#pfh editing

[aohendo]

Prince for Hire D2 updates:

25 Dec: Did a complete read through, not changing anything except spelling mistakes/similarly minor goofs. Noted the lag areas. Set markers in my timeline for where it felt like each act ended. Started working on listing open questions-closed questions (tension shortcut), especially for the first half.

26 Dec: ctrl-f’d for my triangle brackets to find the “insert conversation about xyz here” notes--found 10 instances (not including continuity, beats, etc.); starting to work through those today.

[aohendo]

Prince for Hire Editing Update

Removed the first two chapters. It now begins with Kiris in the bathtub, and is gonna be a bit of a firehouse of context and the like until I can weed it out a little more.

Removed chapters 9-14 for rewriting. They originally focused on the Competition of the Turre, and I need them to focus on Kiris' attempts to save Prince Thaav, Iiriok's investigation into Kiris, and the Turre provoking the princes into infighting.

Replotted the end to establish a clear, single-book bad guy, since although the Turre are the BBEG, they're really just setting for this book, and will be the primary bad guy in, oh, say, book three (Iiriok's).

Depending how much I can salvage from those deleted chapters, expect deleted scenes coming soon!

[aohendo]

Prince for Hire editing update:

Still in the wild woes of draft three. This draft is now affectionately known as the exposition draft!

First half changes: vastly increasing the prominence of Kiris' mentor figure, and restructuring Kiris' first motives to seem to stem from them. Also, increasing Iiriok's suspicion of Kiris, and thereby increasing Kiris' action-desperation as well as overall plot tension levels. Clarify and explain worldbuiding. Add a little more on Evina. Clarify who knows what about Kiris' magic (and oddities within that magic).

Second half changes: Kiris' self-hatred (sorry, buddy) needs to be emphasized to the point that it's clear why he'd rather just abandon himself and carry on as his fake prince identity. Rework several newly introduced inconsistencies stemming from increasing mentor prominence in the first half. Add 2 missing Iiriok/Kiris scenes. Increase Evina's presence overall to frame her as the predominant antagonist of this novel.

[aohendo]

Scribbled out the major subplots of Prince real quick. Surprisingly efficient way to figure out what I was forgetting to foreshadow, whose motivations I completely forgot to clarify, and why the second to last scene just wasn’t coming off right.

Would recommend, if you’re stuck in an editing stage.

[image id: a printer sheet of paper with scribbly handwriting in 5 columns, with sideways text between the columns /end id]

[aohendo]

Another 4k moved to the 'stuff I deleted' document from Prince for Hire. This time because I removed the character that entire section was supposed to introduce.

[aohendo]

Editing update:

I have realized part of the reason I've been struggling wrangling Prince's plot into order (other than this being draft two) is that the key plot is actually the romance plot, not what I thought was the main plot (ie. the Competition, Kiris' survival, the politics, etc.).

Which, in terms of pure structure, should have been obvious far before I ever made it to the final third in this draft. Alas, I was oblivious as the lovebirds.

If anyone's got romance-writing tips and tricks (or things you hate as a reader) send them my way because this was decidedly not supposed to be a romance.

[aohendo]

The paper edit begins…

[aohendo]

Prince for Hire Editing Update

Continuing to sort out plot threads in Prince, and I've gotten to the point where I've identified the major plot threads (and am currently listing the points where they fall short/what needs to be added to them/what is unnecessary).

Anyway, plugged just plot arc data into Aeon with the relevant events, switched her on over to Subway, and now I've got the cheerfully spaghetti-like outline of my plot and the event interactions! It's neat seeing where things converge and separate, and is actually quite useful for what I said I was doing in the first paragraph.

[image id: a subway stop map with the "subway lines" in various colors representing plot arcs, converging and diverging at plot points /end id]