Even though I expected to do mostly smaller revisions and some consolidation (UK/US spelling, location naming consistency, capitalization consistency), I eventually did one larger change when preparing the current draft. I took out a big part of the early story – some parts were removed completely, some parts were compressed. The reason was that it felt like it takes far too long to set up and get to the point.

Fact is, I was thinking of doing this in one way or another for a while. And it led me to think about the topic of cutting stuff from a draft: where, how and why I did that over time.

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As of now, it’s three years to a day when I decided to give writing a try and started writing a sample chapter. Where has all the time gone? The fact that I am still going on feels like a personal victory, even though the finish line is still in distance. By my original plan, I hoped that today would be the release date for the first book but it needed even more time than I expected. So, what’s my progress for the last month and the outlook for the near future?

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Backstories. Details that make the story and the characters more likely by revealing bits that happened in their past or even before and tie in into the present. Something that makes the story more complex.

Something I feared for all those years before I gave writing a try – and even the first years. How can I, who has nothing but an idea, make a story complex enough to stand a chance?

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It’s getting close to three-year-anniversary since I started writing. It brought me to think a bit about how it started and how it went and to see how I changed in that regard. Doubt is still pretty much constant companion yet it is more often accompanied by hope. I hope that during those three years, I learned something and that each draft is better than the previous one.

Now, where I see the changes?

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