Revision Outline

As near as I can remember, I am currently working on my sixth novel revision. By the time I'd written my first novel, I'd figured out that an outline would be a huge help. Why did it take me so long to understand that the same thing would be true of revision?

In 2007 I spent most of the year revising one novel, and I'm happy with the result. The process, however, was like pulling hair out by the handful. I worked through from beginning to end, going back and forth as I discovered issues. For instance, realizing something needed to be foreshadowed, then searching out the best place to put in a mention earlier. Realizing I'd dropped a thread, and looking for places to tie them off later on without drawing undue attention. Or should this thread have become more important rather than dwindling? Back and forth, back and forth. Just keeping track of all this (in my head, of course--where else?) was headache inducing and there were days I simply couldn't face the mental gymnastics required.

Holly Lisle talks about a one-pass revision. I thought I was doing this, for the most part. But I was so bogged down I couldn't see the forest for the trees. Many days, I couldn't see the trees for the twigs and leaves in my face.

About a year ago Margaret taught a workshop at Forward Motion about using a revision outline. I could see that this method worked with what Holly had been trying to teach. Since then, I've taken Holly's How to Think Sideways online writing course (highly recommended, by the way!) and feel that the process has clarified for me.

I guess the proof is in the pudding, as they say. I've read through Chloe this past week using techniques learned in the Think Sideways class, and analyzed my scene list with all the insights I've learned since the last big revision. Today I deleted scenes (in outline form) that were either weak or misleading or pointless, and replaced them with ideas that add greater conflict and move the story forward more forcefully. I've still got about the last 20% of the outline to rework. There are several really lame scenes coming up that need to be reworked, but I think I've got the underpinnings in place to deal with it.

This is all going in Scrivener. Have I mentioned lately how much I love this program for Macs? One thing Holly teaches is something she calls The Sentence Lite, in which one tries to get to the central kernel of the conflict of the individual scene. This Sentence Lite is what goes on the front of my Scrivener notecards, but, being as they're virtual notecards, there's plenty of room on the *back* for additional details, such as what subplots are carried in this scene, what additional characters are present, etc.

This is giving me the best of both worlds. I used to simply write *about* the scene on the notecards, and then wonder why the scene, when written, fell flat. Well, some of them weren't really scenes, didn't have solid conflict, didn't do any thing that pushed the whole story forward. They had good information in them and were often needed to a degree, yet still fell short of the goal. Spending a bit of extra time to focus on the core conflict of each scene ahead of time helps me to clarify the path through the scene.

At least, that's the goal. I wrote the new first chapter to Chloe's story yesterday, then went back to the re-outlining today with a new sense of purpose. I have a much clearer vision of where this story is going, and what I'd like to accomplish with it. Having this version of an outline is energizing!

2009 plans

Well, here it is the 17th day of the new year. You'd think I could post up some goals for it at some point, eh? Perhaps my first goal should be...

1. Blogging more. Aiming for at least once a week might be a good idea.
2. Getting my website completely redone and the blog integrated. Hopefully within the next month.

Most of the things in my life that I have *some* measure of control over are writing related. While many of the highlights of last year (and previous years) are in family areas, those aren't areas where public goals make sense. So here goes on writing ones:

3. Novel Submissions: Keep Majai's Fury in submission. (I've sent queries out twice already this year, and it's been rejected once. So I'm succeeding in this goal, thus far.)

4. Writing: Finish Dottie and Tempest. (It looks like Dottie is going to move forward and be the first for concentration. I'm taking her story through the How to Think Sideways course as we speak.) I'll consider doing NaNo this year, if these are complete and nothing else seems to be more pressing.

5. Contests: I plan to submit at least two entries into the Genesis. Of course I would like to increase my *streak* of finaling and increase my standing. *If* I final again this year, I'd like to try to get to conference in September. But that's not quite a goal.

6. Revising: I'm not sure what will hit the front burner on this one. It depends on how long the writing from Goal 4 takes. At the moment it's a toss-up between Quest to Be Queen and Chloe. I wish I revised faster is the real truth!

7. Critiquing: I'll take on up to four novels this year for crit, though I'm not sure right now which of my partners will have something ready. So this goal is a bit vague.

8. Forward Motion: Continue with moderator duties at FM, including writing and facilitating one new workshop this year. Other things may come up.

9. Book Tours: I'm committed still to touring at least a dozen new books on this blog this year. Maybe it's cheating to stick it in my goals when there will be two next week!

