WKlein (short enough, but I wanted use WK) -- That's what comes of reading an editing book while you're still churning out the first draft I suppose it depends on your psychology. Me, if I had specific edits in mind I wouldn't be able to do anything else until I did them. You know, the sort that wake you up in the middle of the night and you lay there thinking of wording. Everything else I'd wait. You may have changes to make in the first 50 from what you decide to do in the part of the book you've yet to write.
I'm somewhat of a pantser, so I will go back and change things that are inconsistent with how I've decided to go. If something jumps out at me as I reread an earlier passage, I'll go ahead and correct it, though.
My advice is to do as little as you can in the way of editing until you finish. I've heard of too many people who never finish their book because they keep polishing what they have already.
How do you like that book BTW? Does it contain the usual sort of advice or unique ideas? Maybe I should read it. My goal in book one of my trilogy was to start out with a vague sense of unease (perhaps protag is reading too much into the situation), then ramp up the tension with discoveries, incidents, etc. until she's in a fight for her life at the end. I worry that pacing like this isn't something an agent would go for with an unpublished author -- he or she would never get sucked into reading more.
WK is fine and I think I might not have made myself clear enough in my question... I was reading the book to improve the fantasy novel which I'm revising (currently in the third draft, not first), and I've found it very useful for that...
BUT it also made me freak out about the sci-fi manuscript I'm currently querying (which has been DONE since April -- so far has 6 rejections and 1 partial out) and wonder if making some changes to the first 50 pages before sending out the next round of queries might improve its chances, or if I'm just being obsessive and paranoid and just need to leave it alone already.
So, I guess that's the question: do you ever go back and revise/rework anything from a manuscript that's already out for queries, or do I just need to stop second-guessing myself and see how it's received as-is?
Oh, and as far as the book goes, I have really liked it. Most of the stuff is info you can find if you dig deep enough on sites like this or agent/editor interviews, etc, but it's presented very clearly and concisely, in a way that makes it easy to apply to your work.