Don't you just love it when a writing project develops legs and waddles in a completely different direction to the one you'd carefully plotted out for it?
Back in November, I wrote about the perils of naming a walk-on character in the fourth draft of my current WIP. One of my protagonists had walked into a cafe and started chatting to the owner. It's very unusual for me to actually want to write heterosexual romances into my novel drafts but these two just clicked. So I began hastily thinking about rewriting that protagonist's arc a little bit. Fine. It was going to be tricky but I could do it.
But something else was niggling. My other protagonist becomes embroiled in a fling halfway through the novel that doesn't add much that couldn't be taken on by another character. The more I thought about it, the more I had to concede that my novel was operating a one-in one-out policy of its own accord and I'd be foolish to argue. For all the good reasons it threw at me to bring in Ed, there were correspondingly sound ones to remove Selina.
This character extraction is proving a little trickier. I've been working from a heavily marked-up third draft with notes that are now completely obsolete as I rewrite entire scenes from scratch. To combat that sensation of being adrift, I've created a chapter check list about what needs to be added/removed in each chapter. Once the fourth draft is done some earlier chapters will need ironing out to remove stuff that's now irrelevant. Yet it's all perfectly doable.
The fourth draft's currently at 31,170 words and I'm making slow and steady progress. I'm labouring under the assumption that the novel knows what it's doing. Let's hang onto that for as long as possible, shall we?
I've written a bit recently about attacking the fourth draft of my WIP 'Max' (by recently, I mean Friday!). Funny how just when you think you're on track with a project it decides to surprise you all over again. You see, this one follows a mother and a daughter (from the perspective of the daughter and the mother's lover) and I'd pretty much accepted the fact that the interactions that needed fixing in this draft were the ones involving the lover. Apparently not.
I was in my writing haunt yesterday afternoon warming through with caffeine and clutching my editing rock for inspiration (don't ask) while I was reading the detailed notes for the rewrite of chapter eight. The location needed to have greater significance so I began wondering why my character chose that cafe out of all the others and a waiter trots into the scene. Fine, I thought, let's give him a name. Big mistake.
As soon as I named him and he started talking to my viewpoint character, I liked him. Disaster. The love interest for this character is a little bit square and boring and, ultimately, they don't end up together. But this guy... Well, he comes from a completely different background, he's cheeky and he has connections with her past that the other lad doesn't understand. In short, he's perfect for her and, what's more, it fits the overall narrative of the parallel plot of the mother.
Now, I may be stuffing a new character into my novel for no reason. I may have to extract him from the fifth draft with tweezers. However, I think it's definitely worth a shot. It's going to mean some exceedingly careful consideration of the rest of the novel. To be fair, though, that was already necessary anyway. The extensive notes I marked up for the fourth draft aren't obsolete as much as complementary to the notes I'm keeping in my head about new directions and backgrounds. What I really need is to get this written down. And, in the meantime, Ed's here to stay. As is my editing rock.
I've been excessively silent on this blog recently and I apologise for that. I'm still lagging behind with my book and classic film reviews but hopefully I can get those up to date soon. The sad truth is that I haven't had much time to read and watch anything or, really, to do much apart from react to things going on around me. It's not the most rewarding of existences and it certainly isn't healthy for me personally.
So where are we at? Well, last Friday I delivered what I hope is the last piece of my PhD puzzle. My thesis corrections have been uploaded and outstanding paperwork delivered so, theoretically, that should be that.
In other news, I was delighted to be short-listed in the 2015 Exeter Story Prize with my short story 'Pongo'. That's one I'm particularly proud of and I'm glad all that hard work paid off. One of the things that drew me to that competition was the ability to submit longer short stories. Sometimes you need the extra space and I don't think 'Pongo' would've squeezed in to a more constrictive word count.
I'm also standing for election again in the Pontefract North by-election on the 24th September for Yorkshire First. Politics is still something I'm passionate about, though I don't go into it much on this blog. However, in fairness, I haven't had much time to go into it on my politics blog either! The last post I managed over there was badgering the previous councillor to resign and, lo and behold, now I'm standing for her seat. Isn't life a funny thing?
My priorities have, quite naturally, shifted with waving the PhD goodbye. Top on the list is trying to look after myself a little better than I have been doing in recent months. Beyond that, there are always other things in the pipeline. Here are the headlines.
Back in July I developed a priority list of novel drafts. I've got cracking on the fourth draft of 'Max', marking up all the necessary edits and starting on the nitty-gritty of actually implementing them. This is going to be a long process and it may derail the other projects I want to work on before the end of the year. However, I'd still like to get to 'Danni' and 'Izzy' before the end of the year. I'm also working on the assumption that I'm going to be participating in NaNoWriMo this year, though by this point I've usually had a big idea and I'm working on refining it. I need inspiration to strike.
On the short story front, I need to get back into the groove. For instance, I currently have four in need of a second draft and another four that I've decided need a complete overhaul before I resubmit them. At the time of typing, I only have three short stories out at submission but there are another two I'm content enough with to send out so I need to get on with that. My aim is to make my co-working day with Wakefield Jelly the main day for short story paper edits again. That's worked very well in the past and it's a dedicated day for escaping to edit short stories (in addition to a dedicated hour of escape each weekday to actually write them). Incidentally, if anyone's around on Wednesday 23rd September, pleased stop by at Create and join us Jelly folk. The group has been going for two years now and, amazingly enough, I've been going since the start!
