What I'd do in that situation is work on seeing the structure before poking at it any more.
(Well, actually, what I'd do is put my head in a bucket and sing "La, la, you can't make me open that directory", this is what I'm doing with Lifelode after all. But.)
It seems to me that nearly all the problems you've mentioned with this book come from you not having the structure in your head. Not the whole book, the structure. And you've revised it so much now that just the stratigraphic layers have to be confusing.
There are various ways of looking at structure which seem to work for other people, but what I'd do in this situation is to leave it alone for as long as possible to forget as much of it as possible (that means you get at least today off) and then thinking about nothing but the structure, look at the structure from on top, possibly making a diagram, how you want it, pacing of revelation (this is what I'd absolutely be bound to screw up in this sort of revision) pacing (and order) of events, and shape of story.
I'd also walk somewhere and reduce the story to the simplest line -- "what's essential, what is this about" -- so it's not "this is part of a huge ball of wool" ("a chunk of the Trojan cycle") but "this is these strands, which interweave thusly" ("Sing Goddess of the wrath of Achilles, Peleus's son") and see if that helped -- I mean it has to be doing a huge amount of carry-on from the first two books, and a chunk of set-up for Summerdown but just looking at what it is itself.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
momijizukamori
no subject
Date: 2006-10-03 12:06 pm (UTC)(Well, actually, what I'd do is put my head in a bucket and sing "La, la, you can't make me open that directory", this is what I'm doing with Lifelode after all. But.)
It seems to me that nearly all the problems you've mentioned with this book come from you not having the structure in your head. Not the whole book, the structure. And you've revised it so much now that just the stratigraphic layers have to be confusing.
There are various ways of looking at structure which seem to work for other people, but what I'd do in this situation is to leave it alone for as long as possible to forget as much of it as possible (that means you get at least today off) and then thinking about nothing but the structure, look at the structure from on top, possibly making a diagram, how you want it, pacing of revelation (this is what I'd absolutely be bound to screw up in this sort of revision) pacing (and order) of events, and shape of story.
I'd also walk somewhere and reduce the story to the simplest line -- "what's essential, what is this about" -- so it's not "this is part of a huge ball of wool" ("a chunk of the Trojan cycle") but "this is these strands, which interweave thusly" ("Sing Goddess of the wrath of Achilles, Peleus's son") and see if that helped -- I mean it has to be doing a huge amount of carry-on from the first two books, and a chunk of set-up for Summerdown but just looking at what it is itself.
Not a quest is very hard. Cool, but challenging.