Blood on the Floor

I'm nearly 70,000 words into the writing of Maestra (formerly Maestri) and have come to the realization that I am very guilty of over-writing this thing. Holy crap, this MS is full of bloat. I briefly considered deleting a major portion of Part 2 and starting over but I'm convinced that there is enough salvageable material to justify leaving it and re-working it in the second draft.

My number one enemy at this stage is exposition. Sure, I have a lot of information that needs to come out but I am doing it incredibly poorly in parts. It's clunky and just not clicking. What's really frustrating is that some of those scenes transition into great sequences so it's going to be a surgical strike when I tear this script limb from limb in the next pass.

It's probably reasonable to say that most authors suffer these frustrations. It's all part of the career. I had minor issues like this in Morbid Fascinations of David Bennett but not nearly of the scale that I experienced in the middle of Maestra. By the time I hit 70,000 words I should have been well on my way to wrapping up part 2 and going into the home stretch of part 3, but I don't even see the light at the end of the tunnel from where my story is at. I think in draft 2 a character may end up dying just to speed things along.

Hopefully writing draft 2 of this doesn't follow my experience with writing MFODB in that I actually increased the word count of that book by 15,000 on the second draft.

I enjoy editing when I hit that stage but on this book it really is going to feel like gutting my book. I can't see myself putting out a 180,000 word novel at this point in my career. It just wouldn't work. So I'm going to have to slice and dice this storyline down into something that keeps the pace moving and doesn't feel like some sort of grand egotistical escapade. Things are going to get bloody.

I apologize for not posting more often, lately, but life has been a bit hectic. I've been booking signings and trying to be a responsible husband and daddy while juggling my writing. I hope you all are enjoying the last weeks of winter. Will update again soon.

Morbid Fascinations of David Bennett, now on sale for 99 cents on ebook through February 6th, or FREE on Kindle Unlimited! https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1701845431