They think its all over

But hitting the target was only part of it.  Yes I have written a little over fifty thousand words of my novel, but that’s not the end of it.  Now comes the difficult part, actually finishing the novel.  Last year the end of the novel happily coincided with the target.  This year I think there is at least another ten thousand words left to finish the story.  Then I it will be all over. 

Except it won’t.  Then I will feel guilty about all the typo’s and sentences that do not make sense.  My manuscript will lie on my hard drive and taunt me like some malevolent guilty secret from an E.A. Poe story. An aside, I’ve just remembered the story I had been planning to write in this years Nanowrimo when I finished last year.  Must do that one next year.  Once I’ve corrected typo’s and sentences.  Then I’ll be finished.

Except that while correcting the mistakes I will cringe at the shortness of some chapters, and the bloated nature of other.  I will find hanging plotlines waving about that need to be reconnected.  Secondary characters will be sulking that I dropped them so completely that it was unrealistic to the overall plot.  So I will be compelled to rewrite and proof again.  Then when that process is complete.  It will be all over.

Except that despite all I have said about the quality of this novel, I secretly do want that free proof copy sitting on the self like last years one.  Just to have it.  You know.  So I will need to format the manuscript to get it to be compliant with the publishers specification.  And I will need to create cover art, and blurb, which of course will need proofreading.  And this will take a while because it never goes right first time.  But then, really then it will be all over.

Except that I will want real copies to annoy my friends with.  And they will find more errors.  So I will have the perfect excuse to edit for the electronic editions.  Well I have to have a copy on my Kindle. 

Finally, it really will be all over. No more messing around with that cursed book I started back in November. The novel will be put to rest gathering dust, next to the last one.

And then it’s November first once again.

Blogger Labels: novel,words,Last,Except,typo,manuscript,Nanowrimo,Once,nature,Secondary,characters,self,Just,specification,blurb,friends,Kindle,November,chapters,errors,editions,thousand