Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.
- Napoleon

Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Starting Over (or v5.1)

Partway through the fifth edit of Blink--and after I just finished telling my CP I couldn't figure out what was wrong with the beginning--I decided to start over on the edit. I think I figured out what was wrong. It wasn't the story, it was the way I was telling it. Yup. The storytelling sucked right at the beginning.

I never finished edit #5, so saying I was on #6 seemed dishonest. So... I restarted the edit and renamed it v5.1. Taking a page from the computer programmers, I guess.

This seems to be doing the trick, so I'm running with it. I should be able to resume my previous edit after I fix the first two chapters. Yay.

I love it when a plan comes together.

4 comments:

Tia Nevitt said...

Come now, does it really suck? I don't believe that, especially since your rejections are getting encouraging.

I didn't keep track of how many edits that I did of my last novel. All I know is that it probably wasn't five complete drafts. Some parts I edited more than others. The most heavily edited stuff I tended to eventually either delete altogether or rewrite from scratch.

B.E. Sanderson said...

Oh yeah. It sucked big time.

I don't mind knowing a piece of work sucks when it's in draft form, because then I can fix it. The real problem would be when something sucks and I don't notice it. ;o)

I spent all morning and part of the afternoon working on chapter one, and I'm finally feeling as pleased about it as I am with the other chapters. Now I just need to tackle chapter two - which also stinks, but not as bad.

Tia Nevitt said...

With my last book, I found that the second half of the book was MUCH better than the first half. Which is why I'm considering major revisions.

Erica Ridley said...

Yay on figuring out what was going wrong!! That's half the battle. =)