How many times have you revised your novel before you think it’s in pristine shape for the publishing process? A dozen times? Fifty times? A hundred times? There’s no end, right? It feels that way often.
Author, Roald Dahl, says of this subject, “By the time I am nearing the end of a story, the first part will have been reread and altered and corrected at least one hundred and fifty times. I am suspicious of both facility and speed. Good writing is essentially rewriting. I am positive of this.”
So, how many times have I revised my stories? I’m not really sure. Perhaps a dozen times total? Teetering on the barely-broken-in writing scale. But it’s all good. Some writers may not need to revise their work dozens or hundreds of times.
With that said, I’m back to revising my novel, Passage of Promise. Yes, my first novel I wrote back in 2015. I’m back at it after the last editing, proofing, and editorial suggestions from my editor (second round?).
Since reading through half of the Understanding Show, Don’t Tell (And Really Getting It) book so far…and I will finish it soon…I truly do understand it for the most part and can see the difference in my sentences and wording through my latest revisions. I’m strengthening my scenes, character traits, and dialogue.
But I must admit. A part of me has this urge to turn the story on its head, change it up drastically. Yet, another part of me says don’t jump in the deep, murky water. You’ll get pulled into the endless, bottomless sea.
I’ve got to resist the waves of temptation and focus on making the story sharper, deeper, and stronger with the plot, characters, and scenes posing in proud, unique form on the stage of my make-believe world.
I may have to run it through the critiquing group again, which means my thirty-nine chapters will travel through the queue for the next few months, but it’s worth it.
My editor said it wouldn’t hurt. People’s feedback may give me a different direction or new ideas, and of course, in the critique realm, I take some of the suggestions that work and discard others that don’t.
I heard some authors have spent five to ten years on one book. That’s a huge chunk of time, but when you want your work to be its best, three, five, or even ten years may be in order. J.R.R. Tolkien labored twelve years on his book, Lord of the Rings, before it was published.
I don’t think it’ll take ten or twelve years to finish my novel, especially since my novel has considerably less words than Tolkien’s sequel to The Hobbit. Also, in my case, a stressful deadline doesn’t exist, whereas it does for some others.
This fresh return to my novel fell on the heels of my novella’s (Mourning Dove) feedback journey through my critique group the past several weeks, counting this one and next week. I’ll then collect all the comments, remarks, suggestions and work on revising it.
What made me delve back into the revision process of my stories? I am presently reading a book by my muse, Jodi Picoult. THANK YOU, JODI! Keep writing! 🙂
What are you working on, how long have you been working on it, and what’s your average number of revisions?
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Modest Musings 