Thursday, December 11, 2008

working as if

I sent the partial yesterday. Odds are the agent will pass on the novel. That's not false modesty or some lack of confidence in my story or my own ability to execute it; it's just reality in the literary fiction game, especially in today's publishing environment. But I'm accustomed to making big investments on long odds in May and June and this is no different. I'm working on the rest of the manuscript now as if the agent will request the "full." The only difference is that I'm sleeping eight hours a night now. If I get good news from New York, I'll cut that to three hours a night until I'm done. Like the stormchasers say, I can sleep when I'm dead.

The revision process is good, but I'm not cutting enough words. Hopefully I'll have time for another pass through. In the process of readying the partial I cut 1000 words, and discovered this when I merged those pages back into the main file. That was a happy surprise. I like the ratio, 1000 words cut every fifty pages. It would bring the project down to the number I need. Okay, more later.

Wish me luck! I need it.