PLOTSTORM UPDATE

Well I am over 60 thousand words into the story and still need to flesh out some scenes. That means I have the basic bones of them, but some need meat added. Meat can be setting and sensory descriptions, etc.

Also, right at this particular moment I HATE MY STORY and am severely DISGUSTED with it.

But....I get that way with EVERY story I write at some point in it.

So what do I do? Banish it to the recycle bin? NO....I push through this barricaide no matter how much I don't want to.

I received my revision notes on the book that just sold (book 2-USAF PJ series) and one of the things my editor wants me to do is strengthen the ending of the book. I had to laugh because I remember about thirty pages before the end of the book I got SO sick of it, I just wanted out of it. LOL! So I wrote the quickest ending possible, plus I always overwrite by several thousand words so I had to be brief. So I'm going to try really hard not to do that abrupt Scooby Doo ending with book three that I did with book two....NO MATTER HOW SICK I AM OF THE STORY!

LOL!

No matter how ready you are to be done.....let it brew before you send. Take my word for it...your story will be MUCH stronger.

On the other hand...don't edit it to death.

So I am trying to go through book three right now and read for pacing and to cut unneccessary words. I'm also making sure passive sentences are active and that I haven't overused certain phrases, and that I have strong verbs. I set the story aside for a few days so I could see it with fresh eyes. Once I get all the scenes fleshed out the rest of the way, and make sure everything makes sense, I will go through and proofread the entire thing about three times, giving myself several days between times. Occasionally I will set it aside for two or three weeks, so I can really see it with fresh eyes. But since I'm sending it to Robin and my critters, I don't necessarily have to do that this time until after they send me their suggested changes and I complete those. Then I'll set it aside and let it gel. Then whip it back out to polish anything that needs polished.

So I'm fleshing out scenes right now and flushing out gunk...which this story seems to have a lot of. I tend to repeat myself in several forms, almost like I forgot I already wrote a certain scene and I rewrote it a different way or something. I've found several instances in this Plotstorm story that I have been annoyingly (to me) repetative or running certain themes into the ground.

I think it's because I'm taking a couple weeks longer to finish it. It would have been less trouble in the end if I would have been able to write the rough (mess) draft in under seven days but I've been avoiding the story like the plaque because I'm to the hard part.

I'll also layer in emotion with the fleshing out, so with flesh comes heart to the story.

Hope these plotstorms are helping you all!

Squirrel