NaNoEdMo

So you wrote a novel in November?  Now what?

You are editing it, right?

Then join us for National Novel Editing Month.  (NaNoEdMo)

Just as we spent 30 days writing 50,000 words last November, now we shall spend 50 hours editing them during March.  Usually I forget until it is already a week into March, and then just fail in an epic fashion.  But this year I am hoping to have some friends along for the ride.

Who’s with me?  Who is up for a bit of editing madness?

 

Editing again

As I mentioned in a previous post, I am busy editing two of my old manuscripts with a view to making one, coherent, novel out of them. 

With this is mind, I have been reading the drafts again, and I must say I am surprised.  My draft from 2005, Only Tuesday, has some interesting moments and observations.  On the whole the writing style is rather amateurish, and it is full of one-liners and amusing observations that seem more about the narrator showing off than advancing the story.  However there is one very compelling character, and I am trying to figure out how to transplant her from the novel into my next one.  Apart from that, not much worth saving.  She gets all the best lines I think.

My second attempt, from 2006, was much better.  By a factor of 10 I would say.  Don’t get me wrong, I made the Devil do it, is still a very rough draft, and the writing style needs a lot of work; but I am not  embarrased by it, and actually look forward to finishing writing it so I can see how it ends.  I even found it amusing, and laughed out loud in places.

Lessons I have learned from this experience:

1. Everything they say about your first novel being crap is true;
2. Once you get the crap out of your system, it is actually easier to write;
3. Leaving the novel(s) for three years gave me a new appreciation for how much good was actually hidden amongst the bad;
4. Nothing is scarier than thinking “I wish I had written that,” and then realising you did.
5. Don’t edit while you’re writing, because there is a lot I would have cut from the book, that I now think I can use with a little work.

So watch this space, and expect news about I made the Devil do it, but only on a Tuesday. 

 

2010 project

I have been trying to decide what to do this year.  I wanted to keep the momentum going on my novel, but I also realise that what I wrote last year is a pale shadow of what should be in the book.  More like a plot-line than an actual novel.

So I have decided to take a break for a while from last year’s project, and re-open an old one; or two.

I am taking the half-finished drafts of the novels I wrote in 2005 and 2006 and tieing them together into one.  I made the Devil do it, which I gave up in 2006 due to illness, is a fairly compelling story, and I liked where it was going.  Only Tuesday, which I gave up in 2005 due to boredom, is pretty crap, but it has a lot of good dialogue and a few workable characters.  I will be scrapping the plot (plot?  there was a plot?) and working the material into the 2006 one to make it more rounded, then finishing it this year hopefully.

And the plus side?  Both novels were typed, so I don’t have to re-type it from my handwritten journals like I would with my latest novels. 

 

The great Edit

 So I suppose you think that the reason you haven’t heard anything from me for the last few weeks is because I have been frantically editing to try and make the March 31 deadline. 

Uh… no.  Not actually.  In point of fact I have done about two hours of editing all month.  I have just been so busy with other annoying things, like my life.

I have discovered something though.  Writing 50,000 by hand is tough, but rewarding.  Editing 50,000 words in a hand-written form is less rewarding.  It is almost impossible to edit a hand-written draft, and so the first step has to be to type the draft out.  This is quite painful, and theorectically should take about 50 hours.  50 hours!!!  Not cool.  So I need to seriously look at whether this handwriting thing is worth it next year. 

 

NaNoEdMo

Had it not been for NaNoWriMo, I know there is no way I would even have 50 words on my novel, let alone 50,000.  The pressure, and deadline, were definitely a strong factor in my finishing, not to mention the support of other writers.

Now that it is over, I am really struggling to edit.  I am struggling against inertia, fear, laziness, and I suppose a knowledge that there is loads of work still to be done.

So what I need is some more pressure.  

Enter NaNoEdMo. 

Just as we had National Novel Writing Month in November, we also have National Novel Editing Month in March.  A time for writers with an un-edited manuscript to log 50 hours of editing time in one month.

Which is fine so far, except that I thought it was in May.  Turns out I was wrong; it’s March – Which is 5 days old already.

Dare I try?  I think I better, otherwise this novel is just going to sit in card format for the next ten years, as I find any number of excuses to not write.  So here goes….

Hold the red pens!!!! I’m coming to edit.