Last year I went to SCBWIs winter conference in NYC and
while I was there I had my first 500 words of THE NEWSTEAD PROJECT critiqued by
two editors, both from big six publishing houses. Before I went I must’ve
written and re-written those first two pages more than a hundred times. In the beginning I relied heavily on my
husband, which was a very bad idea. For those of you who don’t know, my husband
is a brilliant man who does lots of non-fiction technical type writing for the
Navy Nuclear Industry and when he reads for pleasure it’s always something nonfiction about some
war in the last century. So when I handed him my first two pages of my YA
thriller all he could say was that it was good, but it had a lot of bad grammar
stuck in incomplete sentences. Needless to
say I was more than crushed, I was paralyzed.
Going to NY did that to me, too. Not that the editors were
harsh, they weren’t. It’s just that because of my fears and constant revisions,
my first 500 words didn’t match the rest of the book at all. They were sterile
and vanilla, but they were written in perfect grammar and without a fragment to
be found. In short the voice was gone.
The first 500 words were my first chance to introduce the
reader to Joel, my MC that I love so much and he wasn’t there. Nothing was.
The reason I write this is because on Friday I sat down with
a list of edits from my copyeditor for those same 500 words and for the first
time in two years it feels like the rest of the book.
Have any of the rest of you had a hang up like that?
Yep, I know what you mean. I think voice is one of the hardest things to really nail, and it can be easily hamstrung if you listen to your deepest fears (and the wrong advice). Voice is not for the timid, but the brave.
ReplyDeleteFor some reason the first 500 is the hardest for me. The resto fo the novel flows just like how I want it to.
DeleteWriting perfect tends to kill voice. Now you know. Remember, not the end of the world, just a learning experience. Your work will be so much stronger now!
ReplyDeleteThank you. I showed your comment to my husband, but he still stands by his postion for perfect grammar.
DeleteOh, those first 500 words are tough! I rewrite them once I've finished the draft so they sound like the rest of the book. I know my character much better by then, so it's easier. Still, I do stress over them.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you recovered from your experience!
I don't know it it's a complete recovery, at least not yet. I still look at them from time to time and make changes.
Delete