Bring on the Rewrites

I have mentioned in a few previous posts about my writing journey for book number two. Now that I am near completion with the first draft, it's interesting to look back and see how the story has come together. And how much I am going to have to work on the rewrites! This book follows my MC Alex Abrams and four of her girlfriends. Her best friend and roommate, Lila, was going to be a big part of the book, and the three other friends were going to be pretty minor characters. I knew that I wanted to give at least one more somewhat of a story line, and I thought that character would be Carmen. I started writing Carmen as a big drinker, a fun loving party girl who always had a margarita in hand. Alex and company start to get worried that Carmen is possibly into the booze a bit too much, and they also begin to wonder if she is attending class on any sort of regular basis. But as I kept writing…nothing much was happening with Carmen. She was just drinking away, going to her parties and avoiding topics about class. I finally realized that I couldn't just keep typing away without giving her a conclusion. So I thought about it, and thought about it…and thought about it. I really didn't see it going anywhere. How could I have Carmen living on campus but not attending class, and her roommate not noticing anything was wrong? I tried a few different scenarios, but nothing really stuck with me.
So I decided to forgo that idea. I switched it around, and gave shy and studious Hannah a love interest. And I love this plot line much more than Carmen's! I've had a blast writing about Hannah's dates, and it really gave my story a much needed boost – in my opinion. So now I just have those rewrites to look forward to. When I go back and start revising, I need to cut all of Carmen's scenes and place a few tidbits about Hannah in there. I also know just from writing the first draft that there are additional scenes I will need to write to help develop a few characters, and hopefully by cutting those Carmen scenes I will get back the needed word count to make this happen.
Journey to book number two has been a lot of fun. I'm super busy right now with Chick Lit Plus, CLP Blog Tours, freelance editing, and now writing for the SheKnows Book Lounge, but I carve out little pieces of time Monday-Friday to write. Sometimes it's only a 300 word day, sometimes it's closer to my usual 2,000. I'm on the ending scenes right now, and it's a pretty intense part of the book. I can't wait for the first draft to be completed! After I do some rewrites I'm going to be asking if any beta readers out there want to give it a look through. I will keep posting a few updates throughout, and I'm getting pretty close to revealing the title :) I'm having a great time writing Alex's story, and I hope to share it with everyone soon!