Tempest clears 40K

Although I've got a lot on the go these days, I'm managing at least an hour on Tempest most mornings. Today I crossed the 40K milestone, and I should reach the official halfway point of my current outline later this week. The outline keeps growing, though! That's good, I believe. The two scenes I've written this week weren't in the outline even last week; they came considerably after I did the massive rebuild of the outline a couple weeks back. I was staring at the notecards--have I mentioned recently how much I love Scrivener?--and realized I hadn't shown a major mental turning point for the main character.

Duh.

Today I also broke and fixed my website while I was updating it. I needed to add Tempest to the *projects* section as well as add the Genesis finals for Majai's Fury and Off Beat (previously known as Marks of Repentance and The Girl Who Cried Squid).

And while I wandered the net looking for agents to submit Majai's Fury to, I discovered a contest at Agent Kelly Mortimer's blog. Then I needed to find something to submit--something that was not fantasy! So I got an entry off today (not mentioning the project here as the entries are to remain anonymous through some complicated method, but you've met it before!)

Third place in Genesis!

Some of you may recall that The Girl Who Cried Squid (aka Krin, or Off Beat) became a finalist in the American Christian Fiction Writers Genesis contest back in spring. The results of the contest were announced Saturday at the annual conference, and my novel placed third in the Science Fiction/Fantasy/Allegory category.

The finalists are:
1st: Chawna Schroeder, Metamorphosis
2nd: Lynda K. Arndt, The Song of Blood and Stone
3rd: Valerie Comer, The Girl Who Cried Squid

Last year, Marks of Repentance went to the final level but did not place, so the improvement makes me happy.

Story Compost

The Matchmaker world needs to be quite complex for a couple of reasons. First, I can see several novels taking place in it, so there needs to be plenty to explore. Second, each novel should be 100-150,000 words. That's a lot of story, to the uninitiated. Longer than the average novel. Why? I figure if you're going to think at all, you might as well think big, and so this world and novel are being designed with the Luna imprint in mind. Luna is a division of Harlequin that features novels in a fantasy setting with a strong female protagonist and a romantic subplot.

The first draft of Majai's Fury (aka Marks of Repentance) came in about 93K, my longest ever. The re-re-revised version that is currently seeking its fortune is 101K. The matchmaker novels could/ should come in at one and a half times that.

Gulp. That's a lot of story. That's a lot of world.

I've been *seeing* this world for a couple years now, catching glimpses of Kaesa, the first heroine to have her tale set here. About a month ago I decided to focus on her story and see if I couldn't get her ready to write in just a few short weeks.

Insert maniacal laughter here.

I've followed my mind into whatever paths seemed to entertain it and possibly pertain to the Plan. I've played with mythical flying beasts and Yiddish matchmaking sites. I've downloaded Scrivener and created characters and twists and plot cards.

There are many layers composting in the Scrivener binder called Matchmaker. Trust me on that. There is a very cool story in there. Somewhere. But many holes remain. What I don't know is if the projected length of the project is messing with my mind or whether there's something else wrong. I'm pretty sure it's fixable, but I can't quite grasp the problem.

Metaphorically speaking, I've added layers of leaves and vegetable peelings and rotted hay to the compost. I've sprinkled it with water, and I can see the steam coming off the pile, so I know something in there is doing its job. I've taken the pitchfork and turned it over a few times. I've spread it out on the story seeds, but the sprouts are small still. Nothing can hurry growth. You can apply light and rain in the appropriate amounts--add a bit of fertilizer--but a strong story needs time to grow, to reach its roots into the good stuff in the compost and be strong and green and beautiful.

And the Matchmaker novel isn't ready to do that. Not this week, anyway. I'd welcome that flash of inspiration that would pull the threads together, but it seems it has to come to me--that going out and looking for it isn't quite working.

Enter Tempest, stage left.

She presented me with a complete, if skeletal, synopsis on Sunday and I've been trying to ignore her ever since. Today I gave up and created a new binder in Scrivener for her. It looks like her story should have no trouble coming in at 80-90K. I'll let it land there if it likes as I'm not sure it's really a Luna story anyway, though it meets the other basic requirements. I guess we'll see.

I hate abandoning projects, and I feel like I've been doing a lot of that lately. It does feel better when I tell myself that they're just composting. Let's see if I can convince myself.

Party Time!

Late last summer I heard about an upcoming contest hosted by Tosca Lee, whose debut novel Demon: A Memoir was released in June 2007. When announcing the contest, she said that people had begun asking her if she could put in a good word for them with her agent, Joyce Hart of Hartline Literary Agency. Tosca decided to run a contest, and Joyce agreed to look over the winning proposal. The deadline for entry was November 15.