I'm also hoping to take on some tutoring work for A-Level students and above. I had some success in this quarter earlier in the year so, if you know anyone who needs a little help with their English studies please ask them to contact me. Hopefully there'll be more on this in the future.
Freelance writing and project management is also another string to my bow and is taking up a chunk of my time at the moment.
There, that's perfectly manageable, isn't it? Who said anything about slowing down? Besides, it takes my mind off the fact I'm essentially flying without navigation at the moment. But, as Angela sings, it's a step in the right direction, after all...even if I don't know quite what direction I'm going in.
If I went into detail about why I'm despairing at the moment it'd take a while and nothing else would get done. Suffice to say, just when I thought things couldn't get worse, they suddenly did. The last year of my life has been a lesson in this so I'm not sure why I'm so surprised. Alas, tolerance levels are eroded beyond recognition. If there's one thing going right in a life perhaps the rest can be accepted as necessary balance but that's not the case. However, I apparently have to carry on so...
I've got a month before my thesis corrections are due and, really, I wanted them finished two weeks ago. I've planned all the edits and I'm halfway through implementing them now. All I need to do after that is write two brief appendices and get them checked over. Then the thesis is done and... Well, it's done. Full stop after that one.
My other task for this week is to work on some of the short story drafts I've neglected. Three need a complete rewrite, though I've been putting it off because the novel drafts seemed more important. I want to rewrite them this week for editing at Wakefield Jelly next week. In theory, let's see how that goes.
Next week I'm cat-sitting for my sister. During that quiet time away I'm going to focus on the fourth draft of 'Max'. I've already had a read through of the third draft and I know what needs to be done. A couple of major fixes and thousands of minor ones. I want to make a dent in that.
The last time I wrote one of my periodic 'writing goals' post I had a six month plan that stretched from December to May and was ambitious to say the least. Unsurprisingly, it didn't pan out, though that had more to do with the thesis work I had to do and a lot of other rubbish that overtook me.
It's true that I spent December working on the second draft of 'Max' (which refused to behave, see here) then I polished 'Lily' in January. I then started work on the close edit of 'Danni'. That's where I ran into trouble. The place I had to put myself mentally in order to work on that particular draft was painful and I blogged about it here. Ultimately, for all my good intentions, I faltered with that draft and it's languishing at 54,342 words. Nor did I work on any of the other novels I earmarked for work before June.
So what did I do? Well, I worked on the third draft of 'Max' when the urge took me. I completed that two weeks ago and then I started a new work 'Phoebe'. This is based on my experiences at the election night count and I originally envisioned it as a novella. However, part one (of three) came to over 20,000 words so I'm not quite sure what it'll end up as. I'm trying not to be rigid, I just want to get it down on paper. At least I'm not aiming for that mythical 50,000 mark with this one.
I need a plan of attack though; a draft priority list if you will. I know I look like a first-draft machine but it's just because it's been easier to do that while I've been shuffling through my PhD (besides, I think the fact that 'Danni' has been through six drafts so far refutes that anyway). In terms of which novels I'm ready to work on and in which order they should be approached, here's the list:
'Phoebe' - First thing is to finish this draft, however long it turns out to be. It's currently sitting at 23,733 words.
'Max' - Then I want to work on the fourth draft of this which is essentially a close-edit and general tweak. I'm pretty happy with the structure and characterisation of this one now, the third draft improved it massively. That opinion is, of course, subject to change.
'Danni' - Perhaps by then I'll be in the right place mentally to finish this. I paused the seventh draft with 24 out of 31 chapters written. I did the hard stuff, the difficult rewriting. From that point onwards the narrative is essentially the same as in the sixth draft (with the exception of the final chapter) but it needs a close-edit.
'Izzy' - I had an epiphany about this one a while ago which involves the alteration of much of the plot but keeps the characters. This needs detailed planning but I know the core of the story. It remains to be seen whether it keeps the ambivalent ending of the first draft though. I'm a sucker for happy endings these days.
'Kathy' - This is currently an unfinished first draft from 2013 which I decided needs to be in first person instead of third. So I need to rewrite the 10,000 words already written then see where the story takes me for the rest of it - I have a tentative plan.
'Liz' - I've neglected this one for too long. This is a second draft and I'm a third of the way through it but I hit a brick wall, possibly because I was rewriting it in Scrivener and I can't get to grips with it.
'Vic' - There's a fair bit of planning to do ahead of the second draft. I want to change the premise slightly but the characters and their relationships work.
'Carys' - Again, there's planning to be done ahead of the second draft but a lot of stuff in this works. I know what I want to change in terms of the main plot so I'll see where the new plan takes me.
'Lauren' - The second draft of this was another experiment with characters I've been toying with since I was sixteen. The whole thing gels quite well now but I need to approach it carefully to make sure I'm not just saying it's better when it's not.
