Transitions. Resurrected Post.
The current work-in-progress, a short fantasy novel, looks to be near completion. First draft completion, anyway. I expect to write ���End��� by next weekend, in time for��Orycon. We���ll see. The point is that the time has come to move on to the next project.
I don���t want to bore anyone with the sausage making aspect of writing, but I should probably explain why it is time to start something new. A first draft is far from a final manuscript. If you picked up a novel in the bookstore printed directly from an author���s first draft, you���d set it back down before you got through the first page, wondering how such crap could make onto the shelf. A novel requires several rounds of drafts and revisions before it is ready even for the publisher to see. More revisions follow.
Why not jump right into the second draft? Because I���m too close to the story. I know what I think the story is. I don���t have an outside perspective. If I started re-reading now I���d miss narrative problems. Plot holes might gape before me on the page, but in my mind the structure is solid and I���d read blithely on, pleased with my own writing. So I need to place this pie on the window sill, give it time to cool. A month or two later I���ll be able to approach it with fresh eyes, see it for the steaming pile it is. Then I���ll despair at my own ineptitude for a few minutes before I knuckle down and get to work fixing the problems.
In the meantime I don���t want to let the writing muscles atrophy. It���s important to move on to the next project. What���s that going to be? Well, I���ve got ideas. Unfortunately I���ve got too many ideas. So likely I���ll be spending much of the time reading, thinking, and taking notes. Once I���ve settled on an idea I���ll begin outlining. If I time it right I���ll finish the outline right when I���m ready to start the second draft of my current project.
But that���s looking too far ahead. I���ve still got a few thousand words to set down first.
