Now rewriting is something I don’t enjoy.  In fact, it’s a real grind, but if you are coming up with a fresh character to replace your old insipid MC, you’ve got to write with enthusiasm or your fresh character will only get more stale as you write.

My solution?  I’m going back to my MM II roots and re-outline the novel.  I really thought with the plot pretty much finished, that I could just write the new character in, but I don’t feel good about it.

So I’m in the process of outlining the novel as if it were new.  A lot of the plot will remain the same, but I need some additional subplots and that will come with the outlining process.  I started by defining the ‘magic’ in my world, defining the effects of motes.  That still needs work, but I’ve already gotten some insights as to how I can pump up my story.

For subplots, one that I hinted about in the first draft and in the work that I have done to date will be moved up and strengthened so the reader finds out about it much sooner.  I need that to hinge the plot that ended up in two distinct parts in the draft.  This will allow a better flow.

My next task will involve character arcs for the main characters.  In the original, the arcs were discovered as I wrote and they weren’t strong enough to get a reader into them.

Then I will recraft the treatment, which is, basically, a long synopsis with the intent of embedding the character arcs, story arcs and ramping up the interest to get the reader more into the story.  As its written now readers are too detached and I do believe that’s the major problem.

I planned on finishing this latest draft by the end of September.  Now, I might not get it done until the end of October.  But we work to improve…

The other three participants are discovery writers, known in the group as pantsers as in seat-of-the-pants.  It was a lot of fun to see the novel ideas come to life as we proceeded.  We have a contemporary fantasy, a science fiction novel, and two YA fantasies.  Mine was one of the YA fantasies… more of an epic or quest fantasy.

Now this novel is better planned out than the novel I’ve been working on.  As much as I would like to continue on with this, I need to get my other one taken care of.  I think I may use this process and rewrite it. I was 40,000 words into the novel when I recast it as a YA work and I need to write it a bit differently so I’m going to do a re-draft rather than a rewrite.  A re-draft is taking the same plot and starting the writing all over.

Now I have to recast my writing goals because I do need to get this done.  My Panix novel didn’t get much traction as I submitted queries to agents.  I may set that aside and work on a new query letter.

So many decisions.  So many variables.  Writing is so much fun.

Found out yesterday that I snagged another Honorable Mention in the L.Ron Hubbard Writers of the Future contest.  That makes 3 HMs in 5 entries.

The writer’s group that I use to help me hone my WotF entries had six honorable mentions and two finalists for the Q02, 2010 contest.  There is a contest every quarter.

I’ve found that the judges like longer stories with well defined story arcs.  One of the finalists in our group submitted a Science Fiction story.  I do believe they gravitate to SF.

There are perhaps as many as 2,000 entries per quarter and that has been rising.  There are about 100 HMs and maybe 8 semi-finalists and 8 finalists.  There are three winners from the finalist categories.

Of course getting HM’s are great, but as a writer you want to win.  Perhaps next quarter…

What have we gone through?  We’ve worked on novel concepts with 20 paragraph summaries.  We’ve been working on the setting, doing a bit of worldbuilding and are now beginning to integrate the two.

It’s amazing what you find out about your novel project when you proceed to piecemeal your way to some kind of an outline.  The best part are the comments.  Not only are the suggestions and criticisms worthwhile, but as you read them, your creativity gets going and you end up with more ideas than you thought possible.  At least that’s how it works with me.

Halfway through means there are three more weeks to go.  More setting work and more work with the secondary characters.  We’ll also work on scene progression leading to an outline, if the participants choose to get that detailed.

We have had some folks drop out.  The workshop can be a bit intense and if you don’t have the time, it can become a burden.  Nevertheless, we press on!

When I wrote my Bellian novel, I used the same approach.  Draw a map.  Draw a journey.  Fill in the blanks with lots of action, angst and twists and turns.  I’ll do this one as well, but I will need to draw the characters more finely for the female YA audience and put in more emotion.

