I did it. Not just some easy 50-hour NaNoEdMo win like most of my EdMo victories, but a truly heroic effort that saw me spending nearly twice as much time editing that "monster of rock", Chaos Angel Spanner book 1. It took a lot of coffee, energy drinks, rock 'n' roll, and flogging the muse into cackling insanity to pull off such a feat.
And you know what? The characters managed to surprise me yet again! Back in Chapter 12, I introduced Shira's pretty neighbours who don't bother to have names, and then in Chapters 13 and 16 two major characters did the same. Sure enough, yet another character went nameless in Chapter 19. More surprises: major villain Henry Becket, who I conceived of back in the "Class of '92" as an asexual ex-gay, had a torrid liaison with a superheroine ex-wife (who will become a major Book 2 antagonist) during the Chapter 18 riots. Shira's long-lost twin sister Kira returned at the end of Chapter 17, and in the opening of Chapter 18 suffered the Whistler Process (which I intended to import into the end of Chapter 16 in the Revision 3 plan) together with her. Sure enough, they pull a twin switch on Shira's nameless girlfriend (who was Leila Shelley until Chapter 13) in bed. Also in the Chapter 18 opening, Anonymous made a Special Guest Star appearance, while previously unused Project Notebook hero Toni Wong appears as a villainess working for Chinese Corporatist Party (Holdings) Limited. Chapter 19: the iPhone murders kill off two minor antagonists, and the death of Admiral Fleer becomes the climax (in both R1 and R2 it was in Chapters 20 and 21). Chapter 20: when Admiral Currie, father of a notoriously perky daughter, shows up for the first time, he proves even worse. Chapters 20 and 21: Charmian; and Karen isn't coming back till 24.2 in Book 2. Chapter 21: the nudefighters go public, and the new powers Shira and her girl with no name gained in Chapter 15 allow them to get away with it. And that's just the characters. They've successfully pulled "Plan Z" on me.
However, despite all my heroic efforts, I still have two chapters and an Interlude left. Before I can do the final full edit (to be called Revision 4.1) on the book, I have to whip those last two chapters into shape and that final Interlude into existence (this one was only a vague idea in Revision 1). That's my task for the first week of April. And so the heroic editing must continue...
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