Books
Shredding and Editing
I’ve been anticipating 2011 as the year of the revision, much like 2010 was the year of the first draft. As such, this means that I’m now tackling the lengthy process of printing, reading and revising, and so far it’s been a mixed bag.
Oddly enough, I actually decided to revise the most recent book first, the fully fleshed out version of In the Blood (although that will not be the final title). I came to this conclusion for a number of reasons.
Firstly: Seven Sons, while my favorite idea of the two, is a great big sloppy mess. I don’t say that in a bad way, that’s just the way these things go. While In the Blood (which I hesitate to abbreviate as ItB) is also a certifiable mess, it is much less of a steaming heap than Seven Sons. As Seven Sons is also longer by about 55k words, I could foresee its rewrite taking anywhere from 6-8 months, which is roughly the same amount of time needed to create a human. I believe the turnaround for In the Blood will be much shorter (around 4-6 weeks) in comparison, so I’d prefer to have at least one of these monsters fully revised sooner rather than later.
The second reason that I chose In the Blood first is because I think a vampire/werewolf/other-nightmare-creatures post young adult romp is infinitely more marketable than a long epic fantasy about glowing rocks. The timeline also coincides better with Angry Robot’s open submission month in March, where they will take unsolicited manuscripts from regular Joe’s like myself. Fingers crossed, eh?
Here is a picture of the whole beast, wings unfurled:
And here is a picture of the book with what looks to be a drive-by shooting happening on its face.
She’s a beaut, ain’t she? In total that is 585 pages.
I’ll admit, it was more than a little daunting to have that whole thing set in my lap, with nothing but a red pen to help me fend off its many deadly irregularities, poisonous continuity errors and frightening word choice issues. But so far the process has been liberating and exciting.
I’ve always been a bad editor, because I tend to over-think the first time I’m writing. In the past, I would edit something as I went through it, which makes for a slow rough and a tricky second. With that method it’s much more difficult to see the writing as if performed by someone else’s meaty paws.
Luckily that hasn’t been the case with In the Blood at all. I am essentially beating it like it stole something from me – namely, my life – and I guess perhaps it did. Everything is coming naturally, and I can see the book getting better with each page. No paragraph is safe from my red pen and its scorching slashing maneuvers.
Whether this turns into a story that is entertaining, dynamic and has real characters is anyone’s guess.
Anybody out there have any editing stories or tips? At this point I can use all the help I can get.
Discussion
4 comments for “Shredding and Editing”
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Dudicus,
Spot on, each and every point. I think you’re smart to attack the more manageable rewrite first … get an easier win to avoid burnout.
It might help to set achievable page counts to edit each day/week so that you can track progress. Generally that helps me stay on task.
Just started a beastly book project myself, nonfiction in fact, so I’ll share any insights I gather from the process.
Actually, I’m documenting everything on the blog each week to keep track of progress.
Best of luck brother.
I agree the self editing stage can be quite daunting. Everything I have written, has been edited like your work, while in the process of writing it. I now think that I might try writing all of it first and then going through it and seeing if that works better.
A beaut indeed, Eddy. Crazy how shot up in red it looks in the next pic.
As far as advice, I’ve never really done any editing, but I keep a few documents on story arcs, symbols, specific characters, a general timeline, descriptions, etc. that I can refer to when I revise things.
I can’t say I have any advice on editing, although I wish I did. I’m wondering two things about Seven Sons: a. Will it be a standalone novel or a series, as fantasy stories seem to end up being and b. Do you have a map of the Seven Sons world? Thanks and Best of luck!