I wrote this FOREVER ago... actually, it was pretty much my first post. So here's part of it that I want to talk about/discuss/use because I've been up too long to be original. (This idea? Not even mine. Inspired by Silent Pages on Twitter. Here's a tip, kids. 3am = Too early to wake up, but you know what's worse? Going to bed at 6pm after a 3am wakeup and being woken up at 11pm. AND NOT BEING ABLE TO GO BACK TO SLEEP.)
(I'm very tired at this point.)
Anyways, post excerpt:
You guys know how in ancient Egypt they used to make mummies out of people? And how they’d put all the organs in jars? Do you know how they did the brain? They’d take this big wooden hook thing and stick it up the person’s nose. Then they'd stir things around up there until they got all soupy and liquidy, and drain their brains out their nostrils.
What? You didn’t need to know that? Oh… sorry.
But the thing is, that’s kinda what revising feels like, at least to me. It’s slow and not very fun and tweeting that you took 50 words out of a scene and added 3 isn’t nearly as much fun as tweeting that you wrote 1500 words… but it’s worth it at the same time.
If you’re like me, revising makes things better. Revising is where you add in things like Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Robots and try to cut out as many f-words as you can because even though you don’t swear, a certain character has a mouth like a truck driver, and where you die laughing because you gave another character three hands in one scene and yet he wasn’t driving with any of them.A lot of this still applies even though this was written in August 2010. (Wow, this blog is a year and a half old! I can't believe it.) (I also can't believe my book is a year and a half old. Holy heck, Batman.) Revising is still slow and not very fun and kinda sucky.
At this point, I've been revising Spyder on and off for almost two years. I, erm, also wrote 2 other books, a half a book and a long short story. But that's besides the point. Spyder has had crazy amounts of drafts, several beta readers and crit partners and I have a query for it.
At this point... I'm going to be cutting back on a few of the plot things, I think. Someone pointed out to me that there's a lot going on in it that might not be necessary and I'm going to try to simplify it but make it strong at the same time. If that makes sense to anyone but me.
I'm also going to really go through and comb out any of the f-words I can because... well, like it says up there, truck driver.
I think - I hope - that those are the two largest things I'll have to do this last revision. (Please let it be the last revision.) I'm ready to move on to bigger and better things with this book! Like rejection!
Wait...
Anyways, what are your writing goals lately? Are you drafting, revising, editing, submitting? Leave me stuff in the comments. ;)
Peace and cookies,
Laina