This gave me something to shoot for when completing revisions on Marks of Repentance, which, as you may recall, I spent most of 2007 doing. The deadline pushed me through market analysis, synopsis, pitch, the whole works (thanks to everyone who helped critique these, by the way!!). When it went out my email box, I heaved a sigh of relief and turned my attention to Quest to Be Queen.

Every once in awhile I wondered what was happening with the contest, but I was very busy in early '08 and didn't have a lot of time to dwell on the proposal's fate. In late February I heard from Tosca with the grand news that my proposal was the winner! There were a few things that needed to be ironed out before the official announcement would be made. She has now posted the results on her website.

I've gotten general praise from both Tosca and Joyce, though it's far too early to tell if this win is a major step towards publication or just an entertaining and confirming side trip. Either way, I wanted to share the news with all of you!

Methods of Revision

My friend Margaret is running an intensive workshop at Forward Motion this month about the use of an outline for revising a novel (or short story).

I decided to begin work on my 2006 Nano, The Girl Who Cried Squid to take advantage of the workshop, so I've been spending time beginning the analysis of the novel's structure and how the subplots tie into the main plot. This kind of thinking hurts my head. I'm not sure why. I don't know if the whole story comes into my mind with such a whoosh (don't I wish!) that it doesn't seem to have parts, or if I'm just darn good at weaving in the subplots so well that the main plot can't stand up without them. Either way, it's hard to separate out the parts and look at them objectively.

After the revision of Marks took me the majority of last year, it occurs to me that there might be an easier way to do things. Or at least a way that keeps better track of where I've been and where I'm going. So this time around I'm trying Mar's way. I suppose it would be an improvement if I got most of the headaches out of the way at the beginning!

That's not to say I'm ignoring Quest to be Queen. That edit remains my top current priority, and I've processed nearly 7K so far this week.

I'm curious. How do you revise things? How much do you analyze and plan? Or do you just jump in and hope for the best? And how does that relate to how you wrote the story in the first place?

Goals for 2008

I went hunting my blog for my 2007 writing goals so that I could have a good laugh. It worked! The complete list is here.

To sum up, I thought I would :

1. Finish this revision pass on Quest to be Queen.
2. Complete one (or, if needed, two) passes on Marks of Repentance and GET THE THING KICKED OUT THE DOOR!
3. Write something. Maybe two somethings.
4. Revise something else if time permits. Squid?
5. Work on the recipe book project.

What of that did I actually accomplish?

1. I set aside the revision pass of Quest to be Queen and started back at it in November of '07. It isn't quite done.
2. The only thing on the list I actually completed! Marks of Repentance did, in fact, get revised. It took nine months, but I did complete a pass! It finaled in a contest and is currently out at another one, so I guess you could say I *kicked it out the door*.
3. Write something? Not so much.
4. Revise something else? Not so much.
5. Recipe book project? Decided it wasn't my passion and shelved it.

Yikes.

In the spirit of providing amusement to us all again in twelve months, what are my plans for 2008?

1. Keep sending out Marks of Repentance. After awhile, analyze whether the novel and/or the query package need another revision.
2. Complete revision of Quest to be Queen, get it out to critters and hopefully into submission in 2008.
3. Revise the opening chapters to Chloe's story (romance) and The Girl Who Cried Squid and submit both to the Genesis contest in April.
4. Revise both novels, send to critters.
5. Write something. Maybe two somethings.
6. Keep critting
7. Keep up with moderator duties at Forward Motion

Busy busy

In my little world at work, things generally slow right down at this time of year. Folks usually have other kinds of shopping on their brains other than flooring. At least that's how it was in 2001 and for a couple years thereafter. There'd be full days in December when no one came in and the phone didn't ring.

Not so in 2007. Yesterday was the only quiet day this week (Yay! I edited almost 3500 words of Quest to be Queen bringing my total in the complete column up to about 47K!). Today was flat-out busy. Had a sales rep, but even without him I had almost non-stop customers in the morning, quotes to write, product to order, freight to arrange, etc.

I've got one more week of work before two weeks off for the holidays. My boss guys have always booked off their kids' school Christmas vacation. Most of our customers don't really want us in their houses over the holidays anyway--with the likely exception of the new houses that no one is living in yet, but they're waiting. Oh, well, The guys haven't had any time off since LAST Christmas either, with the exception of a couple of extra long weekends. I'm thinking we all deserve it.

