Dangerous Phoenix has reached a crucial stage. My heroine, Daisy,
has pulled it off by escaping from the mausoleum (with only the slightest bit
of help from her creator) and storming to the rescue. Naturally her reward is a
happy ending – more or less. I have the complete story down, the characters are
partly fleshed out and the setting/s are introduced. In other words I’ve
finished the SFD or the ‘shitty first draft’. Now how about the second?
This is the stage
I love most. It’s the moment when I travel back to the beginning of the novel and
begin to fill in the gaps I left – maybe research snippets I needed to check, or
a more detailed description of a particular setting, or a deeper understanding
of why one of my characters is acting the way they are. It’s also the time when
I can start moving ‘stuff’ around, decide just how each chapter is best structured
to create flow within and between chapters. And where I discover that though I’ve
been too verbose at one point, I actually need an additional scene at another.
Or, horrors, I’m guilty of repeating myself. It’s rather like being a potter with
a slab of clay. The slab has been moulded into roughly the right size, roughly
the right shape, but it needs a more delicate touch now to pinch, to add, to
reshape until gradually a miracle happens – something better, tighter, emerges
from what was once a little loose, a little baggy. Then all that’s left is to
decorate - or in writerly terms, do a third draft. This is where I’ll focus on
style and try to make sure that wherever I read, I’ve nailed the right word.
Of course,
this sequence won’t work for everyone and it’s always interesting to hear how
other writers do it. But for me, it works and I’m getting ready to flex those
fingers!
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