14th Nov, 2009

Master of Shadows

Over the past few days I’ve come to realize that my new book is not turning out as well as I had hoped. I am going to have to go back and do a lot of rewriting. However, I’m in the middle of nanowrimo and I don’t have the time to rewrite 50,000 words. So I’m going to finish the book as it is and then go back and extensively edit it once the month is over.

Rather than keep posting chapters I’m going to stop, finish the book, edit it, and then release it after I’m satisfied with the story. I’m not going to continue to release something that I’m not happy with.

I’m not sure how long it is going to take to rewrite the book. Since next month is December (and a lot happens in December) my guess is I won’t be able to finish the editing until sometime around the first quarter of next year.

As Montezuma Vly once said, quality is severe drudgery. If a thing is worth doing it’s worth doing right.

Posted by: joncooper

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Responses

Well I’m not sure what to say here, of course you must keep your integrity, and I don’t mean to whine, but man, I’m in the middle and totally wondering how it’s going to end, and now I’m going to have to make up my own ending until you finish the rewrite in 2 or 3 months. Well, I look forward to when it arrives. Best regards, Thayne

By: thayneharmon on November 14th, 2009
at 11:09 pm

Jon, your writing continues to grow in clarity and interest. It’s getting harder and harder to put down your books. I’m sure you have some great rewrites in mind. But as much as I’d read was quite interesting. Congrats on reaching the finish line and I do really look forward to reading the final book when it comes out.

By: pendragon7 on November 14th, 2009
at 11:36 pm

I do apologize. I hate doing this, but somewhere the story took a wrong turn. A lot of things were already supposed to happen by now that haven’t happened yet, and it’s affecting the end of the book.

For example, when Jack and Lily walked through the desert they encountered little blue sparkles. Those blue dots of light are incredibly important to how the book ends, but somehow they got dropped out of the middle of the story. That whole thread never got developed. I can’t just drop it back in now, and that creates a problem.

The middle of the book is just wrong. I’ve had readers complaining that the book got really boring after Jack and Lily landed on Lemura, and I can understand why. For quite a few chapters very little happens that is either action-oriented or plot-related.

The thing is, if I finish the book now I’m not sure how much sense the ending is going to make. Nanowrimo is great, but sometimes when you write at that speed you forget important things and then you don’t have the time to go back and fix it.

So, rather than spoil the surprise ending with something that doesn’t make any sense, I’m going to stop here, finish the draft, and just fix it. I do apologize but I don’t want to ruin the story. I know it can be better than what it is.

By: joncooper on November 15th, 2009
at 9:20 am

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