Follow up to January 27th post.

Seventeen days ago, I was discouraged over MORE revisions required to make my timeline work.  More discouraged and overwhelmed than I'd been for a long time.  Just now, I finished those revisions.  

I have 69,000 words and 244 consecutive revised pages.  No gaps.  No missing scenes.  No major flaws (that I know of right now).  

According to my outline, I now have five scenes left to write.  One, two, three, four, five.  When I finish those five, I will FINALLY be done with this draft, (which I think is fair to call the fourth draft by now).   

Thanks, everyone, for the supportive comments you left seventeen days ago.  Back then, I didn't feel like I'd ever dig myself out of this hole.  But I did it!  And now I'm going to tackle my last five scenes.  Fingers crossed that nothing crazy comes up this time!

First lines

got an idea from to post first lines of a work and show how it changed from the current version. I couldn't even remember my original first line, and I assumed I'd deleted that draft. Not so! Hooray!

*The original first line for THE FAKE MCCOY written September 9, 2006:

I saw a movie once where this guy finds out his mom is having an affair with one of his best friends. It’s great comic fun. He gets pissed off and makes such an ass of himself that the viewers all root for the unlikely couple instead.

It was a lot funnier in the movie than it was in my hallway.

*****

*The current first line for THE FAKE MCCOY written June 2007:

Scratchy sheets were twisted around my legs, a lumpy pillow was tucked under my head, and some damned annoying mattress spring poked into my side. Yeah, I was definitely at home in the bed where I wake up every day. The screwed up part is I had no clue how I’d gotten there.

I kind of think the first one is more attention-grabbing, but I dropped that storyline whichs means it doesn't fit anymore. This was fun though, seeing how it changed. :-)

I guess the thing I try to do with my opening lines is get readers right into the character's voice. In some ways, it is about what is being said, but more important to me is how it's said. (And now, having said that, my original version uses the words "unlikely couple." I now know that Seth wouldn't have phrased it that way.)

2008 Goals revisited.

From a December 2007 entry: 1. Finish THE FAKE MCCOY. *Not done yet. Still working on it.

2. Get THE FAKE MCCOY out of here! *Ditto above.

3. Enter a literary contest. *I have my submission printed and ready to go! I just need to head to the post office today to mail it.

4. Attend a writers' conference. *I'm paid and registered. I have my submissions for consultations and panels printed and ready to for that post office trip I just mentioned.

5. Start writing something new. *Nope, not ready to do this. But I'm narrowing down ideas in my head. When I'm not thinking about Seth, I mean.

6. Sing karaoke at a bar. *I don't even know if I've been to a bar where karaoke is sung this year. I still plan to do this though. I still have nearly eleven months left to accomplish this one. I have to say, it seems to get scarier the longer I put it off.

Hooray! 2008 is already looking much better than 2007 ever was!

Style manuals.

The writer's reference book I have on-hand here is the one I used in high school: The Holt Handbook - 4th Edition. It isn't the most complete or up-to-date thing around. I've decided I need to get a new one and start following it. I have a tendency to ask others for grammar help or try to look online for my answers. I think I'm combining styles. I need to become more consistent!

Any opinions on what would be the best style to choose? The Chicago Manual of Style? Something else? Is there one being used most frequently in YA publishing?

Teach me about em dashes!

I use the em dash in place of parenthesis in my fiction. I used to use it with a space on either side like so: Then Seth's band — The Real McCoys — is offered an amazing opportunity to tour as an opening act. At some point, I was told not to use spaces, so I started doing it like this: Then Seth's band—The Real McCoys—is offered an amazing opportunity to tour as an opening act.

Now someone else has suggested that I should include the spaces. Is it all a matter of opinion? Wikipedia is of little help (and I know I shouldn't trust Wikipedia all the time anyway) because it pretty much says in there that either way is acceptable in certain situations.

How do you use it?