The writing has been going well these past few weeks, though if you'd been watching me at work, you might have thought I was in the process of being eviscerated by hamsters. Revision can be painful. Especially when for several chapters in a row, the outline says little more than "will have to add some new material to this chapter." Gee, thanks a lot, Past Me.
After a few agonizing planning sessions (thinking is also frequently painful), I came up with the required new material and rewrote the problematic chapters into a series of tense, gripping scenes that move the plot along and provide crucial character insight. At least that's what I hope I did. If nothing else, the new version is an improvement over the sagging middle that was there before.
The next few chapters in this storyline are going to stay fairly close to the previous draft, so that will be easier. There are more changes ahead, but I may be through the trickiest parts. And then it's on to the other two storylines, which I expect to be more straightforward, but let's not think too much about that right now, okay? I'm in a good enough groove with the section I'm working on, and I don't want to get distracted.
Good Stuff Out There:
→ From author Will Allison, a powerful essay about his second novel and his marriage: My Editor, My Wife. (Thanks, The Elegant Variation!)
→ The New York times presents Book Covers That Got Away, and Flavorwire pairs the rejected covers and the final products.
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