I saw this cartoon by the brilliantĀ Rachael Smith today and it pretty much sums up the feeling:
Itās such a vulnerable experience, sending your new draft. It feels like waking up on stage with no clothes on. Youāre presenting something as your Best Work (new version), and all you can do is wait by your emails to see what they think. Your brain fills in the gaps, and imagines peals of mocking laughter coming from the other end. Artās immensely personal, and judgement on it is judgement on you.
As it happens, though, Iām quite pleased with this new draft. I think itās reading clearly, and the scenes are a lot stronger. I do put a lot of work into my new drafts, often rewriting whole chapters, and usually Iām just sick of the whole thing by the end of it. But this time Iām quietly optimistic.
One thing I worked on was the main charactersā emotions. In the notes from the publisher, it was suggested that I could really ramp up how our protagonist was feeling, to really carry the reader through. Itās an excellent point, and something I hope Iāve addressed. If not, overdone.
Editing is not a process I enjoy much. Itās slow, demoralising, and takes a lot of concentration. Cutting a paragraph down so it reads perfectly is, of course, a huge thrill when it happens. But getting there, or close to there, is a mountain. One thing I did this time, after working through the book chapter by chapter, was then go back and edit chapters at random. This way, I could view each chapter as its own scene, and build it as such. Make sure it had a beginning, middle and end. Dress the stage. Push the actors on. It was a great way to see which scenes were weaker too - taking them out of the context of the story, it really exposed their technical flaws.
So, Iāll wait for news.
On the illustration side, Iāve been working a few things out in relation to my previous post. I think Iām finding a technique I really like, inks rather than pencils, but Iāll need a few more weeks to find out. Hopefully this might be all going in the right direction!
(Please refer me back to this blog post when everything comes crashing down at a later stage)
