In Which Editing Begins Again
So I'm finally at the point of actually editing a book!
Alright, so in some ways this is the second book I'll be trying to edit. I did try to edit the first book I finished last summer with... mixed results. I'm still not sure that counts as editing anyway, as it was as much a complete over haul and re-write than an edit. And it flopped miserably on its face, as the book is just not one I want to do anything with at this time. There are pieces of it that I love, ideas in it I want to pursue some day, and it was a hell of a learning experience. But at this time, I'm chalking that one up to being a First Book. It was the book I had to write to learn that I could write a book.
But I can write a book! I have a book, and it's been written! And... now I just need to turn it into something worth actually reading and maybe, if I'm a good girl, even publishing.
Last week I finished up the initial read through of my draft, complete with pen in hand to mark it up to hell and back. Now I need to implant all of those changes into the document itself and do the big structural fixes necessary. And there are some big structural fixes, oh my yes!
First change: Word Count
The book is sorely under worded, and with reason. The book before this one, mentioned above, kept trying to get ridiculously long on me. So I set into this novel with the intent of keeping things short and actually getting to the end before I'd completely forgotten what I was doing at the beginning.
The end result: 62,340 words.
Technically, this is in the range for the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America! In fact, its 20,000 over where it needs to be! But realistically, publishers won't touch anything less than 70k these days and most won't even look at anything that isn't at least 80k. And who can blame them? Thin books make it feel like you're not getting your money worth for sheer words per dime!
So I need to add about 20k to the novel. Luckily, I've found at least two chapters I need to add in and there is a plethora of miscellaneous paragraphs of description I left out. I'm hoping that will push me up where we need to be. If not... well, we'll see what happens.
Oh, other positive progress made: I have a functional title! It's probably not the permanent title for the book, but until now, I've been calling the book by my main character's name with "book 1" tacked on the end. This is pretty much how I track all of my stories until I actually find a name for them. Actually, my other two current projects are code named 'that bad vampire story' and 'undead cat' respectively.
I really need to sort out a more permanent blog. LJ is a continually shrinking audience for this kind of thing and really, I need something a bit more professional. I would find such a place now that I'm starting to talk about editing, but trying to find a place to blog is getting in the way of editing, which seems entirely counterproductive.
Alright, so in some ways this is the second book I'll be trying to edit. I did try to edit the first book I finished last summer with... mixed results. I'm still not sure that counts as editing anyway, as it was as much a complete over haul and re-write than an edit. And it flopped miserably on its face, as the book is just not one I want to do anything with at this time. There are pieces of it that I love, ideas in it I want to pursue some day, and it was a hell of a learning experience. But at this time, I'm chalking that one up to being a First Book. It was the book I had to write to learn that I could write a book.
But I can write a book! I have a book, and it's been written! And... now I just need to turn it into something worth actually reading and maybe, if I'm a good girl, even publishing.
Last week I finished up the initial read through of my draft, complete with pen in hand to mark it up to hell and back. Now I need to implant all of those changes into the document itself and do the big structural fixes necessary. And there are some big structural fixes, oh my yes!
First change: Word Count
The book is sorely under worded, and with reason. The book before this one, mentioned above, kept trying to get ridiculously long on me. So I set into this novel with the intent of keeping things short and actually getting to the end before I'd completely forgotten what I was doing at the beginning.
The end result: 62,340 words.
Technically, this is in the range for the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America! In fact, its 20,000 over where it needs to be! But realistically, publishers won't touch anything less than 70k these days and most won't even look at anything that isn't at least 80k. And who can blame them? Thin books make it feel like you're not getting your money worth for sheer words per dime!
So I need to add about 20k to the novel. Luckily, I've found at least two chapters I need to add in and there is a plethora of miscellaneous paragraphs of description I left out. I'm hoping that will push me up where we need to be. If not... well, we'll see what happens.
Oh, other positive progress made: I have a functional title! It's probably not the permanent title for the book, but until now, I've been calling the book by my main character's name with "book 1" tacked on the end. This is pretty much how I track all of my stories until I actually find a name for them. Actually, my other two current projects are code named 'that bad vampire story' and 'undead cat' respectively.
I really need to sort out a more permanent blog. LJ is a continually shrinking audience for this kind of thing and really, I need something a bit more professional. I would find such a place now that I'm starting to talk about editing, but trying to find a place to blog is getting in the way of editing, which seems entirely counterproductive.