I've been editing The Crown Unconquered for a couple weeks now. It's been hard going. My beta readers were pretty much in agreement with me on the main problem spots, which means those things need to get solved, hard. Sadly, I've been in a funk this last couple of weeks as well, which never makes writing easy.
The process goes as follows:
-Get charged up to fix the story, sit down to edit
-Make some progress
-Grow daunted by the task in front of me and unsure of my own skills
-Despair sets in, walk away from story confident I'll never get anywhere with my writing
-Do other things, dwell on story
-Remember how awesome the story will be once I fix it
-Get charged up, sit down to edit...
Rinse. Repeat. Low moods never help, of course. I feel myself emerging from that, so I'm still confident I can get this story fixed and published by the end of the month.
It can be troublesome fixing a story, but if it's an awesome story...then the time is worth it. Plus, it's experience if you should encounter such set of problems again. I know, making it sound easy when it isn't--one fix can cause ripples that require attention, and those, can ripple too.
ReplyDeleteHang in there. Tackling it a bit at a time seems like a solid course of action.