Hi, so I'm working on a trilogy in which I have completed the first two books. As I was working on the third, I got burned out and decided to take a break from writing it. That was four months ago and I still haven't been able to bring myself to start writing it again, but that's another story. I decided I would go back through the first two and edit them (again) with the new things I learned about dialog structure and the suggestions I've gotten on YWS. That's been going fine and making small sentence changes or adding in an action here and there has been fine. But when I get to a chapter that, for example, people suggested should be longer, I have an extremely difficult time writing anything new. I feel like I'm not in the same place or mindset as I was back when I wrote that chapter, in which case, I don't feel like I'm in the characters head at that point, either, because they've grown and changed a bit through-out the story. I'm afraid that it won't sound like something the character would say or that it will come through in my writing that my heart isn't in it.
Talking to my dad, who is the main/one of the only people who reads my stuff said that I should just go through and correct grammar and sentence structure without trying to change or add anything new. He agrees that I'm not in the same place as I was when I wrote it because that was over a year ago. He also mentioned that he thinks it comes out of my head a certain way the first time I write it so if I tried to change it now it wouldn't sound as good. In some ways I feel like a few chapters that I've written could be improved upon, but in another way I feel like I've missed my chance to edit/change/fix them. It almost feels like I'm trying to edit someone else's book. Does that make any sense? Do you have any advice for me? I've "edited" it quite a few times but not as thoroughly as I should have and I never bothered to "change" anything before. But I'm trying to polish it now and I'm hoping this is the last or second to last revision I will do. Hopefully this doesn't sound really weird or like I'm talking in circles, I tend to do that.
Anyway, any help/opinions/suggestions are appreciated. Thanks!
-Lefty
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