Words and Coffee

The devil is in the nostrils. Art by Cliff Rickard

Knowing what I know now, I’ll be happy to blow out a disjointed, gangly mongrel of a first draft in the future if only to clear my mental sinuses. I mean, if that’s what it takes to get a tighter second draft that I might actually enjoy reading, then sign me up.

Lemme ‘splain:

The words are coming on the second draft of my first novel, Shadow of the Black City, and they’re not all bad. I’m almost to the quarter mile post on a mile-long track (I’ve got a new writing progress bar on this blog that motivates me even more to see it fill up). I’ve more or less discarded the first draft without even finishing reading it and am rewriting the second draft. This time around, I’ve done more planning and have a better idea of how I want the story to go.

If I had known it would be that way from the start I don’t think I would have forged ahead. The one piece of advice I read on blogs and in books was to write. Period. Get the first draft out and work from there. It turned out to be very true, but not in the way I thought. As I wrote my first draft, I thought I’d have this ugly duckling that would need lots of TLC and nurturing. Instead I got an unlikeable creature that I smothered and buried in a dark corner of the yard.

Once I stopped rationalizing why I should love my first draft, I began thinking about the story in earnest. I really wanted my story to be pretty good from the get go, but my vanity, pride, desire to not shame my family, whatever it is, dictated that I own up to the tripe I created and learn from it so that I didn’t recreate it the second time around. Now, I’m using first draft more of a means of determining what I didn’t want in the story, how I didn’t want the story structured and how I didn’t want to the characters to act.

Here’s a bit:

Men and women lay everywhere — as if an army of ancients had stood against the Djinn and, seeing their doom, laid down and died. The Bedu mages had drawn their energy from the lives of their own soldiers to send the spirits of air and fire back beneath the Jashem. They burned through lives yet unspent, aging soldiers where they stood. They bled the land as well, bleaching sand, stone and dust, leaving only dried, brittle skeletons of grass and plants and shrubs and trees — as if Hazriyah herself salted the earth, forever damning the valley to desolation.

Lords River Falls not to be confused with my short story, The River Lords

Earlier today, I posted another snippet from The River Lords, a short story I’ve been working on for several weeks. The metamorphosis of this story has been fascinating–and educational. About a week ago I thought I had a draft I was ready to submit for publication, but something nagged at me. I wasn’t all that pleased with the ending and I wasn’t sure that the ending made sense. I felt this way mostly because I had been immersed in all the changes without taking time in between each version and had become too close to the story. I had my wife and a friend with editing experience take a look. Turns out, it wasn’t as bad as I had feared, but there were things that could be done — like hacking off 2000 words from the beginning. All previous River Lords excerpts that I’ve posted on this blog are no longer in the story.

This story has gone from 10k words to under 5k to under 3k — all for the better. The story is more interesting, doesn’t try to explain everything, and has a cohesive flavor. I feel like editing and revising this short story has given me some valuable insights as I prepare to edit and revise the first draft of Shadow of the Black City. The things I take away from this experience are:

1. There is no such thing as writing too much, so long as you are willing to discard it.
2. You can chop way more from your story than you think and still have it make sense.
3. It’s always good to get a third party or twelve to look at your work just to make sure you are writing what you think you are writing.
4. If you think you are starting your short story close to the end of the story, look again, you probably aren’t.

To some who read this post, these insights may be nothing new, but for fairly new writers like me, maybe it will be of use. I’m a writer who, even though I read as much as I can on the process and the craft, am doomed to find out many things for myself, the hard way. But also the fun way–through writing.

I’ve been trimming The River Lords yet again, beginning the story still closer to the end. I’m liking what I’m seeing.

Back on the boat, I coaxed dried grass and twigs to fire in a bronze pan that had survived the Yan Gorge. I spitted the rabbits and placed them over the flames, turning them every so often. I collected the leavings in a shallow pan for broth.

When I offered the entrails to Krhaw Nohk, she hopped backwards and screeched in obvious disgust. I threw the innards into the water; the surface churned with feasting bloodfish. Krhaw Nohk seemed not to notice, so transfixed was her gaze on the cooking rabbits. Apparently roasted meat appealed more to the bird than cold guts.

Krhaw Nohk stepped from foot to foot in anticipation of the meat and broth I set before her. She glanced at me and then began to eat, tearing at the meat with her beak. I wolfed down bites too hot to enjoy. We ate in silence as the evening settled humid and heavy on the marshes.

Mr. Bransford’s contest and all the entries can be seen here.

Here’s my entry:

I rode from the ruins of Wat Rahm on a collection of flotsam amid the swift waters of the flooded Yan River. The corpses of my brothers and sisters, the Jao Naam, bobbed and swirled past with a languor not of the waking world. Amchaara, radiant and horrible, had driven her spectral host like a battering ram, breaking our sluices and weirs and dams. Her wrath had loosed the river—and the magic therein.

Enjoy!

I finished a second revision (rewrite is more accurate) of The River Lords last night. I’m pleased with the effort. I went from 10k+ to under half that at 4848 words. I’ll give it the once over to cut a little more fat and tighten up story elements. After that, I’ll begin to submit it. We’ll see how it goes.

This story has been a great exercise for me for three reasons:

1. I had to home in on the crux of the first draft and trim away much of it;
2. I changed the whole flavor of the story, discarding the original arc; and
3. I tend towards wordiness, so I focused on writing lean and truthful.

It’s fun to see the fruits of this exercise. Whether it gets accepted or not is another story. At the very least, I’m a better writer for it.

Once the final revisions are done, I’ll probably do a podcast of it just for fun. I’ll post it here.