Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Re-Write Nightmare

Here I am sitting down and realizing that three separate stories can be combined into the same one. Having received two form rejections in a week's time I guess it's time to get to a nitty gritty rewrite. I haven't been sure where to take the whole REBEL story and even though this is tantamount to chucking the baby out with the bathwater I have to accept the fact there are three siblings I introduced. The Healer, The Oracle, and the Queen.And in GLADIATOR it was all about sex, sex, sex and the world healing. When I tried to write REBEL I started having problems with the plot and realized, 39 pages in that it's probably part of the GLADIATOR story as is the Queen's tale. So God help me a full scale rewrite of the concept is in order.

I will post excerpts as they go through their many forms. But one thing is for certain. If GLADIATOR in it's final form doesn't get picked up I may consider self-publishing again just because I want to get the story out there. If the houses with my novella right now like what they have I hope they will like the version I have penned this time around.

Two houses down. Four to go.

I haven't been particularly good at finishing a series but hopefully this book reads more like an epic as opposed to a series. Not that series are bad. It's just that I'm not particularly good at writing them. I could say, I give up. I quit. In fact with bad weather coming my way I'm tempted to say just that, rejection is not fun.

But my screenwriting instructor once said, if one person said it you can dismiss it. If two mention it you should probably take a look at it. I think there's something to be said for that and my Christmas shopping list just gave me an idea for the story, rather something I saw at Big Lots in the arts and crafts scrapbooking section did.

Here are the men of my story:

The GLADIATOR:


THE ORACLE:

The women of my story-


THE HEALER-


THE REBEL-

Haven't gotten a picture of the Queen but think Isabelle Adjani. Beautiful woman . Looks fragile but would have to be tough enough to be a power hungry, loveless queen.

LOL just enjoy the pics and when the story comes along I'll share some bits with you.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Well said, Amy. Although I will agree with your instructor to a point, as long as the people saying the same thing are there to help you better your writing. *smile*

I've had to do rewrites before and they aren't fun. It took 5x's before I finally got the third chapter the way it needed to be. However, later on I created a set of -what I call- 'the Book Series'. They are the earliest years of a main character and her mate. The first two chapters of that single story ended up in 'the Book Series' and the third chapter -rewritten 5x's, lol- became the first. *laugh* Sometimes rewrites are awesome and fun other times they feel worse then plucking your fingernails out one by one. *grin*

Good luck, I'm rooting for you.

Unknown said...

Thank you for your kind words.

Heather Haven said...

Amy, I just finished taking a complete novel, over 85K, from past tense to present tense. It was the most gawd-awful rewrite I have ever done. The story is the better for it, so no regrets...but still. I am a mere shell of my former self. Writing is rewriting.

Unknown said...

Sometimes yes sometimes no. Edits are loathsome. But rewrite sometimes yields a more 1st draft feel than the first draft does for me. I don't always rewrite but I do always edit. Thank you for your insight :)