Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Edits and Future Plans

Day two of editing... twenty pages into the original manuscript. This is a painful process. Anybody got an aspirin?

Since I have the liberty of making this up as I go along, I'm thinking time limit instead of page goal for editing. Such as, spending a solid two hours on pages, then taking a break. I'm overwhelmed... there's a lot, I mean a LOT of extra words on these pages. My original first twenty pages has been cut down to twelve. Whoo! On the plus side, I want my manuscript to be smaller, so this is a good thing!

It's pretty exciting to go back over the edited copy. It reads MUCH faster and the clunks are really starting to smooth out. I'm learning so much in this process and it's JUST THE SECOND DAY. How lucky are we to be writers, huh? This is the coolest feeling ever.

Do you guys work on writing new stuff while you're editing your manuscript? It's two very different parts of my brain and right now the idea seems laughable to me. Maybe it'll get easier the deeper I get into the book. I want to at least keep working on short stories to beef up my portfolio. The latest is almost ready to go out into circulation. I've got another two ideas I can work on, and then there's other shorts I've got half-finished that I can polish up. Problem is, after three or four hours of editing I'm zonked. That plus the Clark Kent job is all I can handle at the moment.

But I do want to continue moving forward so even if I can't produce new words I am researching for the next project, little by little. The short stories are fun distractions, but I'm ready to tackle another novel. I don't want to start it until this one has gone through its first big edit, though. I have an inkling of an idea for a book, and it's pretty interesting. I've been researching things like Paradise Lost, the War Between the States, the King James Bible, 18th century writers, Voltaire, British cemeteries, and pirates.

Yes, pirates! Pirate ghosts! They might make an appearance in my next book... we'll just have to see, won't we? ;)

All right... Somebody hand me a machete, I'm going back in...

11 comments:

Arlee Bird said...

Sounds like some interesting research. It will be fun to see where it takes you. Good luck!

Lee
Tossing It Out

RHYTHM AND RHYME said...

Very interesting, wish you every success,

Yvonne,

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Good stuff, B! Want to borrow my weed wacker?

Jemi Fraser said...

I can only work on one at a time, although ideas are always filtering. I can do research, but rarely do actual writing.

Hart Johnson said...

Arrrrrr! Pirates are ALWAYS good.

And I find the muse abandons me ALMOST entirely when I am editing. I have to alternate. I have written a little fan fiction while editng something else, because there are a couple ongoing projects that I can just do a little here and a little there (to keep the writer wheels greased) but real writing just seems sort of stoppered.

Sarah Ahiers said...

i typically can't write anything new if i'm working on line edits. They're just not conducive to each other

Arlee Bird said...

I woke up this morning from a very strange, but upbeat dream. In the dream you were having dinner with a friend of mine's family (not his family in real life, but a dream family that in part was really one of my in-law's family--a compostite family if you will). You were talking about your newly published, soon-to-be released book. You then showed us a very well done book trailer video for your book. It began in a very arty well-filmed sequence in black and white showing a woman taking a shower. I was surprised and wondered where this trailer would be shown since it was essentially R rated--but very artistically done mind you. The trailer went on to describe the story in your book (I don't recall what it was) and show various scenes from the story. I woke up very excited about reading the upcoming book. You need to hurry up on that editing! I'm ready to read it already.

Lee
Tossing It Out

Raquel Byrnes said...

I usually have at least two things going at the same time. One will take over eventually, either I hit my stride, or the story breaks a hurdle.

Sometimes I do free writes in a different POV just to get another part of my mind working.

Good luck with the edits!

Rebecca T. said...

I would love to see a book that incorporated all of those different research points! haha!

Good luck with the editing! Sounds like it's going pretty well :)

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Lola Sharp said...

Hey B!
I know...long time. I'm sorry. I'm still away on a long vacation. I apologize for not getting around the blogosphere lately. The internet here (Maine rental house) is sketchy at best...and the Husband and Child are keeping me going, going, going. Hence, very little visiting of my bloggy friends.

But...

1) I LOVE the new blog crib you have here.

2) Yay! You get to have your virgin slog through Revision Hell!! I hope you have your deep waders and machete...and some vodka. ;) Clunks and wordiness are just the beginning. Wait until you realize you have to rip out and rewrite...and maybe even rewrite that damn chapter AGAIN. Come on in...the muck, er, I mean water is fine.

3) I cannot work on another new novel while I'm in revisions. The lure of the Shiny New Idea will draw me to far away if I let myself start it. I just jot the ideas/notes down in a notebook and then get back to my revisions/edits. But that's just me. Maybe you can handle both.

I look forward to buying your book!

Love,
Lola

Dawn Ius said...

I do not have a machete, but I can wipe the blood off my chainsaw from my last WIP if you'd like to borrow it :-)