I'd really hoped to have Quest off to the critters before shutting down for the holidays, but that no longer looks remotely possible. I'm about 2/3 done the edits, and even though on a good day I can do nearly 5k, a whole week of good days wouldn't see me to The End. And of course, if I'm pushing that hard, it increases the odds that I'm not noticing sentences that don't quite work.

Must say that after the heavy themes in Marks of Repentance, it's fun to be playing with fairy tales, nursery rhymes, and silly songs. The segment I concluded today touches on: the princess and the pea, old MacDonald had a farm, a needle in the haystack, spinning straw into gold, sleeping beauty, and the dairy fairies. Never heard of dairy fairies? Well, then, maybe there's a few things I invented and tossed in the mix just for entertainment.

Marks pass pretty much done!

I've done the read-through of Marks of Repentance and the spell check and all that fun stuff, and discovered one little scene missing, which I'll write and tuck in within the next couple of days. I've promised a few people they could read this version and I'm not sure who. Er...sorry. If it was you, please email me and I'll get it off to you by mid-week.

I completed another big project today, the crit of Selkie for Mar. Much as I like both her novel and mine, I'm very excited to leave those files closed and open different ones.

Jean's a bad influence on me. She was sharing bits of her Nano-novel with me the other day and we were chatting about how bad a house could get if ignored. Well, for Nano '05 I wrote an inspirational romance that I've been gleefully ignoring ever since, remembering all the issues with the story. But because I thought I remembered some fun scenes where the male mc, Dean, deals with his house and his 12-year old twins, I opened the file.

Why?

So now it's in Jean's hot little hands, and she is ZIPPING at the Nano finish line. Not just so she can read this unnamed, unedited, very rough novel, I'm sure. But now I've read the darn thing through myself from beginning to end and I'm curious what she thinks. I have the next two revision projects lined up already. As well as a writing one. I don't really want my apple cart upset. It would be nice if I could revise a novel in less than ten months, I guess. And being as these two (three? :P ) are pre-critique revisions, they will go faster. Next round, after somebody besides me has actually looked at them in the cold light of day--THAT round goes much slower.

But still, do I really want to write romances? Do I have ideas for more of them?

Help.

Sebastian has friends!

I've recommended Holly Lisle's writing clinics a time or two I think. I've loaded them onto my Palm and have been reading through them a bit at a time in the evenings (I get to spend half an hour a day flat on my back on the floor, and the Palm is easy to hold and read from in that position, easier than a book!) I've read the Character Clinic twice in the past couple months, planning to use it to *build* Sebastian.

Sebastian doesn't want to be built that way. Bits of the clinic are stuck in the back of my head and will no doubt be useful, or the whole thing might be useful on a different character, but not Sebastian.

Mind you, he didn't really want to talk today anyway. Maybe he's in a huff because I've been putting him off? However, I learned some very interesting things today about the two people who will join him on his adventure, Curtis and Evelyn. Evelyn's life has been so lousy I'm almost guilt-ridden as I figure out how to make it worse. Does it count that I expect an HEA ending? (happily ever after)

I'm sure you're wondering if this means that Marks is done. Well, define done! I'm still doing read-through, I'm about a third done that. I know I'll have to tidy up stuff in the last chapter for sure as that is rough draft. But I got the proposal off a couple days ago and so the pressure is lowered just a little. I know there have been times in this past year that this process has been beyond tedious, but as I'm reading through, I still love the story. I've worked on it on and off for three years now--including most of 2007--so that's saying something. I hope I like some of my other stories as well when I'm that immersed. Need to get there to find out.

Onward.

Still grinding along

I've started getting critiques back on both the synopsis and the opening scenes of Marks of Repentance. I've spent some time buffing the synopsis in the past few days--and writing *the pitch*. Think of that as back cover copy. Something short, just a few sentences to intrigue the reader. Kristin, an agent with Nelson who blogs at Pub Rants, has been doing a series of posts on writing the pitch. She's dissected nine from various genres in the past week or two and it's helped me to cement what I'm looking for in writing my own pitch.

Hope Nano is going well for all participants. Guess you folk are too busy to stop by and say hello!

Coming together

Now the new first chapter is completed, three scenes each of about a thousand words. These incorporate bits of what used to be chapters three and four with a lot of new material--and lots of the former first chapter got tossed--so I'm reading through (again) making the changes to keep the story flowing through this section. Don't need the characters having the same conversation twice!

I'm currently through chapter eight with this continuity check, and I expect to discover a hiccup or two in the ending chapters anyway that will require real editing. And then there's the spell-check round.

