Steady progress on the book.

I've been making steady progress on the book. Small improvements as I write the second draft.

It's more like chipping away at a block of granite. I can see how much still needs to be done.

The question is, how much am I willing to do? How much improvement can I make?

I'll probably finish this second draft in the 12 day period I gave myself. Then I'll take a 5 day period to write the last chapter. Then, I think, I'll probably read the whole thing aloud to myself and see how it sounds. (Reading aloud seems to catch all kinds of awkward phrasing.) Maybe another 5 day spurt.

So, pretty much the rest of the month.

Then I'll print up a few hard copies and try to get some other people to critique.

My request of them will be to make as many changes, cuts, suggestions, as possible. So that I'll have something solid to bounce off of in the third draft of the book.

Then?

We'll see. If it still isn't good enough, I may have to step back and give it a little time and then come back again and see if it can't be improved.



Later: I'm bogging down. I'm about 2/3rds of the way with 4 days left. I took a day off in the middle to do errands.

There is some pretty lame dialogue that I can't seem to fix. So I'm doing my best and moving on. The book kind of veers in a strange direction about halfway through, and I'm not sure it works, but again -- I've traveled too far down that plot to turn back. I can either try to make the silliness less silly or more, but I don't think I can leave it alone.

Some things I'll just have to save for the final draft.

I'm trying to make this good enough that I won't feel like I've presumed on my critiquers better natures.