I recently started revising a project that I’ve been working on for the past three years. This will be the fifth full revision of it and (thankfully) it has already been sold to a publisher. This revision will focus on voice and dialogue. But when I sat down to do it, I felt trapped in the manuscript, especially with that oh-so-important first chapter.
I decided to retype the story. Crazy, I know, but there is also something so liberating about starting out with all that white space and nothing beyond. Perhaps it is more psychological, but I felt free to really make it what I wanted. I was also able to determine the slow/boring parts and trim them right out (I don’t really have to type all that, do I?). Without the stress of trying to make sure A matches B and C, I could get a little more personal with the characters. I could switch backstory around as I saw fit, without worrying about being redundant. And most importantly, I was able to fall in love with the story all over again.
So far I’m on pg 28. We’ll see how it goes from here.
Happy Revising!
seven different ways but can’t unravel the complexities of a teenage boy’s heart. With the help of her bff’s (and a few secert operations), Cammie applies her super sleuthdom/stalkdom to dating. Cammie and her friends attempt to answer that quintessential question: is he really that into me? As well as the important follow-up question, is he worth it?
