When Enough is too Much

There comes a time in every editing/revising process when a writer reaches that impossible summit. Where the air is thin and ideas wheeze out for lack of oxygen. You know what I mean- the point of editing saturation.

Generally, I write a fairly clean 1st draft. I like to see a good majority of the deep POV, and setting there. Not always, if I'm having a particularly hard time with a manuscript, but most of the time. As I go back and reread, deciding what needs to go and what can stay, I also read with an eye to what could be better: better worded, better action, better charaterization, better instensity. This is dangerous territory for me since I'm a picker. I can pick a story to death and back before I ever hit the send button, or print it to send snail mail.

Which brings me to the title of the blog: when enough is too much. How does a writer know that it's time to just put the damn book to bed and let the editor handle it? I go back and look at some of the books I published a few years ago and see things that make me cringe, things I'd change if I had the chance to do so now. For me, there really isn't an end point. If I put all my stories on the back burner for the next year, took them out again this time in 2010, I'd probably start from word one, page one and change and fiddle and mess with the entire book. It's a sickness. I really believe it is.

In answer to this creative OCD of mine, I've began to use lists to help me rewrite. I'll go through the entire book, from front to back and jot down anything I see that needs changed. (Small problems like tenses, spelling errors, or wrong words, I fix on the spot.) Anything else and I make a note of it. When I'm ready to go back, I mark each item off the list. When I finished with all the items, I send the book to a critique partner to go over. Then it happens again. I go through the comments, one at a time, read them all, then set the book aside for a bit to gain objectivity, keeping in mind the major points my critique partner has made. When I believe the ideas have had enough time to germinate, I go back and make a new set of notes and start from the beginning again. Generally, this means I only have about 2 or 3 drafts (I shouldn't even really call them drafts- because to me, drafts are where you start from the very beginning and write the whole thing from scratch, and I've only done that once so far in my writing career - soon to be twice)of a story. It may take me months and months to do this process, since I'm working on other things at the same time, but it helps me stay organized and on track. It also lets me know when...enough is too much.

I think I'm always afraid I'll reach that point where writing becomes too much methodical craft and function and less about the guts of storytelling. Instinctual storytelling is often the best kind.

So, what about you - where is your staturation point?

-Kate