Puzzle Pieces

I love it when things fall into place.

It’s like…when you’re going around not knowing how mucked up and tense your back is and you go to the chiropractor and get an adjustment, and suddenly you feel SO MUCH BETTER and you didn’t know how bad it was before until it was better.

Okay I just reread that sentence and think I need another cup of caffeine to untangle it…hope it made sense to you.

Anyway the POINT is that this weekend I did my read-through of Red, making a sweep for notes and additions per my conversation with Pot about Sawyer and filling in holes.  Several awesome things happened as a result of this:

  1. I LOVE this book.  I’m always afraid when I do a read through that I’ll find it lacking or flat or that what I intended SO did not make it on to the page.  And while there are a few spots of that, overall it holds up and makes me want to dance and squee. Considering I have 58% more book to write, this is a good thing.
  2. I filled in some minor holes that have been hanging out in the early chapters…not like full scene holes, but details that needed to be there that my brain hadn’t wrapped itself around yet.
  3. And best of all, I figured out a Sawyer scene that was, up to now, a total useless blank, which is now important stuff that’s going to lead to a way more kickass midpoint (which is just around the corner…YAY).  And if it means I get to imagine him shirtless, it’s for research.  Shut UP, I’m not that much older…

Now I just have to tackle the SYNOPSIS.  If I can write a 400 page novel, why should the SYNOPSIS freak me the heck out?  Well because it’s condensing said novel into 1-2 pages.  There’s always that terror that THE AWESOME CANNOT BE CONDENSED.  Yeesh.  I’ll just think of it as a reduction.  In cooking, the reduction is all about concentrating the AWESOME of flavors into a thick, delicious…well, awesomesauce.  If I figure out some secret to it, I’ll write a post about it.  In the meantime, I should do some real work.

10 thoughts on “Puzzle Pieces

  1. If you love your book, everyone else will love it. I’m so glad you’re feeling this way about Red. Oh, and have I mentioned (um, yes) how much I can’t wait to read it?

    Writing a synopsis is always hard for me. You have to decide which points you want put in there. What will draw the reader? But I’m sure you’ll get it done and it will be exactly what it needs to be.

  2. I absolutely love the reduction simile! As someone who is struggling with a book description, never mind a full synopsis, I can relate. Glad things are going well with the writing.

  3. Maybe this is a stupid question, but I’ll ask it anyway…

    If you’re a self-published author, what good does a 1-2 page synopsis do you? It’s not like you need it to shop the manuscript around. So who’s going to see it?

    Are you shopping the books to traditional publishers in addition to self-publishing? Or is it something you do for yourself, to help you with the writing process? Or something else that I’m missing completely?

    1. I’ll be ultimately making a living via both traditional and self published means. My current book Red is going to be shopped to traditional publishers in the near future by my agent. Believe me, I wouldn’t put myself through the torture unnecessarily! 🙂 Although, actually, even for the self-published, having synopses of varying lengths is a very useful component to one’s press kit.

  4. Ah yes, the one-liner, the one-paragrapher, the one-pager. It’s kinda like a contest to see how far you can condense all those words and still gets their meaning across.

  5. So glad to hear you are enjoying your latest book. If it makes you wanna dance and sing, then your readers are definitely gonna like it too! I enjoyed your condensing analogy…how hard it is to capture the essence of your story in a synopsis though…

    Just out of interest (I’m new to your awesome blog) how long does it take you to write a novel? I want to write a novel this year, as I’ve had ideas floating around my mind for a couple of decades now! lol

    Chloe xx

    1. It’s different with every book and depends a great deal on what’s going on in my personal life and with the Evil Day Jobs. Red is going to take somewhere around 6 months, it looks like.

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