Okay, I'm going to do it.
A long time ago, I started writing a book on revision. It was going to be a step-by-step look at how Heart's Desire had changed over the years and various incarnations. It would have had the text of at least three or four novels in it, plus all the abandoned roads that I never went down while writing the various versions.
It was intended to become a sort of "Here's how I do it--your mileage may vary" thing.
I think it ended up being 77k or something and then Things Happened and I never finished it.
Earlier today I was thinking about Heart's Desire and the fact that I've been revising it for quite some time. The original novella, in fact, was probably written in 1997. (I'm saying '97, because the next story in the series was written in 98, and I have that one on my hard drive. So, probably '97.) However, I came up with the idea for Beth-Hill in High School, I believe, or maybe even middle school. I have that first concept around here as well, but not in electronic format.
I'm not sure when I had the original dream that turned into the original novella, but I know I also have that handwritten note about the dream somewhere as well. Maybe I'll even find it, for this.
Beth-Hill is my Newford. It's my version of "write what you know", which is Southern Ohio and small town life. I could very happily write about Gabriel and the Hunt and the Council and everyone else for the rest of my life. (And I probably will.)
But anyway, Heart's Desire is special. It's my "These are the kinds of books I want to write" book, if that makes sense. And that's why, I think, it's gone through so many revisions.
After thinking about it today, I decided that the simplest thing to do would be to (yes, of course) create another blog. And while I write this current (and hopefully last, but who's really counting?) version, I will also write that book I wanted to write, only in the format of a blog.
This will be a very long piece of string too short to save, since I have gobs of snippets and such from the various versions of this book. And at least this way, I can post my favorite cut scenes and not feel that they are forever lost.
revision.blogspot.com was already taken, darn it. So I created Revisal instead.
EDIT: (Because Blogger won't let me backdate a post at the moment)
I read my post from 3/17 and realized that I hadn't posted the wordcount for HD on 3/16. I ended up cutting the rest of what I had on Thursday, bringing my wordcount down in the low 20s. (I'm still going to use some of it, but it was hanging off the bottom of the file, there and irritating me.) So by Friday, I was back up to 30k. Just FYI. :)
A long time ago, I started writing a book on revision. It was going to be a step-by-step look at how Heart's Desire had changed over the years and various incarnations. It would have had the text of at least three or four novels in it, plus all the abandoned roads that I never went down while writing the various versions.
It was intended to become a sort of "Here's how I do it--your mileage may vary" thing.
I think it ended up being 77k or something and then Things Happened and I never finished it.
Earlier today I was thinking about Heart's Desire and the fact that I've been revising it for quite some time. The original novella, in fact, was probably written in 1997. (I'm saying '97, because the next story in the series was written in 98, and I have that one on my hard drive. So, probably '97.) However, I came up with the idea for Beth-Hill in High School, I believe, or maybe even middle school. I have that first concept around here as well, but not in electronic format.
I'm not sure when I had the original dream that turned into the original novella, but I know I also have that handwritten note about the dream somewhere as well. Maybe I'll even find it, for this.
Beth-Hill is my Newford. It's my version of "write what you know", which is Southern Ohio and small town life. I could very happily write about Gabriel and the Hunt and the Council and everyone else for the rest of my life. (And I probably will.)
But anyway, Heart's Desire is special. It's my "These are the kinds of books I want to write" book, if that makes sense. And that's why, I think, it's gone through so many revisions.
After thinking about it today, I decided that the simplest thing to do would be to (yes, of course) create another blog. And while I write this current (and hopefully last, but who's really counting?) version, I will also write that book I wanted to write, only in the format of a blog.
This will be a very long piece of string too short to save, since I have gobs of snippets and such from the various versions of this book. And at least this way, I can post my favorite cut scenes and not feel that they are forever lost.
revision.blogspot.com was already taken, darn it. So I created Revisal instead.
EDIT: (Because Blogger won't let me backdate a post at the moment)
I read my post from 3/17 and realized that I hadn't posted the wordcount for HD on 3/16. I ended up cutting the rest of what I had on Thursday, bringing my wordcount down in the low 20s. (I'm still going to use some of it, but it was hanging off the bottom of the file, there and irritating me.) So by Friday, I was back up to 30k. Just FYI. :)
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