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Tag Archives: revisions
May
2
Playing Catch Up
There’s a sort of surreal mindset that comes with those last few days of revisions. (At least for me.) One of those things that builds and builds stress-wise until it’s 3 in the morning before the book is due and my right eye is twitching like mad and I’m on my 13th can of Coke Zero and I’m not even seeing the words I’m typing. (At which point, I give up and take the next day off from my day job to finish up those last few pages – because even if I actually managed to get to work I’d be a zombie anyway.) It’s probably poor time management on my side, though I don’t mean for it to be. Not sure why whenever I’ve got something due, shoes start dropping, kids get sick, my back flares up…one small thing after another that starts to build up and up. (And…
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May
1
The Aftermath
Of course, the problem with handing in revisions is that once I’ve pulled the trigger to send them off, my brain refuses to shut down. Five minutes after I moved away from the computer, my author-mind was like “Hey, you really should have fleshed out that scene there. Just a couple of lines. That’s all you need. Really.” And maybe I do. The good thing is that I still have time for small changes; it will be a little bit before the copyeditor gets the ms back to me. It’s probably good for me to take a small break from it anyway – after looking at it so hard core for the last few weeks, I’ve lost perspective on it. I’ve reached that saturation point where every sentence looks like crap. I’m second-guessing all my plot points – too much? not enough? OMFG the almost-sort-of-love-triangle? Will the readers be disappointed…
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Apr
17
Review Advice
I get a lot of questions sometimes about my writing methods, such as they are. I always feel vaguely uncomfortable answering them because there isn’t any real big secret. The way I do things may not be the way you do things, and there certainly isn’t any sort of magic pill. Except the Ass-In-Chair-Fingers-On-Keyboard sort. Because really, having all the writing rituals in the world isn’t actually going to write your story for you. Rituals are all well and good if they help you get into the proper mindset to work, but if you’re using them as an avoidance technique? That’s no good. (“I can’t write, right now! I don’t have my special candle/footwarmers/chocolate jellybeans, etc.”) But one thing I can say that I don’t do around revision time? Read reviews. Reviews can be a bit of a mindfield at the best of times, particularly on a site like GoodReads…
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Apr
12
You Deserve a Drink
Did I say I was going to stay offline? Yeah, I guess I did. Guess I lied. But I have taken a few amusing breaks here and there (between using Freedom, which is very helpful, btw.) At the moment I’m a bit mentally frazzled, because it’s taken me nearly the entire day to rewrite most of a chapter (one of those things where one small change ended up changing a ton of other things. It’s a bit of a domino effect. *sigh*) And even though I don’t really drink, I sorta feel like I deserve one. Failing that, I’ve been amusing myself by watching this (and the ton of other videos she’s got.)…
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Apr
11
Off The Grid
I’m going offline for a few days (or at least as offline as I get – which means I’ll still be “on” but I won’t be interacting much, if at all. I’ve got an extremely tight deadline for my revisions on A Trace of Moonlight and if I want to make sure it makes it into your hot little hands by the October publishing date, then I have to take a few steps. Which for me means stepping away from blogging. (Although whenever I attempt to do this, I always seem to get the best blog subject ideas. And then I know I’m just procrastinating away from doing what needs doing – better to just remove the element from the equation. ) I’ve got a guest poster for the next week or so for Word-Whores (and if you’re interested in that, just drop me a line via my Contact page…
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