I’ve found that I can do a lot of final polishing via my Kindle, which means I can do it at the forest preserve while walking (I can walk and read) and means that I’m not wasting paper, although I do write my corrections on paper, but I reuse printer cover sheets. I’ve thought about using my phone recorder to record the corrections, but figure that would take longer to fix, and then instead of walking, I’d be holding things. And I don’t want to lose the note on what to correct. I dislike seeing an error that I thought I already fixed.
But I love that I can update my document and resend it to the Kindle, and be looking at the latest version mere minutes later.
I’ve been tearing apart and redoing the beginning of Hierarchy, and far from being discouraged, I was thrilled when I came up with a perfect line that wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t been redoing the opening. It’s hard to have a smooth beginning to a complicated book. Hierarchy is a dystopia (opposite of utopia, so instead of the world being wonderful, it’s pretty terrible.)
This novel is told from the perspective of four characters in strict order. It was tricky to write that way, and even trickier when I needed to add a scene for one of the characters since I had to add a scene for each of the other three characters, and keep within the time limit before the next scene started. I doubt I’ll ever write one in strict order again. I often write novels that have two point of view characters bouncing back and forth, but four? Too complicated. Hopefully not complicated to read, but complicated to write, and revise, and revise some more.
But, as usual, I learned a lot in the process. I’m also thinking that it isn’t so important to have equal time between different POV characters. But I still think that starting a book with one POV and keeping with one POV for several chapters, or even half the book, and then introducing other POV characters is very jarring. I realize that published books, even books that win awards, do this. But I don’t like it. It feels like I’ve been cheated, promised one type of book, then had the rug pulled out from under me. I don’t like that feeling. Either people do, or they don’t notice that the POV character changed, as in they’re not really connecting with the character. Possible, I guess.
Noticed that I had a character one year later who was the same age as he was in the first book. Oops. Good news is that it made me realize that the three POV characters were all something-five, as in twenty-five, thirty-five and forty-five. I made one twenty-four, and the buddy of the middle one thirty-six. Otherwise it seems too coincidental, and doesn’t help to distinguish the characters for the reader. Hadn’t noticed that they all ended in five until a recent reread.
Recharging your batteries, filling the well, whatever you call it, it is good to take a break and take in input without worrying about how or when it will be used. Three and a half weeks in Europe made for a lot of input.
I did a little writing and editing, more in the beginning even though I was jet-lagged. I was still in the habit of editing, and since I was working on a book that takes place in France, editing while there felt pretty neat. But with spending so much time sight-seeing, and being with my family, and adjusting to the time difference, and eating long slow meals, I mainly took notes of specific details without worrying how or when I’d use them in a novel. I had the vague notion that I’d use them in the series I’m working on that starts with “French Impressions.”
Then something my husband and daughter said triggered an idea. I played with it on the fringes of my attention, thinking about the character and her situation. Because I was on vacation, I wasn’t trying to make a lot of progress with the plot, but I finally had to start taking notes since the character was intruding on my relaxing. I have my novel idea for NaNoWriMo this year. I have a lot of work to do, but there’s plenty of time before November.
What we pack says a lot about us as individuals. My husband spent time downloading maps onto his phone so he could navigate in a number of cities in Europe without incurring hefty data charges. I made sure my Kindle had a number of my works-in-progress to revise, free writing books, and several books from the library as well as a couple of friend’s books I’ve been meaning to read for months. My youngest daughter focused on her laptop having the music, language and other files as well as her phone having several books on it. My middle child bought a subscription to a music service so she could have nice music on her phone since she’s wasn’t bringing a laptop.