Today I jumped back into the beginning of my novel. I should say, for those of you who follow the blog, that I’ve actually not been working on my fiction since I got back from the New York Summer Writer’s Institute at Skidmore about a month ago.
It was such an intense experience, that afterward I felt like I had to set the story aside for a while. That was compounded by working on some paid work, and polishing up the pitch for my non-fiction book (which my agent is taking out to publishers after Labor Day). So it was just finally today that I pulled the novel back out for some tinkering.
One of the things I really had time to explore at Skidmore was the idea that I needed to push back the introduction of one of my characters. I kind of knew I needed to, but it’s so much work that I put it off, and as I’ve learned, nothing makes a tough writing challenging easier than ignoring it for a month (insert sarcastic laugh here).
I’m finding it really hard to get back to. I totally understand how people get halfway through a novel and never finish. I’m halfway through the second draft and I’m jumping back to rewrite the first half again. Rookie mistake or vital adjustment to process in the name of understanding my story better?
As I often find myself saying, I just don’t know, but I’m going to keep writing until I figure it out.
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