JP ShawThursday Thirteen: Things I hate about editing my own work
I'm in the middle of editing my novel right now, which is turning my brain to mush. So in honor of this Thursday Thirteen I thought I would tell you the things I absolutely HATE about editing my own work.
For any writers out there you will understand what I mean. Okay here we go...
1.) I always find inconsistencies with my characters. She started out having brown eyes and then suddenly without telling me she ends up having green ones. Not nice of her.
2.) I thought I was in love with my male lead protagonist but the more I get to know him and the more time I spend on my writing and away from my family, the more my own husband seems like a knight in shining armor.
3.) GRAMMAR GRAMMER OR GRAMER? I am famous for mispelled words and think to myself there is no way a big publisher like Harlequin is going to put up with my brain which now resembles mash potatoes left over in a fridge for over a week, with all my grammatical errors.
4.) Someone please tell me where and when do I use a damn SEMICOLON?
5.) I think I'll rewrite the entire chapter... and chapter three could use a new scene ... wait then there's chapter eleven--she can't run away with him yet... oh damn why don't I just scrap the entire thing and start over!!!
6.) My computer hates me and shuts down on purpose in the middle of a rewrite just to piss me off. Damn that big blue screen of death!
7.) If being overly critical of your own work means you are a perfectionist--well move over Mother Theresa because when I get to heaven God is going to give me the PERFECT WRITER halo for the shit I've accomplished.
8.) Realizing that I'm about ohhhhhhh 30,000 words short for my novel with nothing else left to say or do.
9.) Figuring out that I have no sub characters, and the ones I do have when I have them are basically ornaments on a Christmas Tree, nice to look at but you can't wait to take them down and put them away till next year.
10.) The printing cost of printing out my novel to rewrite and edit because I cannot edit by looking at the work on the computer screen without wanting to pull my hair out. And I need my hair.
11.) Changing things that seem perfectly good to me, and yet don't, and trying to figure out for three hours on one sentence why it doesn't feel right, going in circles, taking out a word, adding a word. This is why I'm a functioning wine-a-holic.
12.) Running out of ink while printing a finished edited piece. Not seeing it on paper is like eating a picture of a hamburger--it just doesn't taste the same.
13.) Finally--never seeing the finish line. When I edit my own work, I am so tenacious about finishing it right away, and have a lack of patience for waiting as my creative juices gear themselves up to give me a home run. I want the ball, I want the basket, I want the goal, and I want it NOW!
If it ain't broke... don't fix it! Unfortunetly in writing though every road needs some construction...
Happy Thirteen everyone!
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