Pedal to the Metal

I’m about 75% of the way through the fifth draft of ‘Tider’, and still going strong; it’s turning out to be more of a rewrite than a draft, however. I never cease to be amazed by the fact that you can’t just change one tiny detail when you’re doing novel edits. That one tiny detail, much like a snowball rolling down a hill, always seems to turn into a life-changing, book-wrecking disaster by the time you get to the end of the next chapter.

Image: losetheexcuses.blogspot.com

I have to keep reminding myself that, with every tweak, I am making the book better and stronger and more nuanced and ensuring it makes some sort of sense and tying up all manner of loose plotlines (nothing is as dangerous as a loose plotline, lying around). It would be impossible to keep going, otherwise. However it does feel, at times, like you’re going around in circles, making a change one day and removing it the next; I’m looking forward to finishing this draft and then leaving ‘Tider’ alone for as long as I can before going back to it with a fresh eye.

Also, yesterday, I finally managed to come up with an opening sentence that I’m happy with. I’ve been working on ‘Tider’ for nigh-on three months at this stage, and I’ve written and rewritten the book’s opening sentence at least fifteen thousand hundred squillion times, so finding one that I didn’t hate on sight was, I think, an achievement. It’s cruel that the most important sentence in the book, arguably, is the one that you have to write first, and the one with which you’re likely to be least happy. I’m really hoping I won’t look at this sentence again when I start working on the book today and wonder if I wrote it in a feverish, coffee-fuelled fit, and throw it out like so many others before it; I’d like to keep it, just for a while, and see if it grows on me.

Image: health.com

As well as that, I came across a scene I’d written at one of the more action-packed escape sequences in the book which I can’t believe survived as long as it did. It comes at a point where the heroine has just taken a huge risk with her life and limb in order to get away from a pursuer, and she meets a small, secondary character. They proceed to have a long, pointless, rambling conversation that tells us nothing about either character and completely kills the forward momentum. When I read it yesterday it was one of those head-slappy moments where you gnash your teeth and tear your hair and scream at the sky:

What was I thinking?!?

Once I’d recovered from my melodrama, I rewrote the scene and cut out anything that wasn’t absolutely necessary (which was basically the entire scene). I ended up trimming over a thousand words. One thousand words is a lot of words to have in a scene that are doing absolutely nothing useful; one thousand words of dead weight, particularly all in one place, is really quite silly.

I know the rules – I know you’re not supposed to have so much as a sentence in your novel that doesn’t propel the action forward in some way (at least, for the sort of novel I’m trying to write – if you’re Umberto Eco or Paolo Coelho or Gabriel Garcia Marquez or someone like that, you’re allowed to use beautiful language, just because), and I know you’re supposed to move fast. So why did I have my protagonist stop off, mid-chase sequence, to chat to an extremely minor character about her troubled childhood?

Darned if I know.
Image: gifrific.com

It’s strange how, sometimes, we can get lost inside the world we’re creating as we write. I’m glad to know that the character my protagonist meets had a hard life, and is unhappy in her job, but there’s no need to make it part of the story. Also, my protagonist is the type of person who is sympathetic to others, and I think that came out in the scene as I first wrote it. She met a sad, downtrodden woman and wanted to help her – that’s nice, but it doesn’t help the plot, so sadly it has to be junked.

*sigh*

FYI – at last count, my Offcuts file (where I keep all the bits and pieces I’ve snipped out of ‘Tider’) is 54,000 words.

Fifty. Four. Thousand. Words.

I’ll leave you with that nugget of knowledge for today.

Happy Thursday. If you make mistakes today, may they be small, and easily undone.

Drafting Dos & Don’ts, or Missives of a Maniac

So, yesterday marked the beginning of ‘Tider Mark II Draft II’, truly a red-letter day in my life, and – I’m sure – in yours. Me being me, and my life being what it is, though, nothing went to plan; in this as in everything I make a mess of, however, I managed to learn some stuff. It’s my civic duty to pass it on, so that those wobbling in my footsteps might avoid the same pitfalls and experience no delays as they ascend the misty heights of Mount Brilliant.

Aaaw, *man*.
Image: tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com

So, without further ado, here is what I learned from yesterday’s editing. Reading it, one would be forgiven for thinking I had never edited anything before, ever. This is so far from the truth as to be laughable. It makes me wonder about the state of my brain, and its ability to retain what I put into it.

