Editing, Lunacy, and the Baby Walrus

If you've known me for any reasonable amount of time, you know I'm a weensy bit crazy. (Or, if you're one of my students, then I'm certifiably insane with an extended day pass. Take your pick.) But sometimes with my creative projects I get an idea so crazy I just can't rest till I try it out. Sometimes the ideas flop.

This past weekend, however, was (I hope) one of the exceptions.

My Insane Idea: I created a 240,100 word monster.

OK. So I didn't write a book in one weekend, let alone a tome the size of a baby walrus. But I did something almost as crazy: I took two overlapping manuscripts which dealt with the same overarching story and merged them into one massive manuscript. 

This would be migraine-inducing to consider at the best of times, but is complicated by the fact that I haven't done a cold read, let alone any sort of edit, on EITHER manuscript in sixteen months. That amounts to a lot of editing.

Let me repeat that: A LOT of editing. Serious #stabbylove editing of the highest order.

My brains after a full Saturday of editing.

(Actually, this is a curried coconut trail mix thingy I made tonight. 

But I'm pretty sure my brain looks like this after editing, all the same.)

The Result:  During the month of April, I plan to pare down the 240K walrus into one, nicely watertight, 80,000 word novel. All my crazy sprawling ideas for these characters, plots and themes need to be shaved, pinched, winnowed, threshed, and otherwise boiled down to one solid book with a coherent beginning, middle and end. With maybe a plot twist (or two or ten) in the between chapters.

"Good luck!" I hear you say. Yes, I hear the sarcasm. Loud and clear.

But you know what? I think I can make this work. Here's my...

Plan of Attack*: 

     1. April starts now. Yes, I know it's still March. Doesn't matter. If I put this off till April 1st, I'll drag my feet even more. I would like to see this thing published before I'm eighty, after all. Won't happen if I continue to procrastinate. So for me, April has 38 days this year (I started editing last Saturday). 

     2. Editing happens every day. Notice I said editing, not writing - though I know I will need to rewrite several scenes, even whole chapters. The opening chapter, I know, needs to be entirely scrapped. Already I am deleting entire sections, while moving other sections around, in small chunks and large. The only way my poor ADHD brain can keep track of all this elaborate "shell game" is to work on it every day.

     3. Tell on myself. Hence this blog post. If I don't tell people about this stupendously idiotic idea of mine, then it will never happen. Heck, it will never even be half-attempted. Because at rock bottom we're all whiners when the going gets tough, right? So don't let me whine. I expect comments, emails and tweets heckling me toward April 38th, 2012. Yep.

     4. View editing as a reward, not a chore. One of the reasons I'm so distractible, and can be such a whiner when it comes to writing, is that I have three jobs whose variables and schedules change constantly. It suits my ADHD just fine, but it means that it's easy for me to drop things, especially when work obligations get really tough, as they always do this time of year. 

     When that happens, I'll reward myself with a 30 minute spurt of editing after I've reached some milestone with the work obligations. That way necessary things get done, and so does the editing. I might even manage to get more done of both than I originally anticipated.

This is how I beta-read other people's work.

I owe my own manuscript the same courtesy.

 So there you have it. I've put my nutzo writing ambition out there for all to see, and I'm asking you to hold me accountable. Any encouragement is always appreciated, though I should point out that heckling is often more effective when time constraints are an issue. 

Either way - what do you think? Any other crazies out there who have tried this before? Especially under a self-imposed deadline? Or should I have my day pass revoked?

Oh look - a donkey with a mustache!

Wait...that belongs with a different post altogether...

* Not quite a 22 Things list, a'la Write Me Happy, but it's a start. Ain'tcha proud of me? (You know, I really should join that challenge as well...)

6SS: Gair's Peculiar Gift

Our next installment for Six Sentence Sunday, from my fantasy work-in-progress 

concerning dwarfish mayhem, currently entitled Karst. In this excerpt, 

Gair shows another side of him that (eventually) proves both a blessing and a curse:

             Rough hands shook him, breaking his concentration.

            “Crazy lump-stone has fallen asleep,” muttered a nearby voice. 
Though muted, there was no mistaking the metallic note in it.

