This is a secret post. You’re not supposed to read it because it’s… duh, a secret!
I’ve written this same post so many times that I’m embarrassed to write it again. But you’re a writer, you know how it goes. You do something that you think is momentous, and you have to tell SOMEBODY.
Please keep this to yourself, but I’ve just finished, like ten minutes ago, the re-re-re-rewrite of my book.
Not the fourth rewrite to make it beautiful.
Not the third rewrite that takes out all the hackneyed eye-roller phrases (“this ends now”).
Nor even is it the second rewrite that ties the beginning to the end.
This isn’t really a rewrite at all, but a fresh new story with deepened characters and a reasonable plot. It just borrows elements from a previous version. Now, for the first time, that old story has a bottom to it.
Architect Penn Hsu tells us that if you knock down all but one wall of a house and rebuild the rest, it is no longer the same house. Ergo, ipso facto, allegro non troposphere, this is a new book.
Anyway, it’s done. At least I can tell YOU about it and not feel too foolish.
Nope, no , there it is.
Foolish through and through, because I keep finishing the same danged book!
This time is for real, though. Done and done.
Maybe…
John D Reinhart 