I am tired of my own words

[namaste]

OK, so I've been working on this children's book -- writing one, not reading one, I'll say just in case you were confused. I've mentioned it over on LJ, but figured I'd use the space here to vent a little bit for what it's worth.

Basically, if I haven't bored you about this previously, it's about a stray dog who finds a home, written mostly from the dog's POV. It's aimed at middle school readers, so 9-12 year olds.

I was happy enough with what I'd done to get a professional critique of it from a published author with books in that same age range. The result was very positive. Lots of good comments for what I've got, and a few points to strengthen the plot and fine tune the language for the readers' level. (Best part was hearing that with these tweaks, "it's publishable." That's not a guarantee, mind you, but just knowing I haven't been wasting the last nearly nine months of writing is wonderful.)

Thing is, it's so hard to refocus on the nitty gritty details at this point. I know the story, I know how it needs to read, but just sitting down and moving this part there and tweaking that part isn't nearly as much fun as the writing itself. Finding time to write when it was all fresh and new and plotty was easy. The reworking? Lots of distractions. I was pleased I had a four-hour train ride to Chicago today (I'm here for a conference) just because it gave me specific time away from WiFi or TV to just focus on what needed to be done.

Anyone out there have any ideas how to keep things fresh? Or just some encouragement? I've got another six chapters to plunge through on rewrite yet, then need to do a complete re-read before I take the next step, and I don't want to be bored with my own work.

Comments

[ignaz]

Anyone out there have any ideas how to keep things fresh?

Drugs.

Wait--I mean coffee! And isolating myself someplace with no internet access and a steady supply of tea. That's what works for me.

GO YOU for working on this! It sounds like such an awesome project!

[namaste]

It was amazing how much I got done on the train. All those moments when I wanted to go playing on the web were just ... gone ('cuz so was access).

I've got another four hour ride going home on Tuesday, so I'm shooting for getting another big chunk done then.

[zulu]

Hee, this may be entirely limited to a subset labelled "ME", but what I do is race with people. Make a vow to get so much done in a certain time period, with my racer vowing to do so much of their project in that same time period, and then getting together at the end and comparing. Maybe I'm unhealthily competitive? But it really gets me going when I know that someone's going to hold me accountable and that if I don't do my part I won't "win".

However, right now? I totally hear you. I have this big bang I'm supposed to be editing and I keep putting it off to do other things. Probably today sometime I'm gonna have to ask someone to race with me so that I actually sit down to it!

Yours sounds like a great story! I know someone who's had a few books published for that age range and it's interesting to crit the story and see what has to happen, and how, for it to be publishable. A very different publishing environment from SF short stories, with its own intricacies and demands. Very cool that you're doing it!

[namaste]

There are some things I've had to change for that age range like --- making it more linear. I'd started a chapter with a bit of a flashback, but was told that can be confusing, so had to rework it to be more straightforward. At the same time, some of the sentences were too straightforward, and I've needed to rework those.

In terms of having a schedule/race -- to get the first draft done I challenged myself to consider it a NaNoWriMo and shoot to get it done by the end of November. That worked pretty well. For this I'm shooting to have this done by the end of the month. I'll be visiting family in Florida, including a niece and her two kids -- 7 and 9 -- who are voracious readers. I'm going to use them as beta readers, since they're the perfect target group.

[zulu]

Oh, yay! Yes, a deadline helps too, and it's great that you've got first-readers all lined up.