'Mel' - This was my 2014 NaNoWriMo novel so it's pretty low down the list. I need an epiphany to hit on this one.
'Lily' - It seems strange to put this one at the bottom of the list when I've had positive feedback on it and advice on how to improve. However, I feel that I need to look at the others first. This may well get boosted back up the tree but, for now, I want to focus on the others.
This is quite a list, isn't it? There'll likely be a new NaNoWriMo draft in November to go along with it. Let's see where I am by the end of the year, eh?
The novel rewrite I'm working on at the moment is a tricky one. Of course, I didn't realise it was a tricky one until I got about 10,000 words into it. That was about the moment when I understood the mood I was going to have to get into it in order to make this story work properly. It needed resonance, emotional power. I've got through six drafts with this one but I knew there was something missing. It could be that I just didn't want to go to the place it took me to, but now I don't have much of a choice. Because, after all, if something is this painful to write then some good must be coming out of it, one way or another.
One of the central themes of this novel is rejection, which works on several levels. It's a dual timeline narrative and to say my protagonist is damaged in the front story would be an understatement. However, it took this draft for me to realise how damaged she is in the back story too. I suppose this is what happens when you spend five years with a character - it's a slow process of revealing the layers and reaching the core. The fact that I finished the first draft of this novel in June 2010 is scary, but it's one of those I'm determined to work on until I'm happy with it. As with all my novel drafts, even if I don't get them published, I want something that I'm eager to read every now and then.
As ever, I took refuge in music to work out what's going on with my protagonist. There are a couple of songs that fit where I'm heading with this story and how she reaches the end she does. One of those is 'Reason to Believe', my favourite version of which is by the wonderful Bobby Darin.
"If I gave you time to change my mind,
I'd find a way and I'd leave the past behind,
Knowing that you lied straight-faced while I cried,
Still I'd look to find a reason to believe..."
The other song, unsurprisingly, comes from one of my favourite musical scores, with music and lyrics by Jerry Herman. It's one of the most gut-wrenching songs I've ever heard and Bernadette Peters makes you feel every spasm of pain. In the end, the conclusion my protagonist comes to is that, once anger fades, the emotion it was concealing still remains. Because time heals everything except...
I'd better get back to work. If I don't finish this rewrite soon I'm going to be a wreck.
Now that I'm in that scary limbo between thesis submission and viva I decided that a little shake up of my daily plans was in order. I've just been muddling through for the last year or so, trying to do everything all at once and getting snowed under with it all. It was only when I allowed myself the novelty of a weekend off that I realised there are better ways to split my time for the moment. I won't like it, on account of it feeling like I'm doing too little on certain days, but I'll try to stick to it where I can.
So I've got various irons in the fire as far as work goes. I'm researching several academic papers that I think I can set my mind to drafting now the thesis is gone; I've got a steady stream of short stories that I'm writing, rewriting, editing and submitting; I've got two blogs to keep ticking over; I'm hoping to stand for election in the locals in May for Yorkshire First (I forgot to mention that over here, see my other blog for details); and, of course, I have those pesky novels in various stages of rewriting. If I don't break it up a bit then I'm liable to feel more overwhelmed than I do just looking at that list. We're probably looking at something like this:
An admin day - Time spent on catching up with blog posts, typing up short stories ready for editing, sorting out submissions.
An academic day - Work on those papers I've got in mind, one at least is ready to be written straight away.
A short story day - For the actual writing and editing of short stories, which will entail me going to the library because that's definitely an out of office task.
Two novel days - To work on whatever novel I'm beavering away on at the time.
Evenings - Fan fiction or other relaxing activity that is probably not work.
Weekends - I can work, if I want, or I can write fan fiction or I can read. I don't have much of a social life but who needs one when you've got books?
I know myself well enough to say that Mondays will probably be my admin day unless there's something pressing to be done in the other categories. We'll see how it goes, of course, and I might go back to muddling through very quickly. Anyway, it's worth a shot.
Here's Snowdrop with my thesis, to brighten up a dreary Monday...
A few weeks ago I came up with some tangible goals for those ten (how'd it get to ten?!) novels I've got in various states of...undress, for want of a better word. It requires motivation on my part, which I've currently got in spades, and sticking to a fairly rigorous schedule.
December's plan is to write the second draft of 'Max'. I'd been trundling along quite nicely with it, although I was still running behind schedule (but since I'm planning on working Christmas morning and possibly evening, I doubt it matters). However, the other night I realised that the chapter plan I'd sketched out back in September was failing me. The first half was fine but one character has evolved to the point where my initial plan doesn't work any more. This is a pretty good example of character development kicking a writer in the shins but I'm not complaining too much. The fact that I had to stop and think is evidence that the pieces of this novel are falling into place and that can only be a good thing.
Of course, I wasn't so congenial about it yesterday. Actually, I was really angry because I still wanted to stick to my December rewrite strategy. Fortunately, I had to do a Sheffield trip for a supervisor meeting and, in a bid to distract myself, I focused my mind on fixing the problem. A new end-point flashed upon me, making perfect sense, and I spent the rest of the day working back from there. The chapter plan is rough and needs some depth but the sequence and development works.
