"The End"
According to my profile page, I joined Absolute Write June 13th, 2008. A few months before then (while I was a Lurker) I started my first serious try at a novel (The Gateway of the Fallen - had a different title then) around that time. I wrote 50,000 words at first, and was about a dozen or so chapters in. After a few months on Absolute Write (and various other writing resources), I discovered: It was horrible. The tense was wrong, the the adjectives, the verbs, the names, the title....
Almost nothing but the basic premise of the story remains from those days.
Four chapters were cut, because the story didn't really "begin" there. Tens of thousands of words were often tossed aside, simply because I hated the tone or an idea was cliche. The story was turned inside out, plot points were moved around, bloated dialogue was destroyed, and Mary Sues were killed. But, miraculously, I just wrote "The End" on a full novel length manuscript (80,000 words). I never thought it would happen.
What's more, I read a few pages from the beginning - and it didn't suck.
I know, I know -- now the real work begins. Editing Hell, Beta Hell, Query Hell, Editor Hell, Publishing Hell, and Review Hell. Rinse, repeat. Still, it's a big deal to me. I feel like I just got off of a roller coaster. I think the bolded quote in my signature applies to this somewhat: Not all who wander are lost.
Thanks AW!
According to my profile page, I joined Absolute Write June 13th, 2008. A few months before then (while I was a Lurker) I started my first serious try at a novel (The Gateway of the Fallen - had a different title then) around that time. I wrote 50,000 words at first, and was about a dozen or so chapters in. After a few months on Absolute Write (and various other writing resources), I discovered: It was horrible. The tense was wrong, the the adjectives, the verbs, the names, the title....
Almost nothing but the basic premise of the story remains from those days.
Four chapters were cut, because the story didn't really "begin" there. Tens of thousands of words were often tossed aside, simply because I hated the tone or an idea was cliche. The story was turned inside out, plot points were moved around, bloated dialogue was destroyed, and Mary Sues were killed. But, miraculously, I just wrote "The End" on a full novel length manuscript (80,000 words). I never thought it would happen.
What's more, I read a few pages from the beginning - and it didn't suck.
I know, I know -- now the real work begins. Editing Hell, Beta Hell, Query Hell, Editor Hell, Publishing Hell, and Review Hell. Rinse, repeat. Still, it's a big deal to me. I feel like I just got off of a roller coaster. I think the bolded quote in my signature applies to this somewhat: Not all who wander are lost.
Thanks AW!
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