Frustrated with rewrite

[FibonacciEddie]

do trust your instincts because, after everything else is 'said and done', it is you personally that needs to be able to stand by your work and say, 'I wrote this book.'

 

[HareBrain]

I remember a long discussion I had with a reader about present tense writing and how it was too immediate to them and might even be similar to the fingernail on chalkboard feeling. So even when we are happy with our present tense writing we should go back and turn off our filter that's preventing us from hearing the fingernail effect.

I think you'd have to know that was true of a lot of readers before you abandon an effect you're particularly interested in, though.

Yet the Hunger Games sold tens of millions.

Hunger Games feels to me like historic present (the use of present tense when narrating past events), so there's nothing "difficult" about it -- it's just past tense that's had some words changed. Opening a page at random, I find, for example, "I know the minute must be almost up". That isn't her lived experience, it's herself talking to herself about her experience.

Very few books tackle present tense as "proper" present rather than historic present. "Proper" present approaches stream-of-consciousness, and is sometimes difficult to read, but very rewarding if done well. David Mitchell's NumberNineDream is a good example.

 

[Robert E. Parkin]

I've rewritten my first book three times before I finally liked how it flowed. I say stick it out and get it done. If will make for a much better work I'm sure.

 

[AnyaKimlin]

Very few books tackle present tense as "proper" present rather than historic present. "Proper" present approaches stream-of-consciousness, and is sometimes difficult to read, but very rewarding if done well. David Mitchell's NumberNineDream is a good example.

Mine is sort of punctuated stream-of-consciousness. I think that is why it isn't working in past tense its become just a told story. I finished the draft in past tense and I am sure it's a disaster so now I need to redo it in present tense. At least I now know I would be gutted if it got published in past tense.