I'm wondering, though, if this issue is symptomatic of something else. You see, this novel wasn't going to have a happy ending. It was about pain and realising something wasn't meant to be (sort of fitting considering my mental state when I wrote the second draft plan). However, that just didn't work. Way back in 2010, I wrote a post called 'So Much For My Unhappy Ending' about one of my other projects (which has since been through a metamorphosis of its own). After planning a dismal ending, I couldn't follow through on it. Is it just that I don't want to make my characters miserable? I don't know. But if a happy ending is remotely possible, doesn't everyone, fictional or otherwise, deserve a crack at it?
The current state of my WIP is 33,704 words and my projection calculator has me completing the draft on the 7th January. Now that I have my new plan, maybe I can get back on track.
Now I've completed my 2014 NaNoWriMo draft, my thoughts have returned to setting up a clear schedule of writing goals for the next few months. These are, of course, subject to the vagaries of my PhD completion timetable and sanity. I have found, though, that I've got a renewed sense of determination and passion. And plus, y'know, focusing on my writing lets me ignore the shambles of everything else so...we'll roll with it.
December - I'll spend December working on 'Max', the second draft of a novel I wrote back in mid-2012. I replotted this in my week of despair in early September but, despite that, I think the plan works. I've added a viewpoint and some other characters along with lengthening the time frame and making it a bit more serious. The first draft was an exercise in cleansing my mind; now I know more of the characters and I'm ready to create something a little better.
January/February - The first couple of weeks of January will hopefully be spent polishing 'Lily' to perfection. That's the novel I spent September and October with and, right now, the plan is to read it aloud and see how it sounds. After that, I want to work on the tweaks I need to do to 'Danni'. When I did the last of these planning posts back in May, I said that's the novel I'm happiest with. I still maintain that but I want to give it a thorough sweep which may or may not take six weeks.
March - I know what I should do in March. I should get back into 'Liz' because it's a very good story and the first draft was brilliant. I've got a scene-by-scene breakdown for the rest of the rewrite but I can never seem to get back into it. This possibly stems from the fact that I worked on this redraft in Scrivener and I've decided it's not for me. However, the novel is still plugged in there. Why not just export it, you say? Well, I'm a pest and the two benefits of Scrivener as far as I can see are the split-screen functionality and corkboard. Those are the two things I'm actually using. We'll see. There may be another reason why I can't finish this novel but we'll see in March, won't we?
April - I have a tentative plan with a friend in April to work on first drafts together. In which case, mine would probably be altering the first 10,000 of 'Kathy' into first person then finishing that novel draft.
May - Here we reach a conflict where I'll probably either work on the second draft of 'Vic', my 2012 NaNo novel, or 'Izzy', the first draft I wrote after it. Both need planning work done before I can crack on but 'Izzy' needs more so that may be the tipping point. Better see what planning for these I can insert into earlier months.
That all looks a bit gruelling, doesn't it? Lucky I'm determined. The novels that leaves outstanding are 'Lauren', 'Carys'and my latest NaNo success, 'Mel'. Let's see where we are in May. Right, Gene?
Don't worry - this isn't me throwing in the towel before I've begun. However, I am having to do a little more juggling than I would've liked and admit that I'm going to be starting from behind.
For the last month or so I've been rewriting my 2009 NaNo novel ('Lily') for the fifth/sixth/seventh time (honestly, pick a number, it's been through so many drafts and half drafts that I'm dizzy with it). I blogged about my process for rewriting this at the beginning of the month but I'm afraid things have got a little out of control.
The last draft of this thing came in at just under 80,000 words. So I started on the 19th September and happily trundled towards the finish line, trying to write about 2,000 words a day to hit my target. It was tricky but I was managing it and the novel is so much stronger thanks to my additions and small alterations. Everything has been tightened up and I'm proud of it. Except that when I reached 75,000 words the other night I realised that I was still a distance from the finish line. So I checked the last draft to see approximately how many words I had left to go - more like 14,000 than 5,000. I whimpered a bit, realised I couldn't write that many good words in two days alongside a Sheffield trip and other work and decided I needed to adjust my goals.
I don't like the idea of getting behind on NaNo but, I suppose, the beauty of being me is that I'm stubborn as hell. I might start from behind but that'll make me work all the harder to catch up. I'm not sacrificing the chance to make 'Lily' the best it can be ready for submission and I'm not missing out on producing a 2014 NaNo draft with these characters who have been haunting me all year. I'm just not. If I'm going to drown in work, I'll at least be fighting till the end.
I hope that title put 'Do Re Mi' in your head. It was rather intended to. Though this post isn't about musicals, it's about writing (for a change!).
I've gone back to working on 'Lily', the first novel I completed. While the document is labelled 'Fifth Draft' there was an aborted attempt way back in the day so it's more like the sixth. Instead of going through it with a luminous pen, though, I'm typing the whole thing out from scratch. I generally do that with second drafts because there's so much to change but at this point it might seem a little silly, like giving myself far more work to do than I need to.
However, it has the benefit of making me think things over. My sentence structure's evolved a lot since I last toyed with the novel and I'm more confident generally. There are some additional plot aspects I'm trying to weave in as I go but I wanted to make sure as much as possible had been looked over critically. I want this novel to be the best it can be, after all.
