So I'm estimating that I'll be finished with my first read-through of the manuscript on the train ride home tonight, which means that at long last the editing process can begin! With about 20 single-spaced pages to go at this point, I think I've managed to form some strong opinions of what works well, what doesn't work so well, and what should simply be deleted and never spoken of again. The first and third acts are really tight, so I don't anticipate much major surgery in the opening and concluding chapters, but the midsection of the novel is a little messy in places. It's not that it doesn't have its inspired moments, merely that it could stand to lose a few thousand words here and there.
While the good Mr. King recommends a 10% reduction on the re-write (which in my case would be about 15,000 words), I'm thinking that I could carve twice that from the book and not be all that broken up over it. So the first edit is going to consist of a quick second read-through, during which I'm going to try and be as merciless in possible in identifying overly-verbose passages or sections that have become tangential to the novel's overall plot. The former are probably going to end up getting deleted, but the latter might get shunted off into an appendix or incorporated into another book.
Wish me luck!
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