're now set in a marketplace (instead of at the city wharf) and it seems to be pulling tighter together. It took me three days to write about 1700 words and there are definitely horrible parts in there. It's hard to look at this as first draft when I've revised the entire novel a couple times and this chapter something like 8 times. However, first draft it is and needs to be treated as such. Treated how? Like something that just needs to be WRITTEN already--so I can fix it. It's difficult to fix something I haven't written yet.

I think it's a solid start. Now I just need to get some momentum going.