When a chapter is slow, combine it with another chapter. I had revised both chapters several times, and they seemed fine. But fine doesn’t equate to interesting, exciting, or worth reading. As I imagined the critiquers on critiquecircle.com commenting on it, I could picture several of them asking, ‘What was the point?’ Well, part of it is to show the main character being effective at helping people solve problems. It takes a while to show something like that, which is why the general advice, ‘show, don’t tell’ is never meant to be used all the time. Part of effective story-telling is knowing when to summarize something.
I had so much fun combining chapters, that I got a bit carried away. Still, it’s a good way to see something fresh. And a lot of my chapters were too short.
With showing, it’s important not to drag something out. How do I show a boring meeting without boring the reader? Having the main character count the wrinkles on the speaker is one way. (Barry’s idea, actually.) But it made for a neat scene.
Some people might think it’s a bit early to be thinking about National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) which occurs in November, but that’s the downside of being a planner. If I’m going to finish the first draft of a novel in November without ‘writing too much’ i.e. stressing my body, I need to start a month or two earlier, i.e. in September. To start writing, I need a complete outline. So I should be starting that, like now.
I don’t want to work on my outline now for something I’m supposed to write in November. But I like focusing on writing new stuff in November. So my idea is to work on the outline in November this year.
Not sure when I’ll write the novel, maybe next November. Perhaps I can iterate over a novel and write it over the course of three years at a sensible pace. Maybe. We’ll see.
I have a few ideas for the novel–it’s going to be the fourth book in my French series. I know one of the character’s conflicts, need to figure out the other main character’s issues. And when in the book’s universe the next book starts. Book one to two had a four month gap. Then book two to three had no gap. I’d like to skip some of the slow stuff, but June is a lovely time to be in Paris.
But I have the whole Summer and Much of fall to ponder these things. I don’t need to have a certain amount done by a certain point in time. That’s the beauty of this idea. I can even figure out the title.