Re-writing is very slow going

I finally finished re-writing the first chapter of my book today. This is actually my third session working on it since last November and these were spread out over a month. Yes, it is pathetic how little time I spend on my book, thanks for noticing.

But, though it’s far from perfect, I think it’s much better now than all previous tries. The ending feels a little rushed to me but I am getting tired and cannot think of anything else to put there for the moment so it will have to do. The original ending was better but since the plot has changed so much the original ended would not make sense, out it went. I am getting much better about chopping up my work and ditching stuff, you will be happy to know.

The biggest problem with the first chapter is that, obviously, it needs to grab the reader’s attention. That and some very weird, ambiguous things are happening in the first chapter that were challenging to write. I don’t want the reader to really know what’s up right away, esp since the characters don’t know. These two were hurdles enough without throwing in a third element.

When I first started this book, my idea for the first chapter was, roughly, two characters have a fight. I didn’t know what the fight was going to be about but, luckily one of my best friends at the time totally flipped out at me for no reason just as I was starting this section of the book and I suddenly had my inspiration. I say luckily because I have come to realize with time that the book is better for my life than this needy friend was, so it ended up being a win.

What had me stuck was that, in writing this scene, I kept re-playing the fight with this ex-friend over and over again. I kept wanting to make my side of the argument “win” and to show why the other side was ridiculous.

This was a very stupid thing to try and do. The original chapter was terrible.

So I let the Chapter fester for about a year and finally re-approached it. It got a total overhaul in terms of what actually happens in the chapter but the fight was still the weakest part. I finally decided to scrap using my friend betrayal as inspiration.

After two tries and a lot of off paper thinking about it, I got the fight to the point where I think it works. It’s hard to say because I have re-written it so many times but I think it’s better now than before. Also, oddly, in trying not to write about my ex-friend and I, I think I may have captured the essence of that fight more than ever, which is weird but not necessarily bad. One of the themes of this series is friendship and betrayal so it totally works.

The bad news of the night. Revising that chapter took forever and that was only the first chapter. Granted, this chapter was extra challenging and also got a total overhaul and most just need a few edit but, still, I really have my work cut out for me. I really still want to finish editing this book before I start my next book with NaNoWriMo so I really need to get cracking in order to pull this off.