So the novel-in-progress — a near-future thriller — went out to beta readers in November, and by the end of the month I received four sets of comments. The overall reaction was pleasingly positive, and the two issues I’d been most concerned about turned out not to be issues at all. The comments I did receive are all helpful. Several have already been applied to the latest draft as I work through my list — but you know what? Except for one item, everyone focused their comments on different aspects of the story.

This isn’t a bad thing at all. What it means to me is that the overall story works pretty darn well, that there aren’t major issues, and that different people just want more detail on different things.

Of course it isn’t necessary to address every comment a beta reader makes. It’s the prerogative of the writer to leave things as they are, to change them a little or a lot, or to go in a completely different direction than the beta reader suggests.

But what to do if one reader has real problems with a critical part of the story that the other beta readers didn’t question at all? That’s the situation I found myself in. It was tempting to shrug off the criticism. After all, no novel gets glowing reviews from everyone who tries it. Some books just don’t work for certain people.

I let the critical comments sit for a few days, and then I made myself go over them again, while reconsidering the reader, the reader’s preferences, and his reaction to the rest of the novel.

In this case, my beta reader has been an enthusiastic supporter of my work for years, he’s critiqued me before, is a writer himself, was generous with praise for almost all of the manuscript, and gave solid reasons to back his opinions. He’s also a good stand-in for the most demanding corner of my target market.

So should I listen to him, even though my three other readers were okay with the scene? My answer to that was an emphatic “yes!”

Will I be able to address all of his concerns? That was more like a “maybe.”

The challenge with the problem scene is that the protagonist needs to hold onto some level of agency — that his actions and choices determine the outcome — but because of the situation, the element of agency is elusive. Stuff is happening, but the ability of the protagonist to affect it is minimal — kind of like being tumbled in the white water of a breaking wave, when all you can do is roll with the forces around you and hope you don’t get crushed. So in this scene the element of agency is primarily in the relationships between the protagonist and other characters: how he handles the stress, the choices he makes, and what he learns from them.

I wasn’t sure I could address these issues in a different way, but I decided it was worth experimenting with the scene, to see what I could come up with.

So yesterday I spent the entire day rewriting the target section. I was completely involved with it, even while I knew that the new material wasn’t really working out all that well. I’ve been at this game long enough to know that sometimes you have to toss a lot of words around before you find the right ones to use, especially in a situation like this, where the subtleties of dialogue, discovery, and realization are so important. At the end of the day, I’d addressed most of my friend’s concerns, but I was pretty sure that what I had was kind of a hash.

I re-read it after dinner, and yes, it was a mess. So I started in on it again, just as obsessed as I’d been during the day, but I’d had a new insight, a better understanding of the possible choices and the necessary sequence of events, and at that point I was able to drop some of the complications, which tends to be a good thing for me.

So is the scene better? Well, I haven’t actually re-read it since 2AM this morning, and I’m not sure I’ve had enough sleep to properly evaluate it. But I’m glad I ran the experiment. The simple fact that I was deeply involved in the revision effort tells me that it probably needed to be done.

At SF Signal, the table of contents has been posted for ‘The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year Volume Seven’ Edited by Jonathan Strahan, with my own “Nahiku West” at #22 in the list of stories! This is the first time my short fiction has made it into a best-of-year anthology, so I’m pretty happy about it.

The anthology will be published by Night Shade Books on March 5, 2013.

“Nahiku West” — a 9,000 word novelette, originally published in Analog and now available as an ebook at Book View Cafe.

Long ago — actually last spring — I wrote a companion story to last summer’s novelette “Nahiku West.” It’s called “Out In The Dark” and it’s the second story featuring the reluctant Commonwealth police officer, Zeke Choy**.

Since “Nahiku West” was published in Analog, I sent the second story there as well and waited the summer to hear back on it. Three months passed, and I was just about to inquire on its status when Stan Schmidt, long-time Analog editor, announced his immediate retirement — and I knew the waiting wasn’t over yet.

I did eventually receive good news. Analog’s new editor, Trevor Quachri, will be publishing “Out In The Dark” in a future edition, date to be determined.

And now, I must get busy writing more short stories! I want to do at least one or two more featuring Zeke Choy, as well as striking out in some new directions.

If you haven’t done so yet, please sign up for my Very Occasional Newsletter so I can let you know when new stories and novels come out.

Confession: I have not written a word of fiction since finishing up the novel-in-progress on October 25.

Why? Two primary reasons: First, I’m having a very hard time letting go of this story and allowing something else to occupy my brain space, and second, I’m fairly stressed waiting on the first full impressions from beta readers.

Does it matter that I’m not writing? Yes. There seems to be a discipline among writers who are successful and that includes writing everyday and continuously producing work. Right now I need to be working on some short stories. Then I need to move on and finish the novel I never quite finished last spring.

Still, it’s not as if I’ve been doing absolutely nothing. I have managed to get the print layout of Memory started, I’ve gone over the unfinished novel, and I’ve developed a possible short story idea. But tomorrow, really, seriously, I need to start writing, even if what I write at first turns out to be only rubbish. I’ve been at this game long enough to know it will get better, so long as I’m doing something.

This has been the process for the current novel-in-progress:

Draft 1: trust the process, tell the story, make up stuff as needed.

Draft 2: fill in holes, add details, consult reality**.

(** this means “research stuff” or “use Google to consult the global hive mind.” The Internet is awesome.)

As of today I’m not quite 2/3 of the way through draft 2. So far the manuscript has grown about 7,000 words since draft 1. That number surprises me. I would have guessed maybe 4,000 at most.

