Novel 2: Good News

tyunglebower ♦ August 22, 2013 ♦ 2 Comments

Just a quick, later at night than usual post to let you know that maybe, just maybe I have found a route to recovery for Novel 2.

It’s difficult to describe the nature of my progress without giving away plot elements, and I am not ready to do that publicly yet. Add to that the fact that I’m not even revising yet because the rough draft isn’t finished. I merely concluded a few months ago that what i had of the first draft was so off base that it wasn’t “finishable” as it was.

So I wracked my brain off and on for a few months, writing down thoughts and potential patches. Ideas. Alternate approached. Mini-outlines. All of it served to make me feel better on the day, but none of it seemed to put my mind at ease in the long run, because the problems I had were not being addressed to my satisfaction.

About two weeks ago I said “screw it” and just wrote out several alternate plots for the piece. I didn’t limit myself at all. I gave myself permission to basically reboot the entire concept. And out of those mutated plot ideas came, what I think, is a workable new approach so far.

That is to say, a new approach that will hopefully allow me to keep the majority of the first half of the rough draft..which at best is what I had written before everything went all pear-shaped anyway.

The last few days I have been rewriting and shifting existing text to make this happen. I hadn’t planned on getting back into writing the text yet, but I was striking while the iron was hot the last few days, and planting these new seeds where I thought they needed to be. I have a lot of alternate track left to lay, but unlike most of the summer I think I can see the end of at least this first tunnel. I have a road to follow again. Bumpy, but leading somewhere.

So I will keep rewriting a little bit each day to redo the rough draft. I even have someone who said they would look at what I have so far..and I am actually considering it. Normally nobody gets to read a rough draft but me, but with all of the surgery and shifting I have done with what I have so far, it’s almost like a second draft of the first half of the story, so I guess it’s okay. Even though the second half of the rough draft does not, as of yet, exist.

Long way to go, but I think I’ve breathed some new life into it.