Here’s a quick update on the science fiction project, its drafts, word count, and next steps. There’s also some new information on the historical romance project and The Red Flag book.
Science Fiction Project: The Drafts
The second draft is complete, and I will begin working on the third draft this week. While I wrote the first draft, I left notes for myself along the way, and part of the third draft will be addressing those notes. This stage will also involve rewrites of major scenes and continuity fixes. Basically, the entire manuscript is about to get a huge overhaul. This will be the biggest step toward a final manuscript before going to my team of revisers. I don’t know how many drafts it’ll take before this project is complete, but the third draft will be a major milestone.
Science Fiction Project: The Word Count
As I suspected, the first draft did not meet the word count goal. The second draft helped, and the third draft will also help. Having anticipated this, I did make a plan for expansion just in case. It’s not a plan that adds random scenes since that would be lazy and hinder the natural flow of the story. Rather, this plan will expand on character relationships and motivations, making them more complex and dynamic. These changes will take place within scenes I have already written. This will give them more dimensions and benefit the entire story as a whole. This is something I had wanted to do but held off on, so now is my opportunity to do it after all.
Historical Romance and The Red Flag Book
True to my word, I have stayed focused on this project and have not slipped into working on the historical romance despite my eagerness to get started on it. However, now that the sci fi is nearing its final stages, I may allow myself to start thinking more about the romance. I feel a rough outline starting to form. And if you haven’t yet heard, The Red Flag book now has an audiobook edition! So be sure to check it out.
The next update may happen a lot sooner than this one did, so be on the lookout. And as always, thank you for your support!
-Julia