I have completed the collection of stories. There are eleven of them, and in current draft form they total 108,000 words. The shortest is 2100 words, the longest 25,000 words. That word count will reduce on revision, I'm sure. I've printed them all out and the task of revision will begin once the day job lets me. The last story I completed is probably the one that needs most doing to it during this revision round, but I'll leave it to last so I can bring some objectivity to it.
Meantime, day job or not, I'm trying to let my head clear a little before planning what to do next. I have three potentials on the starting blocks, each with their own challenges. I'm not sure yet which of them I'm going to commit to.
I also need to work out what I'm going to do with the collection once I am through the next revision period. I think I know my way forward on that, but have yet to set it into motion.
Thursday, 28 April 2016
Sunday, 17 April 2016
Where did that come from?
Life is full of little surprises.
As I hinted in my last post, a final vamp story insinuated itself into my head. Six weeks later, it is still not quite finished, although I think I'm in the home stretch now. I've had to retreat from a few false story lines to try and keep it on track. Also, I've had to fight against my tendency to write in too much detail. One of my notes to myself reads "too much narrative, not enough story," which I've corrected now, I think.
I always knew it was going to be a very dark tale, and in that sense have a different tone to others in the collection, but at the moment it seems to be going into full-on Clive Barker horror territory. whether the final draft will still do that I don't know--I need to look at how the overall story is balanced once I get into revising the first draft, and correct it again if it is anachronistic.
Thee are other reasons why this one is taking so long. Some of it is down to other things happening in my life, notably work. However I was also sideswiped by another story in the sequence that ambushed me on the way to the supermarket and flew out from my fingers more or less fully formed. I think it is the natural first story in the collection, and is also pretty much the best thing I've written so far, in my opinion. That is pleasing, but also makes the revision of the full collection that much harder, because I've raised my own bar.
That's a good thing.
As I hinted in my last post, a final vamp story insinuated itself into my head. Six weeks later, it is still not quite finished, although I think I'm in the home stretch now. I've had to retreat from a few false story lines to try and keep it on track. Also, I've had to fight against my tendency to write in too much detail. One of my notes to myself reads "too much narrative, not enough story," which I've corrected now, I think.
I always knew it was going to be a very dark tale, and in that sense have a different tone to others in the collection, but at the moment it seems to be going into full-on Clive Barker horror territory. whether the final draft will still do that I don't know--I need to look at how the overall story is balanced once I get into revising the first draft, and correct it again if it is anachronistic.
Thee are other reasons why this one is taking so long. Some of it is down to other things happening in my life, notably work. However I was also sideswiped by another story in the sequence that ambushed me on the way to the supermarket and flew out from my fingers more or less fully formed. I think it is the natural first story in the collection, and is also pretty much the best thing I've written so far, in my opinion. That is pleasing, but also makes the revision of the full collection that much harder, because I've raised my own bar.
That's a good thing.
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