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I'm writing my first novel but I'm very much like you constantly revising while I'm writing. You are so close to the end I would just push through the last two chapters not even revise them and drop it for a week. Come back and do the revisions. If you are anything like me you will probably end up rewriting certain several times till you are happy with it but go ahead and finish to the end first.
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I think writing can always be improved. I agree with your idea of letting writing percolate- it works for me. Showing it to others also helps, and takes less time. Good luck!
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Losing the plot
Part of the problem of writing is the lack of clarity about what exactly is the plot. I'm sure that you have read enough books to have an instinct for what the plot is, but unfortunately instinctual plotting is very difficult and I have to say rarely successful. Writing a story/novel is for most of us a very long journey; so unless you know exactly where you want to go and what route you are going to take, you will, believe me get lost. Ahh, but I can hear you saying now, but part of the fun of writing is sometimes getting lost, but believe me when I say, and this is from experience it can be very disheartening.
The secret of success means knowing exactly the difference between the plot and the story. We have the novelist E M Forster to thank for making this sometimes difficult distinction. He said a plot is a narrative of events, the emphasis falling on casualty. For example: "The King died and then the Queen died" is a story. The King died, and then the "Queen died of grief" is a plot.
Unlike life's story which is a sequence of events that chop and change unpredictably, your writing and knowledge has the benefit of the bigger picture. You must not allow your story or plot to take over your thinking. Why? Because you will repeatedly find yourself asking the same question "what happens next". Allow this to happen and what you will have is a disjointed uninteresting story that is chaotic with many mistakes. So shape your story before you start and stick with it. Do not allow events or characters to change the course of your story indiscriminately.
Remember a story is like a straight line with a beginning a middle and an end. A plot is a circle intermingled with a series of loops, vey often repeating itself before completing its journey.
I hope this helps
Regards Rowland
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My story is an adventure, so the plot changes as new information becomes available to the protagonists. By the end of the story they will have helped rescued friends, found out about an invassion, discover who is controlling the war, and eventually assassinate the one responsible for all bad that has happened to the protagonists throughout the book. They are pulled by someone's revenge, then they are pushed because of obligation, and last they choose to fight for what is right because they are the only ones that know the truth.
Does that sound like a plot, because this has never changed? Basically, everything that happens to say that is what I'm changing constantly.
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I rewrote the first 100+ pages of my book simply because I was unhappy with it. With university and other things constantly getting in the way of it I found that by the time I finally had the spare time to complete it I was no longer the same person and rubbished my original ideas.
The rest of the story didn't change but the start, apart from character names, is unrecognisable from the original. The key events and the character relationships never changed but I finished the entire thing before I began obsessing about the details. Once you have something - anything - down from start to finish I find that it's a whole lot easier to change the parts that don't live up to your expectations.
Happy writing.
JD
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I'm surprised you don't have the ending of the story already in your head. Am I right in thinking you are editing/rewriting as you go along? If this is the case, it is a fatal way to do things.
Complete the first draft. Put it away for several weeks. Then come back to it for the first edit. Put it away again for the same time and repeat the edit. Letting friends read your work may help but they rarely give you honest constructive feedback.
You are bound to ask "is this the best way to do this?" The trouble with that is, if you keep it up you will never complete the novel! It is rare for writers to be completely satisfied with their work. At some stage you have to say it is the best I can do and I'll not rewrite another word, unless your publisher says that's what's required.
As said in another reply, a story has a beginning, middle and an end. You have a straight road going from A to B. There can be as many side roads as you want, (twists and subplots), but every road must eventually lead the reader to B, (the end).
Good luck with your story.
Reiner.
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My comments might have been misleading. I haven't started writing the novel yet. I'm only working on the details in the outline. It's a very detailed outline where I summarize each chapter by what is going to happen. My situation is that I keep changing my mind on how I want things to develop. I don't want to change my mind after I start writing because then it will take a large chunk of time to go back and rewrite it.
Since the time I started this thread, I have finished the outline. I then put it away for a week and then opened it up and read the entire outline. I was surprised that after I finished the outline I didn't want to make any changes to the plot anymore. I was satisfied with how it all flows.
The advice to just push through and finish it was just want I needed. (Stop nit picking and finish it) I realized after a week I was stressing on the story, not the plot. I have months (maybe a year) to figure out how that stressful point in my book will flow.
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What is "editting"? (sic).
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haha, yeah I guess I should edit my title also.
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