90% and Beyond

It wasn't a bad week on the writing front, and the week's not over. I made it to the 90% plot point and a little further. I said last week that it looked like I'd finish the rough draft during this week(July 1-7). Unless I run over the word count, which looks like a possibility, that estimate is on target. If I work on it this weekend, I could get it done on or before Monday. Otherwise, it would be on or before Wednesday.

After the rough draft is complete, the plan is to read through it to see if it feels like it works and probably make notes along the way for things that need attention in later stages. My outline did not survive contact with the keyboard, and I had to change some plot points to fit the story, which is good in a way. It means I didn't try to force the story to fit the outline. If I think it's working, the next step would be to go through it fixing and polishing and tweaking. That's something that gets done multiple times. I could do a pass focusing on dialogue and one focusing on prose and one focusing on description, etc. It's really important to write what you love to read. At some point I'd let it rest for at least 30 days and then look at it again with "fresh" eyes. From experience, I know 30 days isn't long enough, but it's an optimistic goal. If I'm in the middle of another rough draft, I'd want to let that deadline slip and be glad about it.

The middle grade series is looming on the horizon. But first, I need to finish the last book in the B'vellah War series. I'm estimated about three weeks or so to finish the rough draft for that. Then it's on to reading the complete book to see if I think it works. Then polishing and tweaking.

Part of my process for working on a rough draft is to go over yesterday's work and fix and polish as I read through it. At the end that saves a lot of work. If I'm typing too fast, I can leave out a word in a sentence. It's a lot easier to remember the word the next day than weeks or a couple of months later. There were a lot of ship name references in the book. It's amazing how many times I had to italicize them the next day.

As I mentioned a while ago, I spent a lot of time on plotting this book. It still wasn't enough, especially when plot points shifted around. I'm already thinking ahead for the middle grade series. I'm going to have to pre-think that series a lot. It's one that I hope to be able to sell to a publisher, but if it doesn't work that way, it's still going to be a solidly plotted work.

Have a great weekend.