Okay. After eight months and endless rewrites the book is done. It’s due on my publisher’s desk in two days. I’ll give it one more read. I’ve read the thing—it feels—ten million times. So I change the margins. Change the font. Set it in a binder so I can read it on paper, not a screen. Anything to make it look different, feel different, as if I have not read it before. I even go to my local library so I can read it in a different place. That can sometimes help. Great. I find a corner chair, and after stalling by looking at a fascinating book on display, I open my manuscript, pen in hand. I’ll give it three hours, I tell myself, and since it is Saturday, maybe we’ll go out tonight. Celebrate the book being done.
I start reading. I don’t get past the first page. OMG! It’s not reading well. It doesn’t move. It’s awkward. No flow. It’ll stop any reader dead by paragraph three.
I go home, turn on the computer and start rewriting.
3 thoughts on “It’s done!”
Your post will help my students realize the importance of rewriting. Thank you!
God bless you, Avi.
Ain’t that the way it goes?! And there’s always that “It’s me!” aspect that’s ready to destroy any confidence which may remain.
Thanks for your generous sharing!
Gillian
Writing is hard but writers endure.
Avi