5 Year Writing Goal: January update
I’m taking part in Misha and Beth’s Five Year Project and my five-year goal is to write a novel and get it published. This is my update on progress this month with my novel, The Reluctant Scribe.
My most recent – and most helpful – critique was by a retired professor of English literature. She suggested my character needed more reflection and more internal dialogue in certain places. And she thought the ending was too abrupt (another reader made the same comment).
I printed off the whole thing and read it through again. It’s 5 months since I last did this, and the passage of time really helped me take an objective view. The final decisions made by my main character seemed obvious to me at the time of writing, but with the benefit of distance I realise that the story would be made stronger with more exposition.
Showing is great. But sometimes you have to do a little telling too!
Should be over 25,000 words by now, but I’m not.
Ruth Livingstone 