So it's a lot of work and it doesn't end here. I plan on another pass through once I've finished this to check and improve syntax and grammar then I want to read the whole thing aloud. I'm not sure how long all this will take but I have other projects to intersperse with this one - many other projects. Not to mention that PhD which is taking up a good proportion of my time at the moment. I'm only really allowing myself to work on the novel after nine o'clock at night which means, of course, that some nights I just can't bring myself to. Which is fine. I've got my priorities and my PhD is top of that list, no question. But I've always been a multi-tasker.
My inclination is to get this draft finished so that I can focus my attention on NaNoWriMo in November. Perhaps that isn't realistic but I'm going to give it a go. Because, really, I've got the words on the page, it's just a case of mixing them all up to make a novel. Right, Maria?
Apologies for the radio silence. It's been a tough few weeks. Actually, everything since my birthday at the end of July has been a mini-nightmare, all conspiring to make this one gigantic monster that's inclined to chase me down the street with fangs bared. I'm holding him off for now but I can't say it's easy.
The less said about the thesis at the moment, the better. I just have to hope the problems I'm having with that (not completely of my own making this time) will iron themselves out. As a side note, I hate Edmund Yates and Wilkie Collins with every fibre of my being. I'd be happy never to see a passing reference to them ever again, though I'm told that feeling fades...eventually.
So - the writing. There's still some good news in the bag that I can't share with you yet but, beyond that, I'm really pulling my finger out. Last week, I took the time to focus on my writing and made a little progress. As I intended to do back in May, I've done a little planning ahead so that one novel ('Max') is ready to be second-drafted. I also cheated a little on my resolution not to do any 'proper' writing and made a concerted effort to finish the second draft of 'Lauren'. We're nearly there with only two and a half chapters left to write and it's hovering around the 60,000 mark at the moment. I've changed a lot about this (added five viewpoints for a start) and it's very rough but getting there, plot-wise. Everything needs tightening etc but that's a job for draft three.
My plans after I've finished that may change. Currently, what I want to do is work on the sixth draft of 'Lily'. That will require concentration, focus on every word, and may not sit comfortably alongside my thesis edits which, at this point, require the same thing. Not to worry - I've got several short stories to write and rework and I'm working on a play rewrite, which I need to submit to somewhere specific by the end of the month. I haven't got much out at submission currently but that's going to change.
To say I'm using my writing as a distraction wouldn't be far off the mark. August was atrocious, punctuated by problems with the boiler that still aren't resolved, a re-emergence of my anxiety issues and some rather more serious problems. My grandmother was diagnosed with bowel cancer. Even when they're 91 it's something you don't want to hear and the doc isn't planning on telling her because of her dementia problems. I've got mixed feelings on that one but my dad and aunt are the ones with the rights over her, not me. As well as that bombshell, I broke up (very amicably, as it happened) with my partner of nearly nine years and there have also been other things going on I can't really discuss on a public forum like this. However, what it all boils down to is a great shift in how I define myself. I've got to change my mindset and fight some long-ingrained habits. Learning to be yourself without other people around to bounce things off can be tricky but, hey, it's not as though I have a choice right now.
I've learned a couple of things in the last month. The first is that I have a renewed confidence in my writing abilities and I really need to hold on to that. The second is that honesty is truly the best policy. It might've made me ill, it might've caused a minor earthquake in my little world, but I feel a bit better for it. Not that I can keep a grip on that perspective constantly. Just have to roll with it for a while, I guess. Finally, the third thing I learned is that I can be strong. As I tweeted last week, I've essentially taken a blowtorch to half my life over the last month. Maybe it was stupid but once I'd struck the match, it was out of my control. And, in all seriousness, the fact that it is all out of my control now is vaguely reassuring. I did the right things for once, the brave things, and the fact that it didn't quite work out is not down to me. I have many things to reproach myself about in the past but, this time, I think I behaved fairly well.
So I'll just continue to roll with the punches. As I've been typing this, a man arrived with no warning to paint our windowsills and the saga of the boiler continues on Wednesday. I may be lonely at the moment, very lonely, but as long as I have my characters around I suppose I'll get through it. Betty Hutton can also help...
Some of you may be interested in the latest issue of Ariadne's Thread (Issue 11, Spring 2014) which has a short story in from yours truly. It also has plenty of other stuff in there too, including some great poetry. I'd recommend buying it for the two poems by Armando Halpern alone. 'Carlo Crivelli, Virgin and Child' and 'Back From the Labyrinth' are engrossing, evocative pieces and I've reread them several times already.
My own story, 'To Catch a Fly', is one that I wrote years ago following an experience with my late maternal grandmother. I rewrote it with a burst of inspiration last year, changing the tense and the overall situation without diminishing the truth at the heart of it. In some ways, it's a very personal story and, in that sense, it's wonderful that it's my first writing success in years.
If you want to buy a copy of this issue, it's available directly from their website and you can purchase via PayPal. I should go into a spiel here about supporting small literary magazines but I'm sure we all know the challenges they face and support where we can so I'll leave it at that.
