Epiphanies, they're good for the writer's soul.
So.
Recent feedback from a beta reader has, as the subject line suggests, given rise to an epiphany about my writing, and my characters, and I think I've just realized something that has plagued me for two books.
My MC, my POV character. I believe, as I said to another beta reader in working through this epiphany this afternoon, that I'm using Mercy too much as what I call "the author's telescope", or lense, and not enough as herself, with her own identity, thoughts and feelings. Too much: "Look here, see this situation, and these interesting people?" Not enough of what Mercy feels, or thinks about it.
Thinking back, I'm pretty sure I did the same thing in Dark Vision, with Elysia. But not, I think, in the more recent novella, Veritas. Also, there are places in this draft of Nemesis where the problem does not exist. The prologue, for example. Chapters from Reaper's POV, for another. It's really in Mercy's POV that the problem makes itself really known.
So, the good news: I can fix it, especially now that I'm actually aware of it.
The not-so-good news: lots of rewriting looms ahead of me.
Sometimes I feel like I will never be done. At the same time, I see how this will make things better. I actually think this, more than anything else, is what the agent was talking about when she gave me feedback on the old draft. When she had trouble connecting to Mercy. I've had this doubt in the back of my mind for awhile, that the rewrite hasn't really fixed enough. I think this is why. I think I was going about it from the wrong direction.
It is by turns depressing, daunting, but also exciting, to contemplate another rewrite. I really think this is it. The major problem, more than any other, that needed and continues to need addressing.
You know what's really funny? I used to read about other authors rewriting entire books, and shake my head at the very idea. And those authors who rewrote the same book multiple times? CRAZY.
I guess that tells me where I'm at now, as opposed to back then. :D
Recent feedback from a beta reader has, as the subject line suggests, given rise to an epiphany about my writing, and my characters, and I think I've just realized something that has plagued me for two books.
My MC, my POV character. I believe, as I said to another beta reader in working through this epiphany this afternoon, that I'm using Mercy too much as what I call "the author's telescope", or lense, and not enough as herself, with her own identity, thoughts and feelings. Too much: "Look here, see this situation, and these interesting people?" Not enough of what Mercy feels, or thinks about it.
Thinking back, I'm pretty sure I did the same thing in Dark Vision, with Elysia. But not, I think, in the more recent novella, Veritas. Also, there are places in this draft of Nemesis where the problem does not exist. The prologue, for example. Chapters from Reaper's POV, for another. It's really in Mercy's POV that the problem makes itself really known.
So, the good news: I can fix it, especially now that I'm actually aware of it.
The not-so-good news: lots of rewriting looms ahead of me.
Sometimes I feel like I will never be done. At the same time, I see how this will make things better. I actually think this, more than anything else, is what the agent was talking about when she gave me feedback on the old draft. When she had trouble connecting to Mercy. I've had this doubt in the back of my mind for awhile, that the rewrite hasn't really fixed enough. I think this is why. I think I was going about it from the wrong direction.
It is by turns depressing, daunting, but also exciting, to contemplate another rewrite. I really think this is it. The major problem, more than any other, that needed and continues to need addressing.
You know what's really funny? I used to read about other authors rewriting entire books, and shake my head at the very idea. And those authors who rewrote the same book multiple times? CRAZY.
I guess that tells me where I'm at now, as opposed to back then. :D