Writing Update: 29/03/24 (Patreon)

No word count update this week.

As with last week, word count seems a poor metric for determining "success" - whatever that means in this context. Though I haven't written anything new for chapter 6 (and believe me, I'm chomping at the bit to get back to it!), I've finally worked through the editing block on the end of Book 1, and the start of Book 2.

Putting together the prologue, and cleaning up Book 1 was... a lot more difficult than expected? I suspect many writers find editing boring. I don't--I rather enjoy it--but with writing that's still "fresh". My normal writing process generally involves going back a few paragraphs or scenes, editing, expanding and rewriting before extending the current scene. But returning to these old chapters, well...

It was, to a certain extent, like editing the work of another writer. The person who wrote that stuff is me, but distant by about a fifteen years. So, I wanted to... respect the work of the original writer, whilst also bringing it in line with my current expectations. In some ways, it might've been easier (though longer) to simply rewrite it all from scratch. On the other hand, well... people seemed to quite like Constant the first time around, and so that old me from fifteen years ago must've been doing something right.

In the end, I kept as much of the original as I thought was right, trimmed -a lot- of material (though some might work its way back in), and wrote up a new scene (Sakura, and David's "favour"-friends) and inserted new material here and there. I boosted the "body horror" of David's discovery of unwilling surgery and transformation, but also stripped out a lot of the crying and collapse. His descent into a two-week bender is driver more by anger and betrayal than tears and sorrow.

One aspect of the rewrite I've been very pleased with is the stronger "Persephone" thread emerging. She's an essential background element, and I lost track of her somewhat--I'm making sure she remains in the reader's memory. I hope.

I still don't think the story's quite where I want it. This quick-pass edit cleaned up a lot of inconsistencies, but also revealed a number of larger changes I'd like to make. I'd like to boost the Katherine-Steven backstory more, and develop her relationship with Steele more. Steele himself needs a greater presence in the story, especially in Book 2.

And I'm also tempted to rewrite the conclusion to book 1. I'm considering a very different ending. Basically, a conversation with Steele before the fight with Fosters. Then the fight scene, ending with David going unconscious. The book would end with David waking in the apartment as Cindy, and the ambiguous prospect that this is his life, now. I tihnk it would make the first book work better as a "stand alone" novel, ending with David trapped in this new life.

Book 2 would open with something like the current chapter 2, coming to terms with this new life and flashing back to the chapter 1 stuff, before moving on with the story.

I dunno. We'll see. First thing is to get the rest of the story-to-date edited and posted to TGStorytime. It should be easy going from chapter 3 through to 6, so I'm hoping to return to writing new stuff this week. Meantime, I'll keep posting the revised chapters here, and over on Storytime, a scene a day. Chapter 1 is now fully posted!

Have a great weekend.