'Year of the thesis' is taking its toll. Not just on my sanity (though I am rather worried about that) but also on my writing. When I said I was taking a 'writing break' two months ago part of the reason was that I just didn't want to write any more. I'd lost the spark, it had been smothered under thesis work and personal problems, and I couldn't force it to come back with everything else going on. I'd said I'd see how I felt in the future. Well, I know how I feel now. I want to damn well write. Only problem is that I can't.
The kick I needed was a short story acceptance (I'll tell you about that next week) which gave me some confidence in my writing again. Then I had an epiphany about the first novel I ever completed and has been through four rewrites already. I know what to do with it. Suddenly the writing bug was back.
But - but - but... The thesis is killing me. I need to focus on it and I need to finish it as soon as possible. In addition to that, I'm giving papers at three conferences in the next six weeks and that in itself is causing me some considerable anxiety. There's no time for writing novels to fit into this. I've consoled myself by working on short stories longhand but it's not the same and it's not really what I want to be doing. So I've decided that, if I'm telling myself I can't write, I can at least plan. Then when I can write again, I'll be off like a shot... In theory. So here's the list of how my projects are looking and what planning I can do about them until that luxurious moment I actually get to write them again. These are in order of when they were written:
'Lily' - This is the one that prompted the epiphany. As I consequence I've been sort of secretly working on a plan for the sixth draft which I finished the night before last. It details the major changes in each scene and, of course, there will be many minor ones too. I'm raring to go on this one.
'Danni' - I'm actually happiest with this novel. I finished the fifth draft earlier this year and I don't think there's major work to be done, just tweaks. So this is the one I want to submit (and I know where to) once this pesky PhD is done with.
'Liz' - I stopped working on the second draft of this in March when I was about a third into the rewrite and thesis work started to take over. The good thing is, I've also got a scene-by-scene breakdown of changes written for this. Just a case of implementing them.
'Lauren' - I mentioned back in January that I've changed so much with this that the second draft is essentially another first one. And, to be honest, the draft's nearly there. I've got two of the six sections left to complete and one of them is completely planned out. So I just need to plan the last section to get that ready for work.
'Max' - There are massive changes to be made to this first draft, including switching from one POV to two and doing some serious characterisation work on the two protagonists. That all needs to be planned out.
'Vic' - There are changes to be made to back story on this first draft and more characterisation work to be done. I can plan that out.
'Izzy' - This first draft needs major change and I need to work out what those changes are going to be. I've started some protagonist characterisation work so I need to finish that then plan the new progression I guess.
'Carys' - My most recent NaNoWriMo success obviously needs major work. I have no idea what form this is going to take so I need to think about that.
'Kathy' - This unfinished draft needs rewriting from third to first person and then planned from there to the end. That's doable.
So there we go. There's a lot of planning I can get my teeth stuck into there, as long as I resist the temptation to actually write the drafts. Hopefully by the time I'm finally allowed to indulge, I'll be chomping at the bit. Though when that may be...who knows?
It's probably unsurprising that the question I ask myself on a daily basis is 'am I doing enough?' - it's a symptom of this work ethic I seem to have developed in the last few years. Just when I think I can't add 'more' to my to-do list, I find another gear. In the last month, I've started zooming until the figures waving at me to pull over and have a sit-down are inconsequential blurs. My father's resorted to replenishing my Smarties stash without complaint and knocking on the door every once in a while to make sure I eat proper meals. But, still, the question returns, usually at half past two in the morning when I can't possibly turn my mind off: am I doing enough?
My work diary suggests what can only be described as 'epic multi-tasking'. Since I restarted my it in January following a little hiatus I've apparently worked on two novel manuscripts (completely rewriting tens of thousands of one and indulging in some delicate rewriting on the other), written a full-length play draft, a short play draft and rewritten half a single television drama script draft. I've also got more things out at submission that I've had for literally years: two novels to competitions (different to the above), a script and two short stories. In the next two weeks I hope to add two more scripts to that and a novel (yes, another different one) to another competition. And I keep discovering things I want to enter. That's on the writing side of things. On the academic side, I deleted 8000 words of my fourth thesis chapter and drastically rewrote it (with success, I believe) and I'm currently in the process of drastically rewriting the first thesis chapter I wrote way back in 2011-12 (currently up to 9000 words on that). I've been doing detailed research for two essays I hope to write in the near future, doing some Collins biography work to get my facts completely straight and I've submitted two abstracts, one for a conference and one for an edited collected. Usually, when I hop from one project to another, I don't get much done of anything but the last two months have defied that formula.
But, still, the question remains: am I doing enough? I think the fact is that I'm never going to believe I am. I mean, how long's a piece of string? What's enough? Do you quantify 'enough' by only doing what you 'have' to? In that case, all my writing's redundant. Or do you judge it by the amount of work you'd 'like' to do? Under that glare, I fail completely. I've made a conscious decision to do as much as mentally and physically possible in 2014, and I think I've stuck to that resolution in the first two months of the year. But, no, I don't feel like I'm doing 'enough' because my expectations of myself are ridiculously high. What's the point if they aren't? There's a wonderful line in Merrily We Roll Along's 'Old Friends' from writer Charley that sums up my feelings: 'Well, what's the point of demands you can meet?' Really, what is the point? It means you're not pushing yourself and I am determined to push myself.