Anyway.

Things learned (so far) from Tider: Draft 2

1. Don’t mess with (what you think is) your only copy of your text

So. Picture the scene. I opened my computer file, and all was well. Birds were singing, sunlight laughing through the window, the world was a multi-hued picture of sheer unadulterated beauty, and so forth. I may even have giggled and sung soprano, à la Snow White, c. 1937.

This is the kind of look I’m aiming for, right here.
Image: animatedfilmreviews.blogspot.com

I’d been happily snipping and cutting and editing and making huge editorial decisions for goodness knows how long when a realisation hit me, and it was akin to having a giant, cold bucket of slop poured over my head. It put paid to the singing and the sunshine, let me tell you. That realisation was:

What did I think I was doing, messing around with my only copy of the text?

I’d been doing really well, I thought, saving as I went and being really careful to back my work up to my USB stick, as I always am. Every change I made, I’d saved it. I seem to have been so interested in making backups of my edits to realise how stupid it is to edit any document without making a backup of the whole thing first.

So.

First thing you don’t do when you’re editing a long and important document is this: don’t start hacking away at it without having a backup made of the entire thing. What happens if you decide later that your editorial decisions were wrong? What happens if you preferred it the way it was before you started editing? What happens if you delete something vital by mistake and you don’t realise it until it’s too late? None of these will become disasters unless you don’t have a full copy made of Draft 1 before you begin.

2. Don’t lose the password to your new phone with all your notes in it

Perhaps this one is very much a ‘me’ sort of problem, and has arisen because a) I’m technologically challenged, as you know, and b) I got a new phone recently, which requires a different password to be entered for every tiny little function. It is enough to drive one to the brink.

What my new phone does have, however, is a wonderful note-taking function; I’ve been making great use of it for the past week or so, ever since I learned how it works. I’ve been ruminating on plot twists and character motivation and possible endings and even writing a back-cover blurb (it’s great for focusing the mind on the important bits of your plot, FYI). The only drawback to this is that I tend to forget stuff once I’ve made a note of it. Once it’s in the phone, it doesn’t need to be in my head. This is all fine, if getting into the phone didn’t require the same levels of dexterity, quick thinking and chutzpah needed to outsmart an ancient booby-trap.

Okay. So, I swipe the screen, and enter the password… Hang on, hang on. The *what?*
Image: impassionedcinema.com

Of course, I eventually worked it out. Of course, it turned out to be the simplest thing in the known universe. And, of course, I felt like a total pillock when I realised this. But the short version of this story is: keep a good hold of your passwords. At the last count, I have twenty-three of them. Don’t lose ’em or mix ’em up, particularly when your nuggets of wisdom regarding the dramatic climax of your work of genius are stored safely away behind ’em. Capisce?

3. Don’t worry too much about formatting page layout, &c., as you go

Perhaps this is as clear as day to most people. To me, however, it is a challenge. I’m the sort of person who has to have everything perfect – it helps me to keep a handle on the document overall if I know all my paragraphs and page layouts are okay. I’m not sure why this is, because having perfect page breaks has zero effect on the document’s contents. In any case, I tend to stress myself out over things like making sure there are no ‘widows and orphans’ (in terms of sentences, naturally), and that all the proper indents are in place, and that every new speaker has their own line in blocks of dialogue, and all these other things that don’t really matter until the final edit. They’re very important – don’t get me wrong – but when you’re up to your neck in the middle of your second edit, don’t stress if a paragraph isn’t perfectly laid out. Seriously.

The final point, however, is probably the most important one. Are you ready?

4. Don’t start freaking out until you remember you emailed yourself a copy of the document two weeks ago

If I had remembered this first, I could’ve saved myself all the stress I went through during Point 1, above.

My peace of mind has been irrevocably damaged. I mean, I’ll never look at a USB stick the same way again…
Image: evangelicaloutpost.com

Yes. After I had spent goodness knows how long freaking out over all the work I’d lost from being so eager to begin my edits without making a backup, I realised I’d emailed myself a copy of ‘Tider’ a while back, which had the original version of everything I’d edited. So, then I started singing again and the sun came out, and everything was rosy once more.

Let this be a lesson. Not only do you need to be clever enough to make backups, but you need to be clever enough to remember you’ve made backups. Take it from one who has suffered, so you don’t have to.

Happy Tuesday! Together, we’ll make it through.