Just waiting to be found.

Apparently, this new chapter was just waiting to be discovered by me.

It's been three years since I started Faerylander (which started off as Nearly Human).  Each time I finished a draft, I thought it was better but still missing something.  I would go on to other things.  I started to learn that I could write a book that didn't have so many intrinsic problems -- but I wasn't willing to give up on this book.

I think what it was missing was this chapter I've just written which ties everything together, gets the story started, makes stronger connections between characters and behavior.

Not to get all mystical, but it was like my subconscious was telling me I wasn't done.  Now it is finally giving me the go-ahead, contingent on a nice clean edit.

This rewrite isn't going to take as long as I thought.  The new material plugged right into the version of the book I wrote before the last one.  I was always been kind of 50/50 on the two versions, and this sort of decides it.

This version is more streamlined, with some chapters cut out of the middle, and/or combined.  It has a more serious, no-nonsense tone. 

The main change is that I am turning all the Cobb chapters to first person, and since these are about 65% of the book, that is a real chore.  That is the thing that will probably need the most editing.  It seems like no matter how many times I go over it, I still find the occasional "he" instead of "I": "him" instead of "me."

My sense of this book -- which is muddy, I'm really having a hard time getting a gauge on it -- is that it denser than my other books, and more complicated.

I'm not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing.

But I do know -- or hope -- is that with this version I finally have a book that is really worth reading.