December 4, 2009 Marybeth

Ever run into a problem with your manuscript before? guatemala_sink_hole

Yeah I super did yesterday…And I’m talking like a MAJOR plot hole!!! Like a plot hole the size of the freaking my Great Aunt Bertha’s belly button….ok so I totally don’t have a Great Aunt Bertha, but you so pictured how big my gaping hole was didn’t you!

Well anyways my day had already gone rogue when my dear wonderful fantastic perfect friend Mindy followed through with my super awesome fantastic Mission.

The Mission -Should she choose to accept – Read the remainder of my manuscript and tell me any and all questions she had left so I could ensure they were answered before I ended the book.

Well being the super, awesome, fantastic friend that she is, she accepted! I LOVE YOU MINDY! I got my email back from her and read through her questions. The first couple made me giddy. I was all like, “I can’t wait till you see how I plan to answer that one!” and “Oh my word are you in for a surprise with that this one!” It was magical I tell you!

Then I came to the next one and the world stopped. My five part harmony choir halted their voices and I could hear them mutter in my head, “Dang girl, your screwed.” and “How could you miss that!” and “That’s crappy.” Apparently my choir isn’t very sympathetic. (Memo to me: Find a new happy choir to celebrate with!) Then the fuzzy, fury, adorable animals dancing in my field of happiness stopped bouncing around and stared at me like I was the biggest idiot they’d ever seen … and can you believe those little rodents ran away!?!? The gall of that future road kill! And to top it off my white dress of perfection, you know the one all girl authors made of awesomeness wear when they write a perfectly awesome book, fell off my body into little shreds as though I wasn’t worthy of it’s covering. It was a crappy dress anyway. Didn’t even enhance my best features…

So I cried a little, pulled out like half my hair, ate a whole box full of cookies and three boxes of mac and cheese then sat down and stared at my ruined story. I swear it muttered at me, something about “Thoughtless Author” and “Maybe I should be writing with Crayons instead of a computer..” but I’m sure that was all in my head.

I had nothing.

The question was humongous.

And so my dear, wonderful, fantastic, awesome sister got online after seeing my world had been crushed via facebook (What? You don’t tell facebook every time your world gets crushed. Oh come on…you can’t fool me!) and offered to help. So we sat on IM and fought it out. Then my dear, wonderful, fantastic, awesome, super friend Mindy got online and fought it out with me too. I love my friend and sister. My sister had to go, family to tend to and all, by my favorite Mindy sat online with me for like three hours. I’m in love with her!

And now I am proud to announce … drum roll please … can someone find my choir and stupid dancing animals? … I have solved my problem!!!!

HOORRAYYY!

So what was the worst problem you’ve come up against in your writing? How long did it take you to fix?

Comment (1)

  1. Well, I wrote the entire first draft of THE MOCKINGBIRDS without the Mockingbirds even in it! Yep, the first draft didn’t even have the secret society that the book is all about in it. The second I wrote THE END, I knew something was amiss and that I was missing an underground justice system…So I went back and started reworking it and building in what the whole book is about now! We have all been there and figuring out the problem is actually fun! Solving it even better!

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