I promised I would blog about rough drafting, so here it is.

Here's the thing about rough drafting and revising. I like revising. I'm good at revising. i know what I'm doing when I'm revising. I know exactly what to expect when I'm revising.

On the other hand, writing a rough draft is unpredictable, inefficient, and uncertain. I delete as much as I save. I go down wrong paths, write embarrassing stretches of prose just to see my word count jump before I delete it, and kill characters that I later have to resurrect when I realize there is no one to hold my main character's hair while she pukes later (metaphorically speaking). I don't think I'm very good at it and it is intensely frustrating.

And, unfortunately, it's what I live for. Because in between all that uncertainty and general ectoplasmic horror, there are also stretches of writer's highs -- those thousands of words you write in an hour, your brain lost in the emotions and settings of your novel. Those scenes you write and you know right after you write them -- no, right when you write them -- that they're just spot on. You just don't get those while revising.

My love/ hate relationship is directly related to how far into the manuscript I am. Let me illustrate this point.

0-2,000 words: "The Frolicking Phase" My prose is genius. This idea is gold. Printz, here I come. You might as well sweep everything else off the endcaps at Barnes & Noble now, because they have a new name for them now: My Home. That is where this book will live.

2,001-10,000 words: "The Emo Phase" What was I thinking? I'm writing my own fanfiction. I would not know a timeline if it reached up and pinched my right butt cheek. How did I possibly think this plot could sustain 90,000 words of exploration? I don't even know how my characters speak anymore. No, how anyone speaks. I have completely lost the ability to write dialog. In fact, I can't speak myself. It is time to e-mail my agent and confess that the previous three books were flukes. I need to be taken out back and put out of my misery before my editor gets ahold of this directionless prose.

10,001-15,000 words: "The Slow Realization that You Did Indeed Write Crap Phase" You know, if I just pretend the first 10,000 words don't exist, I think I might have something here. It won't be genius, and it sure as heck still isn't easy, and I'm sad about not getting a Printz or renaming all end-caps My Home, but at least my editor might eventually be able to look at this draft without staggering back from his desk, twitching and vomiting. Hey, look! I just wrote two scenes, and it didn't even kill me!

15,001-18,000 words: "The HouseCleaning Phase" One of these days, I will have to show this to my critique partners, and if I send it out like this, they will have no idea what I am trying to do. Why? Because of the 10,000 words of crap that I started it with. But I love that intro. The Printz/ End Cap/ Genius . . . >DELETE<.

0-15,000 words: "The Rematch Phase" Wow, I feel a lot better now that I've rearranged and rewritten and hacked at those first 10,000 words, even if it means that I have an actually smaller wordcount than when I started. I think I might even have negative wordcount. But . . .this might be good.

15,001-18,000 words: "The First Epiphany Phase" I are a writer! I can do this fast! I love this - the angst, the passion, the sheer criminality of this character and the emo-city of this other one! I am having a WRITER HIGH!

18001-25,000 words: "The Trudge Phase" Still looking for another epiphany. Why do I do this to myself? I would've been a great lawyer. I like fighting with people. I can't believe I have to show this to my critique partners. I can't believe I have to show this to my agent. Farewell, mine credibility.

CRIT PARTNERS: "I'm kind of in love with it."
AGENT: "This is FABULOUS."
ME: "Really!? I'M A GENIUS."

25,001-35,000 words: "The Immersive Phase" Laundry does not exist. All that exists is Mercy Falls, Minnesota (ignore that I made it up) and the wolves in it (ignore that I made them up too).

35,001-45,000 words: "The Ittermittantly Brilliant Phase" WRITER HIGH! writer low. WRITER HIGH! writer low. WRITER HIGH!

45,001-60,000 words: "The Neverending Story Phase" I really ought to end this sometime. I mean, it is a young adult novel, not an encyclopedia. OMG. I am NOWHERE NEAR THE END OF THE PLOT.

*panic*

60,001-70,000 words: "The Fraying Thread Phase" I shall read the beginning again, to admire my flawless prose and AGHAGAHGHAHGH! How could I forget that plot thread that I introduced on page 47!? I am now left with a plot hole big enough to push an end cap through. You know what my editor will do when he reads this? First he will laugh helplessly and then he will buy every red pen that Bic has ever made and he will laugh helplessly while telling me that I will be revising for the rest of my life.