I have a specific goal date and agent in mind for a proposal package, so I'm working through the synopsis one more time, plus the query letter and all that good stuff. I'm getting nervous. This is where the rubber meets the road.

Meanwhile, the main character from my newest idea keeps drifting through my mind, wondering if I'm ready to play yet.

Not yet, Sebastian. A little more patience. Another week, perhaps.

Marks opening scene # 83

Or something.

But I think I've found it! I really really think I've found the right spot to enter this story. The right setting, the right confrontation, the right characters in place. I'm LOVING it. It has a HOOK!!!!

What I'm not loving is the fact that the second scene doesn't follow the first scene. And I could have nightmares about trying to find the right place for the story to rejoin the path of its being. Tomorrow may be soon enough for that.

NaNoWriMo

November is almost upon us and with that comes NaNoWriMo, more commonly known as Nano and actually short for National Novel Writing Month. Never mind that it's international, not national, and that the actual goal is to write 50,000 words of a brand-new novel in the month of November. Which doesn't usually complete a novel unless it is Young Adult or an unfleshed-out draft.

Nano is great fun. Zillions of people sign up and egg each other on. Lots of people don't make it to 50K. But then again, a lot of them do. I have, three times. In 2004 I got 50K into the first draft of a fantasy spoof, Quest to be Queen, which I completed in March of '05. That's the next novel I'm planning to revise because I'm needing lots of good laughs, and Quest will provide those.

In 2005 I decided to try my hand at writing an inspirational romance, which is still unnamed though I did make it through 54K. It has a few really good scenes in it and, I suppose, some potential. If I ever decide to seriously aim for a career in writing romance I'll certainly dust this one off. However, in the meanwhile, I'm not feelin' it calling to me.

In 2006 I wrote a 57K YA fantasy dubbed The Girl Who Cried Squid. I had a great time with this novel, also, and it's on the list for revision right behind Quest.

So, 2007...and I'm not doing Nano this year. Why not? Three of my seven first drafts were written during Nano! It seems as though the process works! Well, it does and it doesn't. I was going stir crazy this summer and wrote a bunch of words on a contemporary women's novel, Connect the Dot. I totally did this just for fun and because I really really needed to be creating something. The revision of Marks of Repentance was taking waaaaay too long.

So what have I learned? I think I need to have a writing project on the go: something I can work on a little at a time and that it's okay if it takes a year to finish a draft instead of a month. Because every novel I write needs at least two more full passes, maybe more. So truly, my first drafting should be taking up (approximately) a quarter to a third of my writing time. Jamming that into one month in the fall, with overflow, isn't cutting it for me. It makes it too long between creative times. If I could write one, revise one it would probably work, but then the first drafts would start building up and it would take forever to get something ready for market.

So this is my new plan. Not sure if it will work or not, but I need to try something new. I'm one of those people that, upon proving to myself that I can accomplish something difficult--and 50,000 words in a month is not a walk in the park--doesn't feel compelled to keep proving that I can do it.

Lots of my writing pals are signed up and raring to go: Mar, Jean, Bonnie, Erin...maybe others. I'm happy to cheer them on! But I'm sitting out this one.

Laptop Love

Being as hubby's rotation had him away at work all weekend and I hadn't been feeling the greatest lately, I sweet-talked him into leaving the laptop home for me. I mean, I know I have two desktop computers (one at work and one at home) and of course the adorable Palm Tungsten E2 but none of those are a laptop. And I envisioned comfy hours in my recliner with heat on my back, surfing the internet and working away all weekend.

Still, all sitting is bad--even in the world's greatest recliner. So I brought the timer over and set it for 45 minutes...and began critting a novel for Mar. When the timer went off, I re-set it for 15 minutes and went off to do some housework.

The second set I spent working on my synopsis of Marks of Repentance. The first market I'm looking at wants a synopsis of 1-3 pages and mine is currently 2, so that at least is a help. What is hard for me to tell is if it is clear, so it's going out to a few folk who aren't familiar with the novel and then I'll see where I've confuzelated things. (Great word, huh?) And then 15 minutes of housework.

Third set I spent at the desk-top computer working on my family calendar that I take on every year. This is the ninth annual coming up! It's not at crunch point yet--still waiting for some photos to come in from family, but I was pleased with what I got done even so. And 15 minutes of housework.

Then I went back to the synopsis. And housework. And critting. And housework.

