OMG...I'm Writing!

I surprised myself. I thought I would continue to procrastinate and hem and haw (whatever that is, but I've heard that people do it when they procrastinate). But I actually have a whole other chapter under my belt! Better yet, I feel wiser approaching the revision this time.

Last spring I remember looking at my novel again after a long break and thinking "wow...this is way better than I remember it being." This time, picking up my novel again after a break, I thought "wow...this is way worse than I remember it being." It doesn't help that I'm reading War and Peace right now. Compared to that my novel seems like a magazine article and barely worth the effort.

My improvements this week have almost exclusively involved taking things OUT, whereas last year it was about putting scenes IN. I'm taking out every sentence that is repetitive or that "tells" rather than "shows." The whole "show, don't tell" cliche is one of those cliches that deserves to be repeated by everyone because it's pretty darn good advice. For instance, I have one scene where my main character Ana stays up all night baking hundreds of cookies for her office. After describing her actions, I have her say (this is all in first person) how she feels obsessed and can't sleep. Do we really need to be told that? Wouldn't it be better to just see her doing something obsessive and staying up all night to do it? Do we need someone who is doing something crazy to turn to us and say "look, I'm doing something crazy"? Anyway. I fired a lot of sentences this week. Sentence unemployment is on the rise.

I'm not happy with my description. It's unsurprising and filled with adjectives and adverbs, rather than a magical combinations of words that convey experience or emotion with strength, efficiency, and freshness. The key is not finding more words, but finding the right words. I have worked on plenty of creative projects in my life, and so far nothing has been more difficult than this. So perhaps reading Tolstoy right now is serendipitous.

I'm also removing or limiting long stretches of Ana talking about her feelings, and moving more toward action...having her do things, talk about the things she did or what other people did, and basically interact with the world more. There's still reflection, but I want the novel to do more, not think more.

Dave asked me if it was hard to cut out so much. It kind of is. I'm cutting some parts that are well-written, funny, and in other ways wonderful....they just don't contribute to the novel and each sentence needs to move it forward or contribute. It can't just be there because I like it. Otherwise it's like that person we've all worked with who is nice enough and makes us laugh, but after awhile you notice they never really contribute and you wonder "what IS it they do all day?" So it is a little bittersweet to hit that delete key, but at the same time it feels good...like cleaning a closet of things you no longer need or wear. It makes room for something better, even though it's hard to let go of what you have.

I'm hoping this weekend to finish the VERY difficult chapter I'm working on right now...it needs a lot of work. This is the chapter where "everything changes". Hope you have a nice weekend and MLK Day!