Beginnings and Ends

Yesterday was a very strange day for me, and here's why:

1)  The first 500 words of THE REFUGEE were critiqued on the wonderful Aimee Salter's blog, and I received some fantastic advice.  I've got some polishing to do, and I'll be undertaking that soon.

2)  I also passed the climax of THE REFUGEE.  Granted, technically I passed it a year ago, but as I'm rewriting the whole bloody book, it's a huge milestone.  I'll hopefully finish sometime this week, then it's off to some beta readers!

But first, I have to go revise the beginning.

Sometimes I feel as though I'm working in this gigantic loop.  Naturally my writing improves as I get deeper into the novel, so that by the time I'm finished, I look back at the beginning and think it's trash.  So of course I have to start over again, and so on and so forth.  One of these days I just need to be done with it.

Though I've tried that too.

For awhile I loathed THE REFUGEE.  Absolutely hated it.  I wanted to forget about it, and start something new.  Something fresh.  But then I mentioned it to a friend, and they told me it sounded like a cool concept.  So I took it out of the desk drawer, and started to revise.

Still hated it.  Back in the drawer.

Then came another friend, and another bit of encouragement.

This has happened so many times, I've lost count.  And now I finally haves something I'm satisfied with.  Something I'm serious about.  But I'm also drained, and though I look forward to some fine-tuning, part of me wants to move on.

Thermostatic Neck Frills

I just looked at my very first draft of THE REFUGEE...and cringed.  Though I also broke into a fit of mild hysteria when I read this:

"Have you tried the thermostatic neck frill yet?"

According to Wikipedia, "Neck frill is the popular term for the relatively extensive margin seen on the back of the heads of reptiles with either a bony support such as those present on the skulls of dinosaurs."

But what I meant was a ruff, such as one typically imagines as essential to Shakespeare's get-up.

Hmmm...Quite fashionable.  A thermostatic (temperature-regulating) ruff would be kind of awesome, actually.