Man, there is some serious garbage in this manuscript. It’s like decluttering–first I started small, deleting the “seems” and “really”s, then I started hacking scenes, then I hacked it in half-sorta…each round I find more I need to get rid of, until I can actually see that huge gilded elephant statue that’s falling apart and I never thought to get rid of. (and no, I don’t have such a thing. It’s an example.)
For reference, the original manuscript was two hundred forty-nine thousand words. (Yes, this is my first completed novel, how did you know?)Â The next draft that I have saved is 136,000 words. Then I decided it was two books, and the current draft of this one is 99,000 words. It’s that draft I’m working on.
And holy carp. It’s so much more of a mess than I thought it was. I haven’t even reached page thirty, and you know I’ve been working madly. *looks shifty*
I mean…well, I took out the ship-fight because that ambush really didn’t make sense. Only that took out the damage to the Dream, so now Borkla (and yes, that name is changing) doesn’t have a reason to bring the Dream on board the carrier. And I do need that to happen, or I have to change a helluva lot that I really wanted to keep. So maybe…he knows something Eve doesn’t. Only she’s going to know how weird of a thing it is for him to do, and she’s going to be suspicious. If she’s suspicious, she won’t let Ben out of her sight. So how the hell will he end up down in the Marine bar, getting extremely drunk and sharing war stories no one would dare tell in front of Eve?
Argh. I really want to keep that. Maybe he’ll wander off when Eve can’t stop him. He does have a habit of not listening, and with Toots there to play guide…
On the other hand, if he doesn’t hear those stories, he’ll be that much more flattened by what happens in the hall. Bwahahahaha, and all that.
Hmm.
Well, anyway. I shall ponder it in my sleep, and attack it afresh tomorrow.
So much for Day Eight. May God have mercy on my poor editing brain.
Snip!
“So what brings an Inner Colony doc all the way out here and into the Fleet?” Though probably it was Fleet first. She wondered if he’d wanted to get shipped clean across the galaxy, or if it’d been a big surprise.
“I am a doctor.”
Ooh, touchy! She jiggled the basket at him till he speared a cheese stick with a fork and laid it on a plate to cut it up. Guess he didn’t get the concept of finger food. “Folks on Evergreen don’t get sick much?”
“What about you?” he asked. “Why did you join the Marines?”
“They didn’t have shit all over ’em.” Marcori grinned as Murrey himself showed with their food–steak for her, and something cheesy-saucy-noodly for him. Doc Shubendra, who’d surely seen blood before, stared at her plate.
“Is that…real meat? From an animal?”
I say again–bwahahahaa!