Well, after working until 1:30 every night this past week, I’ve finally finished the editing. Or at least the second run through of it. Plugged in plot holes. Got rid of plot points that either never went anywhere or didn’t make much sense. (Damn my panster-self!). Is there more to do? Oh yes, but less than there was.
Kind of freaks me out, honestly. I printed it out at work today and I have to say it’s a bit overwhelming to think I managed to write nearly 400 pages in a year. Less than that, actually, if I’m really honest with myself. Even though I started the process about this time last year, I didn’t become *serious* about it until the fall. I had about 28,000 words by then, but I was still half-assing it. Come January, I instituted my 1000-word-a-day policy and stuck to it. By the end of April I had 97,000 words. Which just goes to show me that if I’d actually managed to get off my ass last year and commit to it, I’d be way further than I am now. But it’s a learning process, so I’ll give myself a pass on it…and there were a few mitigating circumstances along the way, some of which I’m still navigating.
So, here I am. After editing, the draft is up to 102,000 words. Ideally, I’d like to make that a more even 100k, and there’s a lot of line editing to do, so I would bet I’ll be able to cut some. I’m spotting mistakes all over the place, but that’s ok. I’ve sent it out to the beta readers (some pubbed and some not) and thus far (except for ugly line edit issues), feedback has been quite good.
Still, there’s something about looking at the pile of pages and realizing that even if this goes nowhere, the fact of the matter is that I wrote a book. Given how many people out there say they’re going to do that in their spare time, that’s no small accomplishment. At least, I can say I tried. 🙂
On the other hand, no matter how much I’ve edited this thing, I always feel like I can do better. That may just be a curse of the artist/writer/poet never feeling satisfied. Or it could just be that I always thought my first book would be some massive high fantasy, with a much grander and complex plot than what I currently have. (Which it might be, if this one doesn’t go anywhere…LOL…and I’ve got some ideas, so no worries). I think I need to be careful, though. There is such at thing as over-editing, and I’m one of those people that could probably fall into that cycle pretty easily.
Either way, I’m feeling pretty good about it. I’m heading to the beach in about a week. Hopefully by then, the line edits will be done and I’ll be able to shut my brain down for a few days. Just in time to come back and start writing Book 2. 🙂
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