Rewriting and Rewriting Again

So yesterday I printed out a copy of the new Lanie Price book and sat down to read it. It’s amazing how much I still want to change. I really thought I’d nailed it with the last write-through, but I keep finding places that could be tighter or clearer or better-paced, places where I began a thought, but didn’t complete it.

This morning, I read a scene and found myself saying, Lanie wouldn’t do that. She would consider doing it, but decide against it. Unfortunately, in the current draft, she does do “that.” Now, I have to rewrite it so that she follows her heart, which means that every action that was the direct result of the initially-used decision has to be altered or at least revisited. Every scene that stems from this decision, which I now think she wouldn’t make, has to be redone or excised totally.

It’s hard to concentrate on the manuscript. I’ve read it so many times. Unfortunately, I did most of my earlier reading on the computer. I think this is why the book reads so differently to me now. When it’s in hard copy, I see so much more than when I read it on my laptop. I don’t know how people can really read their revisions on a computer. I just can’t do it. S. J. Rozan told me that she needs to have a hard copy in hand also. Agent Philip Spitzer recently told me he somehow prefers hard copy, also.

At any rate, I should be happy to see that I have so many fresh ideas for a story that I’ve read a million times. I wonder, though, whether I have fresh ideas because I’ve read it so many times. In other words, is it a case of the story needing new material or me needing to read a new story?

Tagged as: confidence, editing, inner critic, review, Rewriting, self-criticism