I have gotten my first taste of revision hell. It is bitter. Sort of like the medicine my mom used to make me take when I was young. My dad swore the worse it tasted, the faster it would work and the better it would make me feel. I know the advice given in both cases is sound. I even agree with the revision suggestions. Doesn’t mean I like it. Or that it goes down any smoother.
I’m going along my list of things to be revised … correcting, adding, changing … rewrite… Wait! What? REWRITE?! Read it again, nope, still says rewrite. Read my MS again … sigh deeply … all right. Yes, I sound like a petulant 5 year old.
It’s so hard to take “yourself” out of the story. It’s even harder to be objective about your own work. But every change I make produces a stronger storyline. I have so much to learn. I know I will get better as time goes. I still want this first book to be one I’m proud of. I never want to look back and regret my first effort.
My weakness seems to be “depth”. I know the story. It was locked in my head for over three years. I finally wrote it down. Now I have to fix it so that the reader sees and feels what I already know. Therein lies the hard part. This is my biggest challenge so far.
I’m not afraid. I am unsure. I’ve never done this before. I am stretching myself as never before. I am finding out I am more determined than I knew. I want this too much to let anything stop me. Even myself.
So I plod on, trudge through, sigh deeply, persevere, breathe deeply, pant, gasp and whine. A plethora of words run through my mind at all times. How to combine them to make them work for me? How do I describe what I see so plainly in my mind? Why is this so hard? Why am I making this task so difficult? I take breaks. I read books by other authors. Their writing is so descriptive. It flows off the page. I want to write like that. I doubt myself. I go back to writing. I stop, close my eyes and allow myself to just feel the story. A phrase comes to me. It turns into a sentence. Transitions into a paragraph. I reread it. I am proud of this passage. This must be what she means. It has depth. *sighs* It’s only one paragraph.
I have learned that writing is not an easy task. It is not for the weak of heart. It’s brutal and painful. I am just starting to find out how difficult it is. But I will treasure my one gem of a paragraph and I will create more.
~ Madison
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