Progress

I've felt a compulsion to include the reader in this journey of writing a novel, but so far I don't feel there's been much inclusion. I've posted excerpts (which are now out-of-date) and a few general, sweeping thoughts on writing, but I've realised anyone wondering when they can read this thing is completely in the dark. He's the cold, hard facts.

I have 72,759 words written, almost 8,000 more than I had at the end of the first draft. Interestingly enough, this is the opposite of what I expected to happen as I edited. I anticipated wanting to cut away big sections, as that's what I'd been led to believe editing was. In reality, I was happy with the general structure of the story and the gist of my passages was spot on. What I needed was clarity and embellishment, and that's ended up increasing my wordcount.

The raw numbers are as such:

72,759 words

334 pages

30 chapters

3 of those chapters didn't exist in the first draft, and 2 of those are right at the end. The ending was something I initially wanted to change completely, feeling I had totally failed to capture what I had intended. Again, the reality was that the ending was close to spot-on and what I needed was to build the tension around the ending, to raise the stakes one last time. I feel I've done that now.

I've completely finished the main editing pass up to chapter 11, which interestingly enough makes for 111 edited pages. The last two chapters have by far and wide been the hardest to clean up and fix so far. From here on out, I expect the work to get easier and easier. It's been interesting, I must say, that in re-reading the piece I've been able to see how I improved as a writer as my manuscript went on.

How long until I'm done? I don't know. I really don't. I would like to say just a few months, but it took me 2 months to finish up chapter 10 and I have no idea if that will happen again. I want to have it finished before the year is out, and everything I do will be with that goal in mind.

Wish me luck.

Or don't, whatever.