Changing direction

Well, my Draft in 30 Days blogged about earlier has hit a snag. But, at least it's a nice snag. That's because whilst I was at the beginning of starting with Karen Weisner's method an e-mail dropped into my in box. It was from the editors at Mills and Boon. I had submitted the first three chapters and a synopsis for a sheikh novel way back in August last year. True it took them some time but they have said that they like the basic idea, think it's fresh and intriguing but they had a few problems with it. If I wanted to work on the problems and re-submit they'd be happy to have a look. Would I? Ohmigod yes I would!

Looking at it critically and taking their comments on board I have only kept the first chapter and had to ditch the other two altogether. Before now I have found that incredibly hard to do, but this time, with the benefit of their comments I found it easy. After all, they know their stuff and if that's what they want I must try and meet it. The rewrite is going slowly but surely. Slowly because I am now being more critical of myself. This morning for example, I looked with a real eagle eye at what I had produced yesterday. I'd gone and done exactly what they had asked me not to do in the feedback - basically, I had moved the relationship on too quickly. As an individual who likes to complete a task as soon as, I realised that I sometimes do this for my characters. But, Mills and Boon readers like the suspense of not knowing how the relationship is going to go. They want it to twist and turn and meander and for their heroes and heroines to really work at it. So, again, I ditched large amounts of what I'd done and wrote the scene again. I think it works much better this time and realise that culling sometimes has to be done. I look on it now not so much as a waste of time but as a means of writing myself into a scene, testing out my characters. Let's hope it does the trick. Oh, and that photograph, it's of my teeny, weeny summerhouse which I hope, when I get a minute to kit out with a table and chair so that I can write in there in the warm summer months..... if they ever arrive that is!