I’ve just posted the latest update to Alayne’s Story over on the WoW-Europe RP forum. This week’s update takes the characters inside the Halls of Lightning.
In other, semi-related news, I finally got in a Yogg-Saron kill this week. Also, work is progressing quite well on The Unexiled. I had hung myself up a few days with worry over how long the tribal section is running. In the end, I’ve decided not to worry about it and wind up hamstringing myself. It’ll run for as long as I need it. Once I get the draft completed, I can go back and rework it to shorten it as needed. For now, I just need to let the characters flow, do their thing, and I can give it a critical read when it’s ready for one. I think that’s what has held me up on the previous attempts. I was always trying to edit and write it at the same time. Let me explain.
Writing and editing are not the same thing. What I do with Alayne’s Story is to just write it out. I don’t do any editing other than a quick pass for typos (which I don’t always get) and grammar (ditto). I have done what I call a “critical read” of Parts I and II. I printed it out and read them over the course of a few days, making notes on things I intend to go back and change or rewrite. However, I want to get Part III finished before I do that. Why? Because editing is not writing. Editing is revising. Editing uses different modes, different methods, and has a much different flow to it. Since I was never planning (and still am not) to publish Alayne’s Story, I never let myself get caught in the write-edit trap. However, since I am planning to publish The Unexiled, I fell right into it several times.
Why don’t I edit Alayne’s Story? Because, once again, limited amounts of time. And, it kills the flow of writing Alayne’s Story. I should have realized this a while back. I do work as a copyeditor. My job involves editing and proofreading. When I edit something for a publication, I’m reading it much differently than when I proofread or just read. I’m not really certain how to describe what goes on in my head in these processes but I’ll give it a try.
Writing: I’m just letting it flow. I correct obvious typos, grammar errors, and logic issues but I don’t worry about it. I always have the meta-story in mind but I focus more on each scene as a stand-alone.
Proofreading: I read more carefully, looking for unobvious typos (your for you’re, its for it’s, etc) and grammar errors. I also check for better ways to say something (balancing between repetiveness and sounding like I ate a thesaurus).
Editing: I take out my scalpal, my butcher knife, my axe, and a blowtorch and attack the nuts and bolts. Here, I’m looking for anything that weakens or fails to strengthen the story. Every scene is judged on if it does what I needed it to do. If it doesn’t, I rework it. If it won’t fit, I cut it. If I don’t like it, I rewrite it.
For my old short stories, I could write one day, proofread the next, and edit the third. For something long, though, I can’t do that. It really is a flow thing and once I get started looking at something in “edit mode,” I find it difficult to get out of it and go back to “writing mode.” So, if you’re reading The Unexiled (or Alayne’s Story), you’re reading a very rough draft. I am refusing to let myself do much critical reading of either so that I will not talk myself into editing them before they (and I) am ready to take that step.
Okay, lesson over. Back to work. My job is not going to do itself. 😉
