Wordcount Target: 10000, Achieved 7400

That thing that I always tell anyone who asks never to do? Going over and over parts of the first draft again and again trying to get them just right instead of getting on with the rest of the story? That.

In my defence, maybe that rule doesn’t apply quite as strictly when we’re talking about the general subject matter of the opening chapters. As in totally throwing them away and doing something different. So that was what I did today. Prologue gone, new one written (and a much better one, I think). Chapter one survived unscathed, mostly because I couldn’t bring myself to look and just assumed it would still work. Chapter two substantially re-written but from a different viewpoint and incorporating parts of the old prologue. Better but still not great. Chapter three started.

Wordcount target seriously failed, but my therapist tells me I should take a couple of weeks off from having hard-and-fast targets and just write when the mood takes me.  HA HA HAHAHAHAAAAA!!!

What’s done feels as though it’s in much better shape than what came out yesterday, so I try not to let the wordcount bother. What DOES bother me is that the original synopsis for this book had my chief protagonist becoming a hero/leader of the rebellion, whereas the previous book largely failed to establish this and it’s clear from just the opening chapters that the rebellion doesn’t want him and he doesn’t want it. So, er… what was this book about then?

Um?