Re-Writing

The weather is not nice today - it is warm and damp. Go out for a walk and unless you stroll around at the slowest pace possible, you come home damp and sweaty. What we need is a breeze and sunshine and according to the local forecast, we're not going to get it, so I may as well resign myself to a day for working on the novel.

At the moment I have two versions of it. One is slightly longer than the other, but I don't know which is the "better" version. Ever been in this situation? Careless of me, I know. I should be more careful in saving and labelling my work. It means I will have to run  through the two versions side by side to check for changes and or differences.

This time I'm going through to improve the writing. This may sound silly, but an agent told me some time ago now that he liked the story, the setting, the period but was less enamoured with my writing, Not that it was bad - it was confident and clear, but it just didn't make him love it. Well, it has taken me a long time, but now I can finally see what he was getting at. I can see where I can snap two sentences down into one, and make it more graceful at the same time. It takes a while (or it has with me!) before this critical faculty develops, but I'm happy to say I'm there at last. It's a re-writing task in a way. Not changing the storyline, but maybe tweaking it a little for more impact, more conflict, more clarity.

So, I'd better get on with it. Wish me luck!