Tales of a True Writer - I AM a Moron

I've been working on Demons for five years. When I say that, I don't mean that's how long it took to write it. I just mean that's how long I've been querying, revising, querying, revising, querying, scrapping, re-writing, querying, trashing, writing all over again, querying, revising....

I think you see the pattern here.

It's made its way from a sci-fi to a paranormal thriller to a possible paranormal thriller/romance. I've changed it's theme, the book's purpose, the speed, the rhythm and the flow of this book.

One day, I really might have to just set it aside as a great idea that never made it. *sigh* Where is that little red engine now? It could and could and could and then did and did and did, and it's probably sitting in a train yard gaining rust by now.

A year ago, I decided to scrap the last half of the book. I've got this book MEMORIZED. It's INGRAINED in my brainpan. This thing is NEVER GOING TO ESCAPE!

So, I did what any True Writer would do. I skimmed through the book after doing my re-write of the last half and declared the book ready to go. *pat on back*

However, after sending it out for queries, I realized that no one would get to the last half of the book because they couldn't get past the first 4,000 word chapter.

So I re-wrote it...for the MILLIONTH time.

It was completely different.

The rejections took longer than normal, but they still came.

Ouch.

So I decided to take one more look at it. I needed to really get a feel for the plot arc and the character arc and the interest arc. With Tempest, I developed a new method for gauging this and I decided that on this last round of revisions and queries, it was time to try out this new weapon of writing aptitude.

I scrapped the beginning and re-wrote it.

And then I opened the book and re-read every. single. word. And wrote down the scores to see what scenes were worth keeping and which were in serious need of the trash.

And do you KNOW what I found out?! 

I don't have this frelling book that I've read a GAZILLION times MEMORIZED!!!!!

I have the nuggets, the gems, the wonders in words committed to memory; the scenes that dazzled and that sent chills down my spine as I wrote them, the moments that made me cry and the ones that pissed me off. Those are the ones I remembered. And when I did my - HOW many YEARS of SKIMMING?! - there were things that I completely MISSED!

I'm re-reading this book going, "Oh, crap! That was before THIS revision," and, "Oh, Hell. How'd I miss this? This was from THREE YEARS AGO!" and, "Did I even WRITE THIS?! Are you SUUUUURE?!"

*dead pan stare*

It just goes to show that even True Writers can still sometimes be MORONS!!

I'm still not done re-reading the book. After all, I'm re-reading EVERY. WORD.  It's still a really great, extremely phenomenal book. It is.

*head desk*

But when I send it out THIS time, I'll know that I really did send out the very best I could do. This is the best this book has ever been.

And hopefully? This time it makes it.