Revision Season #4: Feeling It
I did it; I used the giant Post It! And then I did math. Plus: the dog's thoughts on my schedule.
Hello from the start of August. Those of you who were around last year remember this is the month I defend heartily. It’s my birthday month, but as someone who has a really complicated (but improving!) relationship with celebrations, especially ones centered on me, it’s about way more than that. August to me is about fullness, about what it feels like to inhabit what is too much, about asking if it is too much, and what is enough. The past few weeks I’ve been thinking a lot about what my work is—not what my job is, which is different, and tied to pesky capitalism, and often, quite frankly the equation that makes me feel bad about all my life choices—but what my work is. Put another way, if I didn’t have to anchor any of my efforts to their financial outcomes, what would I devote time and energy to? Easy. Writing books. Many of you are confused by this, maybe, wondering if this isn’t what I do, indeed? And yet, no1. I coach and teach and edit and write copy and do a lot of work around and fretting about how to get more clients to do that with me so I can…do my work, which is writing my books, making visible to strangers all the things that play out in my head that help me understand the world, people, the big questions.
For me—and for 99% of the writers you know—doing what I consider my work is always done under the shadow of the other things. Time and energy are limited; money is what makes doing the work possible, keeps the children clothed, the apartment air conditioned, the tech operational.
And yet, during this favorite month of mine, despite some legitimate financial tension between my jobs and my work, I’m giving myself permission to just do my work. That means no classes, no new clients, no planning of future things unless I absolutely must. Just revising my book. Gonna follow the advice of the little card taped to my computer which says TRY TO WRITE THE NOVEL2.
Throughout August, I will be uncomfortable with this and also very happy to just be writing. I’ll be hopeful that devoting myself to my work will allow me to do more of it down the line, even if I carry the very particular experience3 of putting a lot of effort into a project and having it not pay off, literally or otherwise. As of late, I have understood that I have let go of that last book I spent an actual decade on, but I have not let go of the experience of it.
When I got my tattoo, it hurt more than my other ones have. And there were moments where my body was clammy and a bit weak, where I shivered, my body telling me to seek safety, that it should shut the hell down. And my brain was like actually, it’s fine, it’s okay, we signed up for this. And my body was like I don’t think so, buddy; are you conscious, are you feeling this?
I was, I am.
I’ve learned that I can’t entirely trust this process, which makes giving myself over to just doing the work complicated, even as I really want to, even as I’m willing to get a bit clammy and weak in the process, hopeful for some new feelings.
What I’ve Done
Rewritten chapter 1 and chapter 2. I cut a thread that contained the first ever lines I wrote of the book. There’s a chance they will be re-purposed later—there’s key info in them! They have a great hook! They’re really juicy!—but for now, they aren’t working in the chapter, so a bit of mourning for that.
Done edits on paper for chapter 3, taking notes to re-arrange what needs re-arranging and what needs an overhaul. Started in on those edits on screen last night. I made three pages into three paragraphs. At some point knowing I would do that would have horrified me but it feels amazing right now. Like wizardry. Like I am a powerful compressor who understands everything about my book.
Since my husband’s work travel is picking up again, I worked a few nights after dinner/kid bedtime. It’s been nice, mostly. A different quiet than daytime. The dog absolutely hates it. Tough cookies, June.
Settled so many foundational facts in these opening chapters. It has become easier to make decisions. AKA we are finding out which spaghetti sticks to the wall4.
Math. In a very rambling but apparently amusing voice note to my friend Payton, I calculated the speed at which I’m working and determined I’ll be done by end of September. Yesterday I applied that math to an actual calendar and it has me done in early October. This means I’ll be desperate to be done earlier. This also means nothing. Stay tuned!
Made a giant list of my chapters on my giant Post-It.
Cleaned my desk and work area. It helped. It always does.
What I’m Doing Now
At the end of each chapter, checking both the handwritten notes at the top of each chapter from my annotating read through and the index cards to see if I’ve hit all my to dos, resolved my logic issues, etc. It is really satisfying.
Re-reading each section as I finish it to smooth lines and make sure it hangs together. Unsure if I will do another whole book read. It might just be time to pass it along to my agent and other readers at that point.
I’m mid chapter 3 edits right now. My cockamamie schedule has me working on this chapter through next Monday.
What I’ve Learned
Or, remembered: I don’t have to solve everything in this draft. My job is to pass it along to the next set of readers. I have reached the point—and I think this is a good point!—where I am saying good enough for some scenes, or leaving in what is not yet clear how I’ll solve. See: uncomfortable feelings.
My pace, more or less. Thanks, giant Post-It.
The decision I made re a major character was kind of embedded in the draft all along. There was this inexplicable element I had to figure out, and that one decision explained the pressure I could not pinpoint the root of. Magic.
I often protect my characters, not necessarily from making bad choices but by being hyper-conscious of their choices. When I make the characters self-conscious it’s my voice, my intrusion, trying to protect them from how I think readers will perceive their bad choices, their impure and ungenerous thoughts, their oftentimes illogical but still very true motivations or feelings. Instead, I’m trying to do more of what Phoebe Waller-Bridge says here, use a “naughty hand,” which absolutely makes for a better scene most of the time.
This is my favorite Barbie meme. Is this about revision? You tell me.
What’s Ahead
Rinse and repeat, basically, down the line of chapters till it’s done. Overall, it’s moving from the what (assessment) into the how (drafting, relying on craft). What changes, and how do I make them, and where? It’s a lighter read of the pages but the work itself is deeper. More precise. Lots of decisions. This is a time when word count shrinks but the meaning expands.
What I’m Afraid Of
This taking forever. Will revision season be revision year?
That I’m creating ghost limbs: cutting large sections of backstory usually that I have deemed unnecessary but which the reader might actually need.
Religion of Office Supplies Report
I used the giant Post It! It’s more or less a simple to do list for my chapters, marking what I have done with the date completed. But putting it down like this I saw the pattern of the chapter sections, which repeat a bit too much for my taste, but maybe don’t really matter. Realizing that I never let the male voice speak first in any of the 10 chapters. This is fine by me.
My husband came home from a work trip with a set of slightly less than giant Post-Its. Will 100% be trying to find a use for them.
The other night while working, I looked up to see this:
So yeah, I’m using my highlighters, still ride or die with my Microns and Optiflow.
When I work on paper, I use an old acrylic clipboard that I always think I should replace but am attached to.
Where to Find Me:
More of a where not to find me, but Quitting5 Instagram for a bit later this week! Looking forward to getting those parts of my brain back.
Running another round of Should You Apply for an MFA Q&A with Write or Die on August 16th, at 7pm EST. This event is free but you do need to register here.
Feeling my feelings.
Talk Soon,
Danielle
Tomorrow, at Write or Die Magazine, a diary of one of my summer weeks is going live, if you’re really interested to see how I pass those hours.
This line is a gift from one of my earliest conversations with my agent, Barbara Jones, who has been very good at helping me calmly steer this particular ship towards its port.
Particular but not singular. I wrote this essay two years ago and I still regularly get messages thanking me for articulating the often silent experience of a book not making it to market. It’s way more common than I’d known it was.
I was going to put in a stock image of spaghetti against a wall, but the horrors of the images that come up has made that impossible for everyone’s psychological safety.
That came out in caps and I’m keeping it. It’s already obnoxious to announce one is taking a social media break so going all in on that, too.
Happy Lion month, Danielle! May your Microns and Optflows roar with delight! ( :