*Snuggles with book*
But then, as it often happens, the love started to fade. It started when I tackled a massive rewrite of said manuscript, switching the POV from first person present to third person past. Both the book and I were exhausted. We fought. We made-up. We fought again. The book tried to eat my brains.
Ah love.
Perhaps you too know of this feeling? When your beloved book turns into a zombie that plagues you at every turn? That's the way I feel right now. I have given birth to a zombie novel! A novel that eats at my brain! It wants to devour my creative process and digest my prose!
It wants to killlllllll meeeeeeeeee!
Okay, okay, let's tone down the melodrama, Caroline. But eep! I really do feel that my book has turned into a beast that I don't quite know how to tame. And yet, I still love it. I still want to snuggle with it...sometimes. It's kind of like a cute zombie. Like this:
See? My book is still lovable! Definitely very hug-able. But it still kind of wants to eat my brains. The main issues eating away at me right now:
1. A lot of successful YA novels focus heavily on the romance. Mine doesn't. Is that bad? Will editors be turned off?
2. Is the genre (YA alternate history with fantasy elements) too "out there"?
3. Will this revision never end?
4. Will I die of consumption before I finish this book?
5. Is this novel any good? Yes? No? Maybe? A little bit hazy? Ask again later?
6. I think my beta readers will tell me to re-write the entire middle of the novel. I have serious doubts about it.
7. In this rewrite, I have made my protagonist too generic? Have I lost her voice?
8. Should I explore a career in penguin ranching? I hear it's the next big thing.
So yeah. My brain = a little zombified. But that's okay! All part of the process, right?
"RIGHT!" says the zombie manuscript.
