The Revision Plan

[hrj]

Just for fun, here are the layers I need to cover in the revisions:
1. Labels -- there are still lots of personal and place names I need to come up with, as well as a bunch of specialized vocabulary around the magico-religious system.
2. Continuity -- various plot details got changed during the writing process but I didn't want to get bogged down going back and updating everything at the time.
3. Placeholders -- while my general rule was that I had to write everything, first-to-last, without skipping, there were several places where I needed a descriptive section that was so technically complex that it was really going to mess up my momentum at the time.
4. Texture -- various elements need to be covered/mentioned more consistently or continuously (people who seem to disappear for long periods of time then pop up again, habitual experiences that only get mentioned when plot-relevant). In some cases I may determine the current coverage is ok, but it needs to be reviewed.
5. POV -- I'm trying to do something very specific with how I handle point of view, but occasionally I found myself slipping. This needs to be reviewed very carefully. One aspect of POV is that I made extensive usage of how each character addresses, refers to, and thinks about other characters depending on relationship and emotional state. I think that part is probably pretty solid, but I want to look at it systematically.
6. Description -- unless I'm really keeping a handle on it, I tend to slip into a very dialog-and-movements focused text and let the description slide. I need to make sure that I have sufficient descriptive passages properly distributed.
7. All that other copyediting stuff and anything else I've forgotten.

Comments

Question on #2

[kareina.livejournal.com]

When you are writing and make one of those plot changes that will need to be adjusted elsewhere in the story for continuity later how do you make a note of it at the time? Some sort of colour-coded highlight in the text where the new information first appears? A parenthetical note to yourself in the text at that spot? A note in a different file entirely? Nothing at all, you just hope to remember it later? or...?

Curious because you might have thought of something I haven't, and while I don't write fiction, I do write science stuff, and sometimes one re-does calculations and gets a slightly revised result that may change things that have already been written for a paper in progress, and if you have a better idea than I, I will happily steal it...

[klwilliams.livejournal.com]

I find when I use a placeholder name for characters that I have trouble writing them. Even if I change the name layer, having a name gives me a grounding to the character.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

Good luck with the revisions!

Re: Question on #2

[hrj.livejournal.com]

Since I'm using MS Word for writing, I just use the "comment" function. (Inserts a separate comment tied to a particular block of text. Only displays if you pick "show comments".) I use the same technique in my investigation reports at work if I want to keep track of questions that need to be answered, tentative conclusions that need to be confirmed, etc. It's especially useful there if there's a chance someone else might have to work on the report when I'm not available.

I'm also using comments to note information that may be relevant to eventual test-readers or editors, e.g., where I've deliberately altered a biblical quotation and want to take note of that fact and why.

[hrj.livejournal.com]

I don't seem to have that problem -- although all the major characters got their names early on, so it may be that we aren't so different. (There's another story of mine where the major characters got given temporary placeholder names ... and then grew attached to them.)

What gets complicated is when I have to keep track of the multiple ways a character is going to get addressed or referenced (given name, surname, title) when none of those actual name elements has been decided yet.

Re: Question on #2

[kareina.livejournal.com]

Ah, this is a perfect example of why it is worth asking questions like this, even when I could think of a variety of useful possible answers myself. I have avoided using the comments function because I didn't like the way it offset the text on the page to make room for the comment bar in the right hand margin (though that my not apply to the latest version of Word, I don't recall), I forgot (if I ever noticed) that one could set comments not to show...

Re: Question on #2

[hrj.livejournal.com]

How the comments display depends on which version of Word you're using. The version I have on my Mac puts the comments in a footer section at the bottom of the window. (It pops up when you create or edit a comment and then you have to drag down the division line to make it go away.) The old version I was using at work (before they migrated us all to a new version of Windows) had the bubbles-in-the-margin version. You could toggle between show/don't-show for all mark-up (comments, change tracking, etc.). The new system at work does it a little differently (and I'm blanking on how it displays) but very annoyingly insists on pointing out to you that your document has comments every single time you hit "save". I haven't figured out how to turn it off yet. But in all cases, you can disappear the comments (both from the screen and from the printout) by setting it to "show final version".

I find the comments immensely useful, in general.