Another Momentum Update: First I’m just going to allow a self-congratulatory moment for sticking with this “month at a time” deal up until now. This doesn’t mean that my life has changed in any significant long-term way as a result, but at least I’ve managed to keep the goal alive.
My most recent goal was to finish revising one of my older manuscripts, Following Infinity. Did I finish it? No! But I have no problem with this because even if I didn’t get all the way through, I have gotten a significant amount of work done on it so far. In fact, I plan on having the revision work (including one quick pass at proofreading) finished within the week. And I could not be any happier with how well it’s going, so I still consider July a big success.
It was hard to get into a regular schedule as the month began since it was an unusually busy July for me this year. I started out forcing myself to get a certain number of pages done or to work for a certain amount of time, just to make sure I accomplished something. I’d start with a very broad overview to determine what I didn’t think was working and then tried to isolate the problems down to different parts of the manuscript, or what happened in which chapters, or which characters needed work, or what scenes were completely unnecessary, or so on. There was a lot to do, and in the beginning that can be overwhelming.
As the month went on, I started to notice the story working its way into my divergent thinking. I worked on mental outlines while on the treadmill. I started digging out music to listen to that I thought captured a certain tone I was going for and would let that steer me. I started walking around the house talking to myself when I was trying to work through a section of dialogue I wanted to add or change. Eventually sitting down at the computer to work became less of a chore and more of a release. It was something I looked forward to doing and made the time to do. My favorite days of the week became the days off I had from my workout schedule, because on those days I’d be able to start working two hours earlier than usual. When I reached the point where I had boxed myself into five or six or seven hour days of working, I knew it was paying off.
Revision is really hard work, but when it’s going well it feels great. The whole writing process is a lot like a jigsaw puzzle, when you start with an overall idea of what you’re trying to accomplish but you’ve got two thousand tiny pieces you somehow have to fit together perfectly. What plot scenes don’t work, or aren’t necessary, and what needs to be done to fix them? Who are the characters at their core, and are they consistently who they need to be? Do they progress through an arc that the readers will be able to follow? Are there continuity problems or chronology gaps in the story? Can specific sentences be better, or is good enough really good enough in some cases? Am I using words that would sound natural coming from my narrator? Am I achieving a balance between my narrator’s (hopefully) subtle exposition and giving the readers opportunities to fill in some of the story blanks themselves? Knowing that these issues have been identified and addressed and knowing the overall story has been significantly improved as a result is a huge, huge rush.
Sometime in the coming days I’ll be posting here again, as well on Facebook I’m sure, to recruit an opening round of volunteers interested in reading the revised manuscript when it’s done. I know I have a small, faithful group of beta readers who will be ready and willing to step up for me -- and they all know how much I appreciate their help -- but I hope this one gets to go a little wider.
Which brings us to August. School will be coming back to life by the end of the month so of course it’s going to be a presence again soon. I have a variety of significant challenges waiting for me this school year, but fortunately I’ve found reasons to be more at peace, if not slightly optimistic with them than I was even a month ago, but I’m not all the way there yet. So even though it isn’t the most tangible of goals, I have one pinned down for August: Get myself mentally ready for the school year. I see a pathway on how to get there now and I hope it will work, but a lot of whether or not it will falls back on the whole concept behind this Momentum project: Not just knowing what needs to be done, but following through and doing it.
And speaking of doing, I think I still have a little fuel left in the tank tonight, and some revising that needs to be done....
