The Three Rs: Revise, Revise, Revise

Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/tnarik/366393127/. Creative Commons

A couple weeks ago, Susan Swan, my mentor at Humber, suggested a few changes to the first few chapters of my novel. Yesterday, I popped my finished revisions in the mail, satisfied that the story was stronger. Here’s an overview of the changes I made:

A Truckload of Characters

Have you ever moved to a small community, where everyone seemed to know who you were right away, but you were struggling to keep names straight? That’s what my novel was like. A truckload of characters. I thought I’d be able to orient the reader to the characters. Susan had a better suggestion – only keep the characters I need to tell the story.

Demoting Lena

Earlier this month, I wrote a post about trying to get Lena’s voice right. My main character, Darby, discovers several letters that Lena wrote to Darby’s mom some twenty-five years earlier. These letters shed light on the murder of Bea, Lena’s sister-in-law and Darby’s mentor.

Susan suggested that I tighten the relationship between Darby and Bea by making Bea Darby’s aunt. She also suggested that the letters should be written by Bea, so we get Bea’s point of view.

So last week I demoted Lena to a minor character, and gave Bea a voice.

Writing as a Journey

This isn’t my first revision, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. I have pages and pages of hand-written material that will never make it into the novel. But writing is about exploring, and sometimes you have to go in the wrong direction to figure out which way you really want to travel.

Right now, I’m satisfied that I’m heading in the right direction.

A Guide During the Journey?

If I wasn’t working with Susan, I probably would have floundered for quite a while before I figured out this latest set of changes. Susan is an experienced writer, editor, and teacher and I trust her opinion.

I don’t know if I would have let too many other people read the complete early drafts, though. Only two other people come to mind.

I’d like to hear from other writers about who their early readers are. Do you have one or two trusted readers, a great writing group, or do you fly solo on the early drafts?