First Edit for Chapter 12 of MGC Finished: Free Sample!

It shouldn’t have taken a week for this, but there was also a lot of family stuff in there. I also worked a bit on some other things, so I wasn’t exactly dawdling. This chapter was much more emotional than the others I’ve done, which I think the sample displays pretty well. I debated about whether to keep this in, and in the end, keeping won. There’s precious little Naddi and Conrad history in the novel, and this scene includes that. In fact, I think there’s too little of Naddi in the book entirely, but, even though I like her, she isn’t the focus. There’s also a lot of current Naddi and Conrad here, which I also like.

The Tale of the Tape: I gained a couple of hundred words without sacrificing hardly anything on my Flesch stats, so that was okay. That was mostly due to word choices and clarity issues. Really looking forward to the second editing on this one. One thing: I need to pick up the pace drastically on this or the final edit will be done by my heirs. Sheesh!

A Random 250 (or so) Words:

Up Next: some basic sorting of original information for a new short project and a new long project, then a rough of MGC Chapter 18. After that, it’s the first Edit on Chapter 13 and a free sample. Triskaidekaphobia, anyone?

Thanks for reading!

First Edit for Chapter 11 of MGC Finished: Free Sample!

That took a while longer than I expected. In between the stuff going on at home and the other things I was doing, it’s been six weeks since the last time I provided a sample of something I finished editing. And I think I know why.

I added 800 words to this chapter from the rough to the end of the first edit.

Now, wait, let me explain. Chapter 11 of MGC brings back two characters that I’ve written about already in my novel Turning Springs (get your copy at my Smashwords dot com profile page). If you’ve read the work (you have read it, haven’t you?), you’ll recognize them right away, but their role in the current work needs to be addressed. That adds words. If you haven’t read it (I know, some of you haven’t read it), you need to know who they are, and why they’re there. That adds words. In addition, there’s a creepy and unusual aspect to their arrival on the scene, which also adds words. It’s longer, yes, but there’s a lot going on that didn’t make sense to put into separate chapter. And, as I read through it, it didn’t seem longer, because there’s an agitated quality to the dialogue that moves the scene along.

I know I broke the rules with this one, but keeping the rules intact would have ultimately served the work poorly. I’ve always found shorter chapters in the midst of longer ones to be a bit of a distraction, so I kept the longer one. I’m happy with it.

Tale of the Tape: Aside from coming in 800 words longer, I really didn’t work on it all that long in the six weeks. I was dealing with other projects (one large and one small) that aren’t ready for sampling yet and life stuff, so I probably spent eight or ten hours on the chapter total. My Flesch scores are all comparable, which tells me, after 800 extra words, I didn’t do much damage to the chapter’s readability. I don’t want to do it all the time, of course, but I’m glad it worked out the way it did.

A Random 250 (or so) Words:

Up Next: Smaller stuff, then another MGC rough and another MGC edit (with an accompanying free sample, natch).

Thanks for reading!