The day starts

[ksmith]

Stare at words written the night before. Delete half of them. Rewrite. Better now I think.

Why can't I get it right the first time? It's not like I'm not thinking. It's as if I need to keep writing and writing, purging words until the only ones left are ?the best ones? ?The right ones? The survivors. Sentences that looked fine last night, two night ago, now read as stilted. Too on-the-nose. Delete delete delete.

And now I need to walk away. Dammit.

Comments

[difrancis.livejournal.com]

Is that like whittling a giant oak down to a toothpick? Walk away now. Go on.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

No. It was more like whittle the giant oak into a futon...then change it to a dining room set...then change it to cherry wood....

Questions of tone more than length, iow.

[sksperry.livejournal.com]

At least they're still in crayon English the following day.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

With words written after midnight, it's a coin toss.

[equesgal.livejournal.com]

The other day I saw a huge pull of papers and realized they were all past revisions of my novel. Wow, I thought. Do I need to outline better??

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Do I need to outline better??

Are you an outliner, or a seat-of-the-pants plotter? I am the latter, and I still try to outline even though it turns out to be a complete waste of time. Story births when it's damned good and ready. The only thing that helps is forcing myself to work even when there's nothing there. I know the breakthrough will come eventually, and when it does, it comes in a big wave.

I have forgotten how many times I rewrote Code of Conduct. Granted, it was my first novel, and I was learning as I wrote. It took six years. Four versions? Five? Twice that many, if you include false starts.