by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
There has been a subtle change in the momentum of this first novel in just the last few days. Things are beginning to speed up. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel with this first novel and soon, after about a month, I’m going to sit down and rewrite the whole thing to produce the Beta Draft.
Things should go a lot faster now because when I write the second draft, I can simply go through the outline for the first draft (with a few modifications) and, as such, I won’t spend so much fucking time moving scenes around so there is an ebb and flow to the scenes.
I have really, really arbitrary rules about some structural elements of the novel and I think that is a representation of “first baby syndrome.” Once I begin work on the SECOND novel, I think I won’t be so tense and strict in my weird arbitrary rules.
At least I hope not.
I’m generally not one for rules, but I was trained as a journalist and it was comforting to have a very strict structure to follow when writing a story. It’s the same way with how I structure novels. I have these rules that I follow so I don’t end up with a 1,000 page mess that goes nowhere.
In that respect, I’m a very strict, very extensive “plotter.” I like to have absolute control over my not just the plot but my characters because I know the story so well that I don’t have any wiggle room, no risk that I’ll go off on some dumb, boring tangent that nobody wants to read.
Anyway, I’m pretty pumped about how things are going. I hope to push myself harder so I can wrap up this first draft in a few weeks. That will be pretty cool.
