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pameladeanI don't want to work on my revisions, so I'm going to write about them instead. I'm hoping that this will be a head-clearing activity, because in truth I am sadly muddled.
What needs to be done falls into several categories.
1. Split the huge volume into two, possibly writing a bit of fancy framework to prevent readers of the first part from feeling that they have just fallen off a cliff, and innocents who pick up the second part first from feeling that they were just fine a moment ago and what is all that rock rushing by them? Think of titles for the two volumes.
2. Deal with strong negative reactions to the ending suffered by several, though not all, of my beta readers, without disturbing the experience of those who liked it. These objections cover the motivations of the characters, consistency with the earlier books, and political implications of various kinds.
I did not anticipate the need for the above. For what's below, I did:
3. Put intimations of various important objects and characters and themes that suddenly leapt up in the second half into the first half, in a decent fashion, so that they do not come out of nowhere and cause the wrong kind of alarm.
4. Clear up ambiguities, at least to a point.
5. Give the first volume some kind of narrative movement. Or not. I'm still up in the air on this one.
6. Clean up all the fiddly, line-by-line problems with voice, clarity, pacing, theme, and so on, so that they all do what they are supposed to, unless what they are actually doing is better, in which case, leave them strictly alone.
7. Cut where possible, from single words to lines to scenes, since some new material must go in and both these volumes will still be awfully long.
8. Agonize about how long some of the chapters are, but decide to try to preserve the viewpoint switches. Oh, right, and write another Arry chapter, if possible, because I muddled up the viewpoint switches. Yargh.
No. 1 has to be the last thing I do, I think, except that thinking of titles is running as a background process and also serving as a form of cat-vacuuming, since I can look up quotations and pretend it's research. No. 2 terrifies me, but I've done a great deal of work on it, and have at least as much left still to do. No. 3 is going very well and is nearly finished, except for the water-clock. No. 4 has been tackled but needs more work. No. 5 is on hold. No. 6 is going quite well, though it will have to be done separately for all the new bits. No. 7 is not happening at all except that occasionally I'll take out a word or two. I can see such trouble. No. 8 is ongoing, except for the actual writing.
P.
What needs to be done falls into several categories.
1. Split the huge volume into two, possibly writing a bit of fancy framework to prevent readers of the first part from feeling that they have just fallen off a cliff, and innocents who pick up the second part first from feeling that they were just fine a moment ago and what is all that rock rushing by them? Think of titles for the two volumes.
2. Deal with strong negative reactions to the ending suffered by several, though not all, of my beta readers, without disturbing the experience of those who liked it. These objections cover the motivations of the characters, consistency with the earlier books, and political implications of various kinds.
I did not anticipate the need for the above. For what's below, I did:
3. Put intimations of various important objects and characters and themes that suddenly leapt up in the second half into the first half, in a decent fashion, so that they do not come out of nowhere and cause the wrong kind of alarm.
4. Clear up ambiguities, at least to a point.
5. Give the first volume some kind of narrative movement. Or not. I'm still up in the air on this one.
6. Clean up all the fiddly, line-by-line problems with voice, clarity, pacing, theme, and so on, so that they all do what they are supposed to, unless what they are actually doing is better, in which case, leave them strictly alone.
7. Cut where possible, from single words to lines to scenes, since some new material must go in and both these volumes will still be awfully long.
8. Agonize about how long some of the chapters are, but decide to try to preserve the viewpoint switches. Oh, right, and write another Arry chapter, if possible, because I muddled up the viewpoint switches. Yargh.
No. 1 has to be the last thing I do, I think, except that thinking of titles is running as a background process and also serving as a form of cat-vacuuming, since I can look up quotations and pretend it's research. No. 2 terrifies me, but I've done a great deal of work on it, and have at least as much left still to do. No. 3 is going very well and is nearly finished, except for the water-clock. No. 4 has been tackled but needs more work. No. 5 is on hold. No. 6 is going quite well, though it will have to be done separately for all the new bits. No. 7 is not happening at all except that occasionally I'll take out a word or two. I can see such trouble. No. 8 is ongoing, except for the actual writing.
P.