By then it was late afternoon and I decided I'd had enough productivity. So I went on to other things, like cooking up a LOT of dry beans and making a mega-pot of soup. Canned some of the beans and saved the rest for today, when I also canned up the soup. Yes, I'm crazy.

The beauty of the laptop came into play again, because with the wireless now set up on the broadband, I could leave the laptop open on the peninsula (well away from stove and sink) and work on things while the canner canned. So I worked through a few more chapters of crit. And now I'm blogging from the recliner again! Gotta love it.

When one of my desktop computers dies, I'll replace with a laptop and the remaining desktop will live at home. I think I still want to have at least one desktop though.

Spoiled? Perhaps. Three computers (and two Palms) might seem like over-kill for two people. The same two people have only two vehicles--one, if you count the fact that the truck has been out of commission for a couple of weeks. It's supposed to be home, (almost) as good as new tomorrow. I hope. I'm ready for my own wheels again too.

It's been a lovely weekend.

Doin' the Happy Dance

My word count goal for Marks of Repentance all along has been 100K. Today I wrote THE END (for the third--or is it the fourth?--time) with 99,752 words.

Happy sigh.

The last 3000 words or so are pretty much brand new so I know I'll find plenty of little wording errors. Maybe even bigger errors. I may even have forgotten a thing or two I meant to include. And I have new plans for the opening scenes. I know I'm not REALLY done.

But for today, the file is DONE, saved, backed up and closed.

And I'm going to play with something else. No idea what yet. Maybe just customers...

97K and change

As you can see, Blogger decided to be nice to me this evening and allow me to change up the rest of the layout. Here we are till the snow flies.

Revising went well again today. Sometimes it is amazing to find out that I planted seeds for certain thread tie-offs way back in the story and didn't even notice that they were there. The power of the sub-conscious at work, I guess. Today I was mulling over that last sub-plot that I didn't really know how to end when I realized that the answers were already there in the text. They just needed a bit of tweaking. Back and forth I went over the past eight chapters or so seeking the right spots to change just one sentence here and there. So I'm pleased with that and feeling really positive with how the ending is pulling together. I'm smack in the midst of the climatic scene right now.

Thank God--truly--for good critiquers who aren't afraid to tell me when things aren't working.

I read somewhere again recently that the denouement--the wrap-up scene--needs to directly answer the questions that were set-up in the first scene. So as I'm within reach of that last scene, I'm thinking back to the beginning (and the comments from the contest judges) and believe I've found the best opening scene to deliver a bit more punch. So being *finished* won't mean finished at all. I think I'll have to flip the novel back to the beginning and start again at that end. Hopefully the stuff in the middle will be solid enough to ignore now though!

I really want to start revising a different story soon. Like Quest to be Queen. I'm in the mood for a light-hearted romp through spoofiness about now. But first I have to have Marks kicked out of the nest. Really. Must stay focused. It's soooo close.

94863

Today's writing/ revising went really well. It's amazing how much clearer I can think without a headache! In re-reading notes from my various critiquers, I think I'm on track to address all of the issues. Some of them still need to be wrapped up, of course, but I've been laying the groundwork for them. One fairly major point I still don't quite know how to solve, but it's still coming up and doesn't need foreshadowing. I'm hoping something sensible will come to me! :P

I expanded two scenes by quite a lot today and did minor tweaks on a number of others to bring them in line with the vision and clean up grammar, minor continuity and wording issues. The original novel has 4K left--two chapters--in it that I haven't touched yet. I'm guessing I'll be adding at least 2000 additional words so will likely come in just over 100K.

There have been many times in the past months that I have been so bogged down in this novel I hated the whole thing. I'm starting to remember why I once liked it. It's been almost three years since I began worldbuilding, so it's been a long haul, though of course I've worked on other projects as well in that time period.

It's cool to be close to the end. Of this pass, anyway!

Gathering threads

After a busy Thanksgiving weekend I'm back at work today with all the crazy people who want their floors replaced yesterday. Or by next week at the latest. Right.

I'm done the read-through of the 88K or so that Marks of Repentance is in this current draft and have begun making a list of the threads that need to be drawn tighter. Some of the scenes between here and the end will still work with minor modifications. Others will need to be totally rewritten. I'm beginning to get the feel for what needs doing, and I didn't drop any threads at all to this point, though I did weave one in a little tighter during this read-through. If the customers would now only give me a little more time to focus down on the story, I should be only a few days from the end. Which means that I hope to be done in October!

I've also got first drafts of query letter and synopsis completed and know I have a lot of work to do on those. A little scary to be contemplating that step.