            If those words had been uttered by anyone other than Eitri, Gair might have shrugged it off. He was enamored with what he had just discovered – that by shoving away sounds near to him he could hear what happened far away – he did not know quite how far. Possibly very far. 

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Thanks for reading!! 

6SS: Injurious Turning-Point

Next installment of Six Sentence Sunday - another six sentences from my fantasy work-in-progress of dwarfish mayhem, currently entitled Karst. In this excerpt, a critical injury comes to light, on which much of the following conflict rests:

            “Why doesn’t father want me to hunt?” Gair asked suddenly. “Why is Eitri at his right hand? I’m his son.”

            For the first time, Bragi’s face fell, and a cautious light leapt into his kind eyes.

            “I do not say it is the right thing,” he said, "but I would also say to not ask such a thing – at least, not yet. Do you want a second wounding, by making your father repeat his words?”

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Thanks for reading!! 

6SS: Bragi's Calculations

In keeping with my current seriesfor Six Sentence Sunday - another six sentences from my fantasy manuscript of dwarfish mayhem, currently entitled Karst. In this excerpt the dwarves in the Uplands,  coming out of their alternate shape and preparing for the next challenge:

By the time darkness fell, all the dwarves were in their proper shape and preparing for the hunt. They would, of course, hunt at night, when their cave-vision gave the best chance of seeing their prey, with or without hoods. Though Razivan miscalculated their timing in coming to the Uplands, he had been right about one thing: it was a new moon. No moon meant less light, and an easier time seeing during the hunt.

            “He was right about that only because he didn’t do the calculating,” Brenna muttered to Gair as she laid out the hunting-knives. “Bragi’s the only one with the charts and sense to predict what the moon is doing from five leagues beneath the ground.”

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Thanks for reading!! 

6SS: The Rooted Stair

In keeping with last week's Six Sentence Sunday - another six sentences from my fantasy work-in-progress concerning dwarfish mayhem, currently entitled Karst. In this excerpt, Gair and the other dwarves are on an urgent march to the surface, to scavenge for food before the pier-lamps that guard their city against the millipedes burn too low, and the gigantic insects overrun their city:

Through the brittle layers they moved, rising like vultures through gloriously festooned clouds, heaped with fascinating embellishments – some natural, some obviously dwarf-made. The closer they came to the surface, the more Gair noticed other details – expert carvings drawn straight out of the damp rock. At first the etchings were mostly of millipedes, their lithe bodies and countless legs twisting in and out among the folded stone. But these soon gave way to other pictures: great trees, their roots stretching down into the cavernous folds; birds, flying fearlessly between the wet teeth of grinning flowstones; cougars and wolves, prowling the blank surfaces as though they only waited for Gair to look the other way before pouncing. They were carved so deftly, so very life-like, that they seemed almost real.

“Why would our father-dwarves carve such things?” he wondered aloud.

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Thanks for reading!! 

6SS: Detour to another WIP

My last few offerings for Six Sentence Sunday has been from Castle 8. Today, however, I decided to post an excerpt from a completed manuscript that I am actively editing, currently entitled Karst. It is a fantasy story that follows a dwindling outpost of Dwarves, and the complex perils that besiege them from above and below, from without and within.

Here is today's excerpt:

Turning a last corner, Gair saw the sagging sink-hole of fire-lit rock, and the swollen cauldrons squatting grimly over the vents. On the other side, several stout figures were dragging away the empty shells of a small millipede (only the length of about nine or ten dwarves) to a farther stretch of rock to break it apart for its valuable, stone-hard scales – yet another part of their worst enemy that the dwarves gladly put to good use. Gair himself wore a bristling tunic cobbled from such scales, as did Brenna. Her millipede armor chittered ominously as she clattered atop her perch.

            “Ho there, Brenna!” On the black scaffolding surrounding the nearest cauldron, a stubby hand waved as the dwarf broke into a rare smile – rare not for this dwarf to smile, but for dwarves in general to smile. Life in the Sighted City did not invite much cause for joy and celebration.

Comments? Questions? Let me know in the comments!

Thanks for reading!