Disciplining a Novel

I am preparing a reverted historical novel, Sun Mountain: A Comstock Memoir, for publication as an ebook and perhaps a trade paper edition. It is a long story about the rise and fall of Virginia City, told through a narrator, Henry Stoddard.

It was tightly edited at Forge, but I have decided to discipline it further for electronic publication. That is one of the good things about electronic publishing: a novel can be refined and deepened.

The novel got superb reviews in 1999, but some of the reader comments suggested it was a bit leisurely. So I set to work and found about 2500 words to cut, mostly by eliminating adjective strings and digressions.

It was tightly written to start with, and now is even tighter. I hope that the changes will move the story along and maintain focus.

I have tender feelings about the novel, because I drew from my own nature to create my hero, Stoddard. The fictional character and I do not have the same background, but we have the same nature and same response to life, and there are many similarities between the author and the protagonist.

It'll be posted in the Nook and Kindle stores soon, with a new and attractive cover, and a little later, I'll do a trade paper edition.