Perhaps I'm asking the wrong question. Perhaps it's not 'am I doing enough?' Perhaps it's 'am I doing too little?' that will satisfy me that I'm not failing. That one I can almost always answer with a resounding 'NO'!
A little look at at my work diary for the past two weeks tells me that I've reviewed three classic films, two books and written three other blog posts. I've spent four afternoons going through a Wilkie Collins biog for every scrap of information I may ever need to know and a long evening arguing with British Periodicals to get some articles loaded up for a paper I want to write. I've created a 245 point list of terror detailing the changes I'd like to make on my thesis chapters as they stand and I spent one agonising day trying to write the appendix that refuses to be written. I've also finished the last third of a play and added nearly 20,000 words to a novel rewrite. Oh, and I did some babysitting and a Sheffield trip too. No wonder I'm shattered!
The thing about this novel rewrite is that it's one I can and should do rapidly. Effectively, it's another first draft. The characters involved in this novel have been in my head since I was 16. They've been in scripts, they've been in three different locations to date. I failed in 2011 to complete NaNoWriMo with them and then managed it in 2012 - after a location switch and a POV change. The NaNo draft was all from the POV of one character - Lauren - while my previous attempt had been from six points of view. You know what I'm doing now, right? Yep, going back to a structure where all characters get a section to themselves. Six different voices and an alteration in the organisation of the setting.
So I'm treating the rewrite as another first draft. Most of the general structure and relationships is staying the same but nearly all of the specifics are being altered. I've only referred twice to the first draft so far and that was for pieces of dialogue I didn't want to lose. Essentially, it's a different novel, albeit it with lingering and very persistent characters. If I didn't treat it like I do my first drafts (get it down, get it done, get on with something else) I'd be wasting time. The 'second draft' isn't going to be in any kind of decent state, just as the first draft wasn't. I need to get the new structure on the page, play around with the new voices, then fix it later. Just the way it has to be.
After that, there's an entirely different prospect. I've got a second draft currently standing at 14,000 words that requires concentration, precision, thought about every word. That will take much longer. It's all about knowing what different projects require. And, for me at the moment, it's all about working on them without stressing too much about what I'm going to do with them. Writing's enough right now. After all, this is the year of the thesis...right?
It's been a long, long time since I did proper paper edits on a novel draft. I mean, I've done bits and pieces, odd chapters, but it's a long time since I held a full draft in my hands then attacked it mercilessly with a pen. True, my rewrites on 'Danni' have leapfrogged finishing the first draft of 'Kathy' (as planned here) but there's a good reason for that. Finishing the first draft of 'Izzy', jumping straight into NaNo and then going back to trying to complete a third first draft in a row felt...well, ludicrous, even for me. So I picked up the edits and spent a solid six hours highlighting what needs to be changed and weighing up every sentence. As I went, I found myself coming up with my own little editing shorthand that I felt like sharing. Some of it's standard, some of it's a little peculiar...
Check - Means what it says, for the most part. I'm not completely happy with the sentence as it reads so I need to look into it further and see if I can change it.
Rephrase - I know that the sentence definitely isn't right and needs a complete overhaul.
(?) - My word choice isn't right in a portion of the sentence, think it over and consult a thesaurus.
Foreshadow - Exactly what it says. Perfect moment for foreshadowing something that happens later.
Check E/T - Nope, this doesn't mean consult the resident alien. It means consult The Emotion Thesaurus, an excellent writing guide I discussed in more detail in this post, 'I Said Love - Or Did I?'
M/C - Stands for 'more common'. I apparently have a habit of making my antagonists far too posh. In this case, it really doesn't work so I'm peppering his dialogue with these notes to remind me to rough up his language a bit.
Tag - Sentence isn't reading well, may need to rearrange the character tagging or add a tag in.
Extend - More of it, I want more of it.
Clunky - Well, it's...clunky.
(P) - Punctuation change.
I'm assuming most of that is normal. I'm also assuming it's a list that'll continue to get longer. I have to say, though, losing myself in these edits is proving rather delightful. The only difficulty is, once I've made notes on what edits I want to make, I have to go back to PhD work for a week. Who knows when I'll be able to actually implement the edits?
I don't know if the length of time it's taken for me to finish this latest first draft is a record for me. I first mentioned it back in February when the protagonist came into my head and refused to leave. Then I had to break off to focus on PhD work. In May I explained that I was finding it a difficult story to work on so I was leaving it be for a bit. Then in June I got a little side-tracked again. I startedanother first draft and poor Izzy got pushed to the back of the queue again. However, in my blog post last month detailing what I need to do before 2013 is out, I made Izzy a priority. Knuckling down, I finally managed to draw it to a conclusion, a decent chunk being written in the last four days.
My first drafts never have large word counts. Maybe it's a consequence of coming by half of them through NaNoWriMo but once they slip over 50,000 words I feel like that's a reasonable basis for revision. Izzy's no different, coming in at just over 52,000. Even with the glow of completing the first draft still present, I'm aware of how much has to be done to it. But loving the character is a good start in that respect. I didn't betray her with her ending in the first draft and I won't betray her in the rewrite. But when will that happen?
