Thursday 23rd July 2020
I’m not sure what it is but the final readthrough is one of my least favourite parts of the process.
I don’t know what exactly it is, but the intense focus whilst reading the draft one last time before it gets sent off always feels a bit like torture to me.
I learnt a while back that it’s not the story. Indeed I’ve actually been really enjoying both the story and the prose to the extent that I’ve had to remind myself that I wrote this. Everyone else might hate this book but I can tell you now this is insanely better than anything I’ve ever written… and I haven’t got to my favourite bits yet.
I get about a chapter in before, I start feeling sleepy or want to take a break. I can’t maintain the intensity I need for very long.
I suspect it might be that like a lot of readers I don’t read every word. With the final readthrough I need to consider every sentence, every word choice. In the past I’ve read novels aloud to combat this. I usually end up with a hoarse throat. This time to change the words on the page, I’ve created a personal ebook and am reading it on my kindle. Both methods are torture.
I’m picking things up: a clunky sentence here, a missing word there. So the process is working using the ebook. It’s just…
I’m at that stage where I’m done with the novel. I used to think it was about working on a project for a period of time and mental fatigue. Now I think that mental fatigue is more something to do with being willing to let the novel out into the world. There’s probably a lot of anxiety about what other people will think bottled up in there, so subconsciously you’re trying to emotionally detach from the project.
As a result, I want to rush this bit; get it over and done. In reality, this draft has been an incredibly quick process and I’m not under any pressure to deliver.
But as much as I want to say “fuck it” and just send it out, there’s still a duty of care. Which means, intensely going over every word and making any minor changes.
I’ve got Pokemon GoFest at the weekend and would like to be done tomorrow. Thankfully Pokemon Go released storage upgrades so I don’t need to find time to clear some space (probably still need to though, 500 spaces ain’t gonna be enough).
However, I only managed to get a third of the way through the readthrough despite staying up late into the night.
Did I mention I hate the final readthrough?
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