HARD MAGIC status report

[lagilman]

Writing the end of a book is like falling off a log. Yes, because it's relatively easy compared to staying on said log, but also because, as you're falling, you have just enough time to think "damn it, I should have..." before you go splat.

Thankfully, if you plan it right, or get lucky, you have time to crawl back and do it right.*

For now, though? I am officially face down in my Wheaties.

It's a rough as hell draft, with three pages of notes to go back and deal with, and a subplot to expand, and at least 1.5 iterations to go before I let my editor see the damn thing, but...

Draft!

*splat*


(next up: remembering and reminding myself that the first book in a series is toughest to write because I don't know it yet, and it will take me a while to kick the mauscript into a form I'm happy with. Staying Dead went through five different revisions before it became Staying Dead. I must remember this...)


*the book's not due until August 1st. 10 weeks to revise! A luxury! Oh, except that Other Book I'm supposed to be working on, too. And the revisions for DAUGHTER OF THE SEA. And...

Comments

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

Congrats on finishing the draft.

[stephen-dedman.livejournal.com]

I know how you feel; I finished the first draft of a novel on Sunday. Rewriting the last few lines until I was happy with them took longer than the preceding ten pages.

[jpsorrow.livejournal.com]

I'm about 4 chapters above *splat*. But it's good to see that someone else believes the first book in a series is the toughest to write. I've been feeling rather lonely on that front recently.

I also have . . . extensive revisions notes already. *sigh*

[lagilman]

Oh gods, yes. Once you're into a series, there are things your brain has storytelling shorthand for, and you can call up a pre-established reference, and know how such-and-such works. First book, even in a known universe? Not so much with the easy.

[handlebar605.livejournal.com]

lets hear a Woo-Hooo for the book.

Well how about a yippee for the draft??

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Yay draft!

draft!

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

HOORAY!

Re: draft!

[lagilman]

Thanks!

(of course, my draft is considerably shorter than yours -- even after revisions, it still won't break 100,000. But it's a good, workhorse little draft and carries the story well...)

[lagilman]

well, a Yip! anyway....

[fakefrenchie.livejournal.com]

Hard Magic is Bonnie is Pupi, right?

[lagilman]

Oui.

[wyld-dandelyon.livejournal.com]

Yay!

"Thankfully, if you plan it right, or get lucky, you have time to crawl back and do it right."

Uh, yeah, I finished the revisions to a story I submitted to Sword & Sorceress this year on the last date to submit it, reread it several times tweaking grammar & such, and elatedly sent it off. Then the next morning I woke up with the very clear realization that one character had two different names. *sigh*. He wasn't exactly a major character, but still...in the repeated rewrites and final re-readings (one of them all the way through, aloud), how could I have missed that?

So I fixed it on my hard drive with a mental note to tell the editor to fix it as soon as they accepted it, IF they accepted it. (No need to call their attention to that small inconsistency if they didn't, of course.)

So this line really rang for me!