For those of you who don’t know, I have finished two YA novels that I am trying to get published. I love my first one but it is proving more difficult to get noticed than my second. I attribute the fact that YA is really heavy on the paranormal/fantasy kick right now. Book one has no fantasy creatures. Book two, however, delves into the paranormal.
I just spent my morning slashing the first chapter of book two and rewriting it. Now that I have set back and read it, I’ve realized I love it even more. It started out too slow before but now it throws you right into the heart of the action in sentence one. However, in doing this I had to completely erase a character, change the place of the “meet-cute” and even changed the hair color of the heroine. Now, once this book is in the hands of readers ***fingers crossed this happens*** they will never know that there had once been a sister to the heroine, the main characters met in a bedroom, or that the heroine’s hair was once red. It made me think about all my favorite books and beloved characters within their pages and how they changed and transformed when they went through the often bloody massacre that we call editing.
Then I think about the characters that I love and how perfect their story is told and I wouldn’t have it any other way. So, I look at the old chapter and hesitate over the delete or save button…..and I click save. Hey, you never know…one day it may be a best seller and I will need some interesting facts to put on my web site 😉