70,001-75,000 words: "The Subsconscious Rules Phase" But I didn't really forget that plot thread! Look how I subtly brought it up here and here without realizing it!? GOOD SUBCONSCIOUS. HAVE A COOKIE.

75,001-80,000 words: "The Sleepless Phase" I just want to get it done. I want to get it done I want to get it . . . it's over. I can't believe it's over.

*withdrawal*


So, yep. That's about it. It looks kind of psychotic written out like that. I would say that I'm not really psychotic, but right now I'm in the intermittantly brilliant phase of LINGER and I'm afraid psychotic is probably the best adjective for me right now, right after "caffeinated."

How about you guys? What does your drafting look like?

The last week has been very character-building for me.

It started off with ShevaCon on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. There were storm troopers, belly dancers, and ghost hunters in evidence, as well as a few writerly types (like myself) doing panels on speculative fiction. High points definitely included staying with tltrent (who took me to the Taubman Museum in Roanoke, which had a John Singer Sargent*)(thanks, tltrent , you are intensely amazing) and having dinner with oneminutemonkey and Mike Allen, editor of Clockwork Phoenix. Dinner involved fire and cows and that is always a good combination (excepting when Vikings are also involved).

*John Singer Sargent being my long-standing unrequited artistic love.

I also met kusanar (hi kusanar !), bought an anthology edited by Jane Yolen, and generally spent way more money than I made. Then I drove home just in time for the worst snow storm in years to hit my home county, putting my power out for 15 hours and my parents and siblings' for far longer (they're still with us), and robbing me of two days of work when my deadline is creeping ever closer. Nature, it was cold. I do not like huddling around a woodstove. Do not do this again.

Repeat. Bad Nature. NO cookie.

I will post more properly later on this week, when I have gotten over the giddiness of having heat and internet back again. Also, I'll post the dates and places for my eight book events this month.

The universe wants me to eat a nutritious breakfast, and now I have proof.

How, you ask?

Well, here's how my morning went.

Maggie drops kids off at school and returns to kitchen to make pot of tea and find breakfast.

Maggie: I have that Kashi cereal to eat. It's vaguely edible.

Maggie puts kettle of tea on in preparation for consuming caffeine for the next 12 hours. Glances towards casserole dish with three pieces of blondie still left in it.

Maggie: *begins washing out tea pot and getting tea bags* But blondies and a glass of milk is practically a complete breakfast in itself. I mean, milk group, grain group, chocolate group . . .

Casserole Dish: *explodes*


Yes, it really did explode. Apparently, when you have a casserole dish sitting on the stovetop and you turn on the wrong burner, the casserole dish gets really hot and explodes into 1,000,006 pieces all over your kitchen. The reason why I know the whole thing was orchestrated by the People Upstairs is because I was standing three feet away from the blast and I'm now sitting here and typing this post instead of driving myself to the E.R. with a piece of blondie protruding from my forehead.

So I'm eating cereal, in case you're wondering. Even if I hadn't learned my lesson, the blondies are studded with glass now, and I don't feel up to picking them out before I've had my morning cup of tea.


Oh, while I'm here, I should plug my Friday fiction over at merry_fates . Tiny faeries, for once.

So I heard from editor Yoda (which is what I am now calling my editor Andrew Karre now. I have to keep him straight from my brother Andrew, and since he is extraordinarily Yoda like at times, that's his new moniker.)(I always wanted to say "moniker.")

Anyway, editor Yoda told me that they had just gotten in the cover flats for LAMENT, which meant that the books were soon behind. And then, my stomach dropped into my feet and continued on to the crawlspace. I don't normally get nervous - I mean, we're talking years of public performance here, people -- so to get this feeling with predictable frequency whenever I think about LAMENT hitting bookshelves is very weird to me.

Eeeeeeeeeeeee.

See, just typing that and realizing that the release date is so close?

Did it again. Stomach, when will I hear back from you?

Stomach (muffled, from the crawlspace): probably sometime after October