Soon I’ll be rustling up beta readers…

I just got back from Oahu last night. I was there for five days, house-sitting — well, okay, dog-sitting — for my daughter and son-in-law. The idea was, this would be a writer’s retreat: five days of intense revision on the novel-in-progress, with occasional dog walking.

I’d never done a writer’s retreat before, nor had much desire too. Generally, when I decide “Now I will do hours of mind-expanding writing” that will be the exact moment that all desire to write suddenly leaves me. So why set myself up for failure? I write well-enough at home.

But in this case dog-sitting was needed, and my philosophy is “try new stuff.” Besides, I actually got a lot of useful writing done when I was traveling alone in July. So I packed up my Netbook and my folder of “to-do notes” and headed over to Oahu, where it was really hot.

Okay, that’s an unfair statement, because it’s not just Oahu that’s hot. Hawaii, at sea-level, is hot. Sure, there are warmer, more humid places, but the truth is I am spoiled. I live at a relatively high elevation on the island of Maui where the air temperature rarely if ever exceeds eighty degrees, and is much more commonly in the low seventies. Sure, it can be hot in the sun, but it’s almost always cool in the shade, and if the upstairs of the house gets kind of warm on a blazing summer day, well, the downstairs is still cool. So, yeah, spoiled.

Also, I grew up on Oahu, living at sea-level in a house without air-conditioning, and going to a school without air-conditioning. I know what it is to live and work in constant heat and humidity, and I’m not fond of it. The funny thing is, it really wasn’t that hot for the first three days, but regardless, I had a hard time settling into work. In the end, I managed two decent days of revision, but I did get to read a long and fascinating novel by Chaz Brenchley, which I will post on in more detail next week, when it’s released by Book View Café.

And next time I go to Oahu to dog-sit? I’ll plan on sightseeing and hiking, not writing. And if I happen to get some writing done on the side, that’s “cool” too.

I’m very pleased to announce that a short story I wrote last spring has been accepted at Asimov’s. “Through Your Eyes” is scheduled for the April/May 2013 double issue. This will be my first publication in Asimov’s, which is a milestone for me.

In the post linked to above I mention that “The protagonist of this story is proving rather troublesome. He’s in my head, lobbying for his own novel…” Uh-huh, and since then he’s gotten his own novel. That’s the one I’m presently working on, with the first draft just finished a couple weeks ago.

The manuscript is inconsistent, it’s full of notes, it’s in desperate need of research, and a couple of sections are just blocked out (“They struggle for the gun” “Intimate, poignant sex scene here”), but all the essentials are in place — beginning, middle, end — so I am officially declaring this to be a FIRST DRAFT.

While I like to call this novel a “near-future thriller,” it is science fiction, making it the first SF novel I’ve written since Memory — though I hasten to add it’s nothing at all like Memory.

It’s easily the roughest first draft I’ve ever done. In the old days, I would polish every paragraph, every chapter, before going on to the next. With the Puzzle Lands books I wrote much faster, but still stopped to polish and revise along the way. With this book, while I did a little backfill and a bit of revision, it was mostly a straight shot from beginning to end — partly out of fear that if I stopped and thought about it too much I would let the internal-critic take over, become discouraged, and quit. I tried to make “trust the process” my mantra, though whether it worked or not, only time will tell.

For those writers out there who might be interested in the timeline, I started brainstorming the story on June 5. Actual writing commenced on June 9, with a session that produced 1300 words. I worked on it fairly consistently over the summer, aiming for a thousand words a day. Sometimes I succeeded, sometimes I did nothing, sometimes I did more. At any rate, by September 2 I’d accumulated 69,000 words…which means that over the next 13 days I added 18,000 words for a first draft total of 87,000. For a lot of writers, this is no big deal. For me — I am a slow writer — this is an astonishing pace, especially given that on some of those thirteen days nothing was written because I didn’t have a clear idea of what was going to happen next. (Do other writers always know what happens next? So many of them seem to.) After revisions, I’m hoping the final word count will be no more than 95,000.

Here’s an ironic “fun fact”: this novel was inspired by a character who came to life in a short story I wrote last spring. I sent that story off to a major market at the end of May, and since then I’ve written the entire first draft and have still not gotten a decision on the story. Of course, now that I’ve said this in public, I’m sure the rejection will turn up on Monday. C’est la vie. ***

And here’s an embarrassing “fun fact”: this is the second first draft I’ve finished this year. The other is a fantasy novel unrelated to anything else I’ve done. The rule is supposed to be “finish one project before starting another,” but…yeah. I’ll get back to the fantasy novel real-soon-now — like after I get a solid second draft of the SF novel, because it’s the one that has a firm grip on my enthusiasm, and in my opinion, enthusiasm is a very good thing.

I am so upset.

Stan Schmidt has been the editor at Analog Science Fiction & Fact for thirty-four years. He was the first editor to ever buy my work, and in fact the first three stories I sold went to Analog.

Last year, when I got back into short story writing after a very long hiatus, Stan was my first choice for “Nahiku West”–and to my delight he bought the story (which just saw publication this month in Analog’s “October” issue). So I think it’s fair to say that Stan Schmidt started my career twice.

He will be missed, but I hope he gets to enjoy more time writing his own fiction.

Here’s the article at Locus Online.

SF Signal is a website devoted to covering the science fiction and fantasy field, with articles, book reviews, and other contributions from people across the genre.

Each week features a piece called “Mind Meld” in which several writers, editors, fans, or others active in the field are asked to respond to a question. No one gets to see the other answers until publication day.

Today was my first time participating in Mind Meld.

The question:

Q: As a reader and as a writer, how do you feel about the practice of revising books after they have been published (or at least have reached the ARC stage)? How much revision goes into your writing process? (How clean are your drafts)?

Find everyone’s answer here at SF Signal.