Tag Archives: plot holes

Filling in Plot Holes

Posted on by

Ten pages of editing a day ended up being a bit much.  After three days of editing, I have 16 pages done.  Since the manuscript is already pretty clean, I don’t mind going a bit slower than expected.  Five pages of editing a day is great.  Plus, I’m pretty sure I’ll do much more this weekend.  I’ll be up in a family cabin in the mountains with no internet access for a few days.  It’ll be perfect.

It’s strange finding plot holes in your own work.  In some instances, I started something early on in the book and lost track of it as I wrote.  Other times, I didn’t plan on a certain plot turn and now realize the start of the book doesn’t line up with the end of the book.  I’ve come up with a good method of tracking all of them.   This is one of the main reasons I do at least three edits before letting anyone read my work.  By the time I’m done with the second edit, grammar and spelling is ususally fine.  It’s the plot holes you have to worry about.  I don’t want my first readers to be confused.

Time to go read.  The Handmaid’s Tale is quite interesting.

With Love,
Richard

Getting Down to Editing

Posted on by

I just finished editing the first two chapters of the book (out of 47).  I’ve decided to edit on the computer.  I could say it’s because I want to be environmentally conscious…but that would be a lie.  I prefer editing on the computer because I can make all the changes I need to instantly without the chance of forgetting.  I go straight through the writing and change what is needed.  At the same time, I have another Word document open tracking all of the plot holes and whatnot that I need to keep an eye on.

I’ve heard plenty of times that you are supposed to ready through the entirety of the novel one time without changing a thing.  I have to cry bullshit on that one.  I cannot read through, see all the small mistakes, and not do something about them.  I’m really enjoying editing right now.  Of my four novels, this one seems to have the fewest mistakes.  Considering how quickly I wrote it, I expected the exact opposite.  My goal for this editing job is to edit about ten pages a day.  With about 110 pages in Word, I should get a new draft done every eleven days or so.

With Love,
Richard