The Novel That Almost Was…And Will Be Again
jenny | Apr 04, 2010 | Comments 6
I have written novels. I have even completed a lot of them. Goblin Market, for instance, and a paranormal romance on my flash stick called “Heart and Home” that got torn apart by me after the first draft, and now lies twitching in the darkness. That isn’t to say I won’t finish it, but I’ve noticed a big pattern with myself.
It’s been weeks since I worked on Running Down the Moon, and even then, it was a minor tweek here and there, with very little actual writing. It’s not that I haven’t been writing. I just haven’t been working on my novel. Even now, I sat down to work on the novel, and found myself flailing in the thick of it, wanting to cry.
I noted on twitter that sometimes when writing said novel, I feel like I’ve bitten off more than I can chew. While that is definitely true, as I’m looking at the complicated strands that tie the plot together, I also found that because i was working on it during NaNoWriMo there is a lot of unnecessary wordiness–especially in the conversational sections.
The thing is, I know I’m better than that. I know I can finish a novel. Like I said, I’ve done it before. I really want to finish THIS novel. It’s a good idea. I just think that maybe I’ve bitten off more than I can chew, and I need to find a way to trim things down so I can get back on track and get to the real beans.
So, I am going to sit down with the novel, bounce some ideas with my partner in crime, and get back to it. I may have to strip out an entire part of the plot, which means serious reworking, but I believe in this idea. I just need to find a way to tie it all back together if I tear out that piece.
Cheer for me, please, friends. I know I can do this. I want to finish this novel’s first draft before September. That is my goal.
Filed Under: Running Down the Moon
You *know* that I believe in you, Jenny, dear. And yeah, sometimes a serious pruning is just the thing to help you see what you’ve actually got. If you need another pair of eyes (though your PiC has good ones), let me know.
Of course you can do it. Just think of it in discrete pieces, not as one huge task. If plot strands are spinning out of control, an outline of sorts may be in order (not sure if you’re an outliner or not). A novel is not one big accomplishments, it is ten thousand little ones.
You’re a fantastic writer, Jenny! Keep on believing you can finish this novel and you’ll pull it together. Sometimes reworking and changing things, or stripping away elements makes the story make things more manageable. Good luck, Jenny, you have a lot of friends who support and believe in you!!
Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming. The only way to do anything is to just keep doing it. You rock!
I was reading that Karl Marlantes worked on Matterhorn for thirty years and cut it down from 1,600 pages to 600. “you get the feeling Marlantes is not overly worried about the attention span of his readers; you get the feeling he was not desperate or impatient to be published
Go ahead, shoot for the stars, you know you can do it, just keep on trucking and it will happen. Ideas are always just around the corner and you will find that as you change things around…Good Luck and happy wirtting…