The deeper I get into the story, the more crucial the read-through becomes. It’s essential for continuity, and it never fails to remind me that the energy to write the book comes from the story itself. Each time I go through, I edit, sometimes with a tweak here and there, sometimes with a fairly important revision to correct a sequence or clarify something or connect some dots.
Moved a Martin Shepherd scene into the book almost intact from the second draft. His story will get more complicated later on, but for now he’s survived the rewrite mostly as written. So easy to plop him in, in contrast to the hard labor of constructing most of these chapters from bits and pieces of the second draft re-thought, re-worked, re-visioned, radically altered to fit the new frame.
“I have an idea.” This is such a cheap way to introduce a plot element. It almost always means the writer has had an idea and isn’t bothering to root the idea in the character, just gloms it in willy-nilly. I’ve seen it in the trailer for the new Star Wars movie, and I saw it on a TV mystery. It’s done a lot, but it’s a cop out. I managed to find a way to show where the idea for the chaos model comes from (her father’s notes), but I haven’t yet figured out how they get the idea for the old antenna leading to the scene in the Environmental Testing Lab. Since the lab was the actual place of origin for the entire idea for this book that has been bothering me for forty years, it’s important how I work it in. This week’s challenge for Chapter 12.
Eclectic Magpie 