I've Finished the First Read-Through of My Novel

I had no idea it would take so long to get through an aural reading of my first draft. I still haven't taken a look at the total word count (I always overestimate those things), but word count doesn't matter. The story is what it is.

First the good: The ending isn't bad. It resolves the characters' stories. I was right to go with a coda; those secondary characters are important to me, and I couldn't just let them fade away without a mention. Of course it's all about the main character in the end, but she got her satisfying ending as well.

The climax of the story came off better than I thought it would. It's a delicate thing, because it's the event that (hypothetical) readers will be wishing for, and thus I couldn't blow it. That type of sequence always stresses me out; I want so badly for it to ring true and be impactful that I often sabotage myself by overthinking it. But it's good. I'm not going to change anything about it.

The bad? Well, I don't want this post to be too long, but there's a lot of bad. I stopped taking notes at a certain point, because there was just too much to cover, so I'll naturally need to do more read-throughs to isolate the areas that need fixing. I do know that the manuscript suffers from a lack of descriptive elements; a lack of "grounding in place". Description is a weak spot for me. I'm always more focused on emotions, and I forget to paint a picture of the scene. I'm pretty confident that'll be an easy fix.

As far as the incidents themselves, I'm not inclined to delete any of them. No, all of them aren't necessarily realistic, but I am writing fiction, after all. Each of them was written deliberately; not to fill space or increase my word count. One thing that my new chronological writing style has accomplished is coming up with multiple ideas for scenes. That said, the Nashville parts do lag. That's a biggie that I did make note of ~ no notes on how to fix it, but just that it needs to be done. My biggest goal is to not be boring.

Now I'm going to take a break from it. I'm exhausted. And frankly, I'm too close to the story right now. Both it and I need time to rest. Let's just say I'm shooting for early spring to have it ready for publication. That gives me three or four months, which may seem like a lot for editing time, but the novel truly needs that much.

I'm trying not to think ahead; I'll need to see how satisfied I am with the finished product before worrying about any next steps. If it's good, I may invest some $$, perhaps in a cover, which I've never done before, and/or marketing. This'll be my last novel, and I'm betting a lot of my reputation on it.  

So, I don't know what I'll blog about in the coming weeks. I wouldn't say I've bored myself talking about this book; it's helped me to work out the story's problems and missteps. But a break is what I need. The manuscript will still be there when it's time for me to come back.