Anyway, this workshop is a combination of novel outlining/planning and world building.  The two are interleaved.  Last year LH did Midsummer Madness, novel outlining using a modified snowflake method, and Bloody August, a world building exercise.  I thought that you had to do one before you did the other, but I didn’t know which to do first.  So I combined them so you do both while you plan.

We’ll see how it goes.  If you want a copy of the program, but aren’t a LH member, send me an email or comment below and I’ll get one to you.  We started today and will end six weeks from now.  For those who wish to participate in NaNoWriMo, this is a great way to get something planned so you can do more writing and less thinking during November.  Think of it as a stress reducer.

I’ll post a few things as we go.

I talked to my married daughter who is a voracious reader.  She said that YA is hot and female main characters draw in the full range of female readers from YA on up.  My wife reads it and she’s… well let’s say she’s older than my daughter.

So, I’ve recast Bellian into a YA novel, but he needs to stay male.  I’m thinking about my motes and meddles novel.  Its tone is more appropriate, but it requires quite a bit of gender bending.  So my approach will be to rewrite motes and meddles into a female MC as a YA.  Luckily I’m only into it 30,000 words and I can still make the plot work with a young heroine.

My writing style just doesn’t come out dense enough for exclusively adults.  I write with a bit more simplicity and my plotting is somewhat straightforward.  So I’ll give it a try and see what happens.

I’m going to continue to query Panix to the rest of the agents on my list, but my next novel project will be Motes & Meddles.  I put together a sample cover.

I’ve had to write a couple of stories to decide what to sent to WotF.  My original was a fantasy and I chopped and channeled it after the critiques came in from Hatrack’s WotF writing group.  I wrote a SF story, but my characters weren’t vivid enough for the one person who’s seen it.  Perhaps I can use that next quarter with less French food (even though it’s SF, the major action takes place in southern France on old Earth.)

Flashing at Liberty Hall continues.  I won last week over seven stories.  I generally produce a flash with a complete story arc and that sometimes helps.  After watching the Giants beat the Cinn Reds, a plot came to me and I wrote a flash.  I posted it at Liberty Hall, but I don’t know if I’ll get any crits.

I sometimes wonder about continuing to write short stories and concentrate on my novels, but I still need to write a steady stream of words and deal with better character development.

I took the time to review the Meddle novel.  It still had first person artifacts littered throughout.  Now those are gone and some of my writing has smoothed out.  I look at my current WIP as the beginning of the novel.  There is an event that changes the main character’s dynamic with his environment.  That point is at about where I left off.  Now I have to replot to increase the length and make the novel exciting.  It ends up being a bit of a thriller as do all four of my novels in process.

I sent another query (snail mail) out to a very good agent.  I have to get going and finish sending out the email queries by the end of the weekend and the mail queries the week after that.

With Panix in query and Meddle tucked away for a bit, my novel writing will be world building and plot development for the rest of June for my thriller novel.  My brother took a look at my initial treatment and he thought my little group of intrepid shadow CIA operatives were a cross between Mission Impossible and A-Team.  I’ve got to develop a better mission for the organization, but action is action and that is the purpose behind this novel.  I unwittingly named the MC Ethan.  That was Tom Cruise’s name in the Mission Impossible movies.  That fact must have been stuck somewhere in my cranium.

I’ve got about five short story submissions out and will add another five to those by the end of the month.  I’ve got some rewriting to do.  I went back through my WIP and there is some stuff to send out.  Unfortunately, my short story style is a bit too light and breezy for most markets.

I pulled out Motes & Meddles  and did a quick read through, changing a few POV errors and toning up the grammar.  I still have to sketch out the novel.  I think I’ve written the set-up.  I’ve got to get the character with more skin in the game and I think I’ve found out how to do it.  I only need to write twice again what I’ve written to get the length up.  I do think the concept is more marketable… sort of an contemporary fantasy-thriller.