Let's put my projects in order of importance (here's an old list of their status):
Next up is my NaNoWriMo novel, labelled 'Carys' after my habit of protagonist titles until inspiration strikes. I hate titles.
After that, I would like to finish 'Kathy' before 2014.
I need to do rewrites on 'Danni'. Final, final rewrites. I've added to this extensively in the last year, bringing in material from a discarded first draft and generally beefing it up a little. I'm now working on dialogue, atmosphere and word choice, possibly the hardest things to do!
Then comes 'Liz'. To say I consider this the finest first draft I ever wrote, rewriting it is proving to be damn difficult. I got about a fifth of the way through the rewrite before halting a few months ago.
I think then that 'Lauren' deserves her chance, though this one is going to become an ensemble novel. I've been playing with these characters since I was sixteen and they need yet another realignment. I'll get them right someday.
After that I should probably have a crack at my NaNoWriMo novel from last year - 'Vic'. I've got a solid idea for the rewrite of this to make it darker than it already was.
Then 'Max'. I know how I want the rewrite of this to pan out but the thought of writing it makes me feel queasy.
Finally, 'Lily'. I have no idea what I'm going to do with her or whether I should do anything at all.
Of course, writing is my secondary concern now. My PhD takes priority. And, if you listen carefully, you can hear me growling with frustration. Is it any wonder I feel like poor Veronica from In the Good Old Summertime?
As you do when you can't sleep, I spent a good proportion of the early hours of this morning cataloguing what I need to do before this year's out and also the things I would like to do. None of these, amazingly, seem rooted in fun. The things I'd like to do are just extensions of the things I need to do. Funny that.
Final chapter of my thesis - Non-negotiable. This will be done and redrafted several times.
Rewriting first chapter of my thesis - I'm pragmatic enough to realise the final work on this may end up being done in January. It's a hefty job and it all depends how long writing the final chapter takes me. More details on my thesis completion schedule can be found here.
Research and write a Yates/Dickens article I've got in mind - Pie in the sky this one. I'll only have time to do it if the days are magically extended by fifty percent.
Research an article on dead insects in a Yates novel - Don't ask. Also, see above.
Corrections on Downton Abbey essay when these come back - Non-negotiable.
Finish sixth draft of 'Danni' - This is essentially a polishing exercise. I finished the fifth draft earlier this year and now I'm trying to make it perfect.
Finish first draft of 'Izzy' - I last wrote about this here. I've been stopping and starting with this one all year and I know where it's going. Just need to get it finished. The first draft's about two-thirds done.
Finish first draft of 'Kathy' - This is less than 20k in at the moment but I would like to complete it before the year's out.
Do NaNoWriMo - I'm determined to participate again, particularly because I have an excellent idea. The characters are roaming in my head and it's going to be set on a cruise ship - plenty of time for research when I go on my own cruise in a few weeks.
These are only a fraction of the things I'd like to do but I'm trying to be realistic. I've got four other novel manuscripts in need of revision and I did say this would be a year for revision. But the most important thing at the moment is my PhD. It's much easier to write first drafts alongside my thesis because I don't have to worry about every individual word as I do with revisions.
I feel a little like Eglantine... Anybody have a self-duplication spell?
For a few years now I've had a rule that I've tried to stick to: finish one first draft before I start another. I know from a couple of projects I've abandoned (though, technically, they're just there waiting to be finished) that I can't get involved again easily. Once I step away from the characters mid-first draft it proves tricky to ingratiate myself with them again. But I'm preparing to break that rule today. I do have reasons though - if that makes it any better.
I'm away from home at the moment with nothing but my laptop and my brain. My plan was to work on the second draft of 'Liz' (see here) but I've done a fair few thousand then stopped. It's a mixture of things. First off, as I mentioned on Friday, I'm using this novel to get to grips with Scrivener. That's not a terrible thing in itself but I am finding that working without the notebook in which I wrote detailed notes on the alterations that needed to occur within every scene is very difficult. I don't think I'm prepared to work on it now only to have to iron out the creases once more when I get home.
Okay, so I've struck that second draft off the list of things to do. However, I'm still in the middle of a first draft of another story ('Izzy') so why don't I just continue with that? It's sitting comfortably at just over 32,000 words but, again, there are aspects to the story I've got written down at home and I don't want to wing it at this point because I'd added logic to the plot progression. That doesn't always happen in my first drafts so I want to make the most of it. (Incidentally, the progression to this one was not written in a nice notebook; it was scrawled on a scrap piece of paper while in Costa so I hope it doesn't go a'wandering.) Aside from the notes issue, I'm not sure I can access that protagonist in my brain at the moment. She's, erm, potent and requires my full attention. But my attention has been drawn elsewhere.
A while ago now I got another idea that I made a brief note about and aimed to return to in about August or whenever I finished 'Izzy'. But having no real ability to continue with 'Liz' or 'Izzy' at the moment I turned my mind back to it yesterday. The initial situation has taken hold. I have no idea what happens after the second chapter but that's how I like it. Me and Kathy and ready to go...
