Snip, Snip

Here I am, a week later, with a few thousand less words, four rewritten chapters and a stronger story. I feared going cross-eyed for a few days, but the feeling passed and I've got the heart to keep on going.

In theory, editing seems so simple. Re-read the story, take out the unwanted parts, fix a few words and presto, it's done. Unfortunately the reality is something else entirely. The constant battle for the right word or expression. The feeling that you know a certain paragraph or scene seems off, but you don't want to rewrite it, but you finally end up going back to do it anyway. The grueling process of fixing out of character slips(would he say this or wouldn't he?), or in my case, out of time slang and references (my story is set in 1891). Filling in plot holes or inconsistencies. Jotting down unanswered questions with a hope they are, in fact, answered by the end.

And so on.

Of course all of this hard work is starting to pay off. I started reading a book yesterday, which I'll leave unnamed for now, and kept thinking, "I write better than this. The story is slow, the explanations clunky, the characters a little extreme to the point of being unbelievable." If this person was published, and continues to be published, then surely I can be published too. Sometimes I forget this when I read some really good books, but it's nice to be reminded that it is indeed possible.

Next comes the scary part: having my reader extraordinaire go through it, make comments, suggestions and all around critique it. The first third is going out today, so we'll see what she says.

Now back I go to my cave to finish editing the other two-thirds of my story.