Finished

I’m finished. Well, I’m not. But I am. I have a 70,000 word novel which starts at the beginning and finishes at the end, with no holes. I still have to read through it all for continuity errors, but I should leave it alone for a week before I do that. It’s hard to leave it alone. I miss Matt and Sarah already. Writing their dialogue has been the most fun. Sarah is the best heroine I’ve ever created. She’s a tough act to follow. I’ll try my best with my next heroine, Kasia, but she’s a slow bloomer. We find out more cool stuff about her as the book goes on. Whereas Sarah came out guns blazing and I love her for it.

With my previous work, I’ve always written and rewritten constantly, but I’ve tried to be more disciplined with this one. There will be a bit of fixing, but I’m wary of changing too much at this point because it could be fiddling without improving, given I was strict with points of view and sparse with descriptions and narration anyway. I’ve spell-checked (thank you Word for picking up my automated British English and changing it to American) and changed the couple of character names and details with Find and Replace. I decided to give Matt a promotion and make him a couple of years older than I’d first intended. Now I have to leave it. Really. Seriously, stop thinking about it! It’s hard!

Spelling and grammar checker pointed out to me that I started dialogue with the word ‘so’ way too many times. It’s good to know going forward. I imagine the characters actually said it, but I don’t need to write each one.

I do have to complete the synopsis, which I find much harder to write than the actual prose. I think I should write it in present simple? ‘Matt kisses Sarah in the hotel gym’ – that sort of thing. But it doesn’t come naturally to me. I always write third person past tense. But the synopsis is a document with a practical purpose, rather than something to be read with enjoyment. At least I hope that’s how it’s viewed by the editors (or the slush pile interns) who read it.

If I need something more to do to keep my mind off Matt and Sarah, I can make a proper start on Dex and Kasia. It’s taking shape in my mind, so I should get writing. But phew! 70,000 words of disciplined plotting and fun winding up the emotional/sexual tension. And two years of my life off and on. Done.