A busy weekend in the non-writing quarters of my life, and a busy week before that in revisions. I still have some spots that will need changes later in the novel, but the beginning I’m pretty happy with, so I started in on the sentence-detangling step. I have, you see, an affliction I call Convoluted Sentence Syndrome. (Please give). You may already have noted it in posts here when it’s a little late or I forget to do my usual detangling. I think in intricately related clauses, you see, that tend to pile into a snarling mess once I couple several of them via comma. Since I’m aware of the problem, I’m always careful to go over final drafts with the proverbial fine-tooth comb to make sure it doesn’t snag on something, but it’s just as long and painful a process as in the literal sense. I like that sentence the way it is! Tug, tug. Noooo!
Obviously, what I need is magical sentence conditioner, but I’d worry I’d pour on too much and end up with the prose equivalent of my sister’s hair. It’s so fine that I swear, if you show her hair to a package of elastics or clips, they start slipping out of the package in anticipation. That or Kirk Prose. All my sentences are very short. To give emphasis. To the action! That is happening! At this moment.
In reality, my sentence conditioner is this. Among other strategies, he gives a list of words that mark places to rephrase. It works very handily to ctrl-f through a short story and check each, but it puts the “grrrr” in grind when you need to do it through all of a novel. If I ever give into the impulse to share the love with you all and start posting Facebook updates on my progress, now you’ll understand what they’re about. All of the novel has been searched for “ly” (adverbs to be used sparingly!) and “of” is soon to begin.
Damn you, oooooooof!
Leave a Reply