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Post by Joy Pixley on Jun 1, 2016 17:06:53 GMT -6
I recently fixed a bunch of formatting / organization issues with my novel and was able to get an accurate word count for the first time, and also a count of the scenes and chapters that remain to be written. ACK! I have 170,000 words already written (not including my copious notes on the last three chapters) and 20 more scenes to write! Some of those are full-length chapters and some are shorter scenes, but even so, I'm looking at minimum 200K for the first draft.
And to think, when I was doing NaNo last November, I was worried that it was going to be as long as maybe 140K. Ah, those were the good old days.
This is going to take some major revisions. I'm already dreading the idea of having to cut entire subplots or even characters. And it's so hard to keep writing those remaining scenes, not knowing if those are subplots I'm going to keep or toss.
I just ordered a craft book on revising, maybe that will help.
Not expecting any answers from you all, just ranting!
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Post by angietrafford on Jun 2, 2016 6:09:06 GMT -6
Stephen King says that the first draft is the final book +10%! Basically, that is what he is telling you need to be cut out.
Good thing to remember is that the first draft is you telling yourself the story, so there are things in there that your average reader does not need to know. Some things are better left to the imagination :-)
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Post by The Voice on Jun 2, 2016 7:53:47 GMT -6
All I can say is hang in there and I'm really stoked about reading the book!  But no pressure... no pressure.  |
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Post by Joy Pixley on Jun 2, 2016 8:19:11 GMT -6
Stephen King says that the first draft is the final book +10%! Basically, that is what he is telling you need to be cut out. Good thing to remember is that the first draft is you telling yourself the story, so there are things in there that your average reader does not need to know. Some things are better left to the imagination :-) But if I cut 10% off, that still leaves me with 180K. Still WAY too long. My concern is that I don't have a ton of exposition or description in there as it is. When I take my chapters to writers group for critique, they basically never tell me to cut boring stuff they don't need to know. And the revision always ends up longer than the original. (sigh) |
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Post by angietrafford on Jun 2, 2016 9:09:06 GMT -6
]ut if I cut 10% off, that still leaves me with 180K. Still WAY too long. My concern is that I don't have a ton of exposition or description in there as it is. When I take my chapters to writers group for critique, they basically never tell me to cut boring stuff they don't need to know. And the revision always ends up longer than the original. (sigh) there is another option… Maybe this is actually a series you are writing. Is there somewhere that you can split it to make two books? (Or even three because let's face it people do like a trilogy!) |
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Post by Joy Pixley on Jun 2, 2016 10:28:13 GMT -6
That's what everyone suggests, to break it into more books. I really don't think that will work with this story line. It's just not epic enough to support three whole books, and nobody has just two. Plus it would be even more work to try to reorganize it so that there's a reasonable ending at the end of each book. And from what I've heard from others who have done book series, ugh, too much hassle. I just want to get this one book done and OUT! Well, we'll see.
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Post by The Voice on Jun 2, 2016 12:02:23 GMT -6
It's just not epic enough to support three whole books, and nobody has just two. I've wondered about that. Why can we have sequels in movies, but in literature, epic tales usually come in trilogies? |
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Post by Joy Pixley on Jun 2, 2016 12:15:05 GMT -6
I think they don't normally plan for sequels in movies. They make one, and if it works, they figure out another story line that follows from that. In books you generally have the whole series at least mostly worked out. At least, if you're thinking of the kind of trilogy/series that I am, where the complete story doesn't end until the last book. I'd say movie sequels are more like mystery novels, where you have another book using the same character(s), but each book stands on its own as a complete story.
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Post by angietrafford on Jun 3, 2016 5:49:50 GMT -6
Well, not always trilogies. Look at Harry Potter, or the wheel of time, or even game of thrones. If you think about it, Lord of the rings was actually four books if you include the Hobbit. I can't think of any two-part books of hand, but I am sure there are a good few of those.
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Post by Joy Pixley on Jun 3, 2016 7:25:04 GMT -6
Yes, not always trilogies, but never two books. If you think of any, let me know, because I don't think I've ever seen one.
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gahlearner
New Member
“Books break the shackles of time, proof that humans can work magic.” ― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
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Post by gahlearner on Jun 8, 2016 6:56:00 GMT -6
Not true. From the top of my head I can think of two: Stephen Donaldson's 'Mordant's need'; the books are 'The mirror of her dreams' and 'One rides through'. They are probably not as well known as the Covenant and Gap series, but I love them, they are great fantasy. And there is Zimmer-Bradley's Survivor series: Hunters of the red moon and The survivors (although I'm not sure I'm rereading my Bradley books any time soon, after all these child abuse allegations). Mind, these are older series, but I bet there are newer ones too. It's been done, I can't see why it shouldn't be done again, if you can make them somewhat stand on their own.
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Post by Joy Pixley on Jun 8, 2016 7:38:25 GMT -6
Not true. From the top of my head I can think of two: Stephen Donaldson's 'Mordant's need'; the books are 'The mirror of her dreams' and 'One rides through'. They are probably not as well known as the Covenant and Gap series, but I love them, they are great fantasy. And there is Zimmer-Bradley's Survivor series: Hunters of the red moon and The survivors (although I'm not sure I'm rereading my Bradley books any time soon, after all these child abuse allegations). Mind, these are older series, but I bet there are newer ones too. It's been done, I can't see why it shouldn't be done again, if you can make them somewhat stand on their own. Interesting, I did not know that! Although it's certainly still more common and expected to have three. In any case, breaking it into two books still has most of the same problems as breaking it into three, in terms of having to redo the structure to have an ending for book one (making it stand on its own), and just having that much more to write, more covers to deal with, more steps to process, etc. I know that famous people somehow manage to publish book series, but everyone I personally know who has tried it either (1) has the first book out and is super-struggling with the next one and warning everyone to not ever do this (at least not for your first book) or (2) is still working on the series ten or fifteen years later and has yet to publish anything at all. As scary as it sounds to deal with the book publishing process, the idea of trying to do a series is exponentially more so. ARGH! |
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