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Saturday, December 18, 2010

Remaking My Baby

Since I left New York last month, I've been working on re-vamping my first book.  This is entirely different process from proofreading and editing; this is changing some elements of my basic story line that will ultimately make the story more succinct (and consequently, shorter).

I tend to be someone who likes information.  When I'm reading, I like to have all the details about the characters, and consequently, when I write, I give lots of details.  I want to explain why Tasmyn hasn't had a boyfriend prior to the beginning of the book, and why her parents are so protective of her. I'm learning that those details can be shared more gradually and more subtly.

I'm not doing much new writing, more rearranging and re-blocking.  Thank heavens for computers and all the benefits of copying and pasting.  It's still a pretty time consuming chore, trying to make sure everything that I change jives with the rest of the book and the subsequent books.  So far, so good.

It's not as painless as it might seem.  Some parts of the story are really special to me or I feel strongly add significantly to the overall plot.  I spend a good deal of time debating over what must go and what can stay.  It's not unlike trying to give your precious child a makeover.  Really, would you enjoy trying to change anything about your baby, even those things that might not be perfect?  

I'm aiming to be finished this revamp by the beginning of January so that I can do a big query push, using the contacts I made in New York at Back Space.  The query letter is ready to go; all I have to do is put in the new word count once everything is done.

I'm also going to add my short story credit to the query letter, and I'm hoping to have a definite publish date on that anthology very soon.

Fingers are crossed that 2011 is a very good year.




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3 comments:

  1. When you said 'What must go and what can stay' all I could think about was the claw from Toy Story. I'm sure 2011 will be a good year for you.

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  2. I'm excited to see what changes you make! I can imagine how difficult this is, but I know the end result will be a wonderful book made even better!

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