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May 25, 2006
UMBRA: So Close to Done You Can Smell it
Today, with only a tiny handful of pages left before the ending, I wrote a new scene, 2400 words of stuff between Our Synthetic Hero and (one of) his nemeses, in which much is revealed, and more is learned. At the current rate of progress, this new version of the book should be done by early next week at the very latest. And, once it is done, I plan to re-read it through again, make sure all the new and changed material fits well with the existing text, and then it'll be time to post it all off to Publisher Brian, to see what he makes of it.
One thing I can say: I feel vastly better about the book now that it's had all this surgery than I did before. When there's something wrong with a manuscript you get a weird feeling not that dissimilar to a sort of itchy feeling that you just can't shake. Whenever you think about the manuscript, it bugs you, and you spend altogether too much time brooding about it, wondering what the hell might be wrong, without in any way coming up with anything like a solution. The only thing that helps is going back to the text and having a look at it. Something is wrong with it; you just have to figure out what it is. [In a weird bit of meta-ness, I had the same feeling about the original version of this post, and here I am a day later fixing it up.] Now the book is nearly done, and I feel much better--more at peace--with it than I did before. To use a different, perhaps more vivid analogy, it's a bit like when you notice a really bad smell coming from your fridge, and you have to pull everything out in order to find the source.
[edited 26/5 to fix various bits]
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Meanwhile, I've just been watching the Australian Socceroos playing the Greek national soccer/football team here at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG). 103,000 people turned up to watch the match, which is incredible, the sort of numbers you'd expect to see at an AFL Grand Final (for Australian Rules football).
Oh, and the Socceroos won, 1-0! From here they proceed to the Netherlands for a match against the Dutch, seen as a curtain-raiser for the World Cup in June. I can't wait!
Posted by adrian at May 25, 2006 07:36 PM
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Comments
Ooh! Look, this is my excited face! Can't wait for the next instalment of literary goodies. Glad to hear it's going so well.
Coincidentally, I had a bad smell in my fridge at the weekend, and had to pull everything out to see what it was. It turned out to be an ex-cucumber which had mutated into something liquid (and probably sentient).
Roll on the World Cup! (where England will expect to win every match easily, before of course being thrashed senseless, at which point we will drag out the usual battery of crap excuses.)
Posted by: pastamasta ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.kabedford.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at June 8, 2006 07:43 PM
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