I’m reading a book right now that is just plain embarrassing. I feel like I’m intruding in the author’s head, and I don’t like what I find there.

Wedded to convention, unable to see their own bigotry, small.

The writer who can’t distinguish truth from a peanut-butter sandwich can never write good fiction. What he affirms we deny, throwing away his book in indignation; or if he affirms nothing, not even our oneness in sad or comic helplessness, and insists that he’s perfectly right to do so, we confute him by closing his books. (John Gardner, The Art of Fiction)

This passage is from the very first draft of the very first chapter I wrote. Both chapter and excerpt have since been rewritten several times. I don’t have the patience now to list all the things wrong with this version. Maybe later. Copyright 2001 by me. (Because, you know, someone might steal my words.)

She waited forever.

She waited, holding her breath, closing her eyes, and melting against the tree trunk, while the first man searched the bank near her hiding place. She could hear his rough muttering and smell his sweat. When she was sure he was gone she finally took a shallow breath, frozen in position and not daring to move.

She was still waiting, eyes closed, when the man and woman approached. “. . . donkey turd,” the woman said with disgust. “Probably walked right by the kid.” They searched more carefully than the first man; Jazlin could hear underbrush snapping and the whish of lifted branches. In front of the tree shielding Jazlin they paused, and Jazlin sensed the darkness of their presence. She felt her heartbeat slow to match the rhythm of her protecting tree. A long flat sharp blade sluggishly pierced the overhanging branches, wiping the trunk and nicking Jazlin’s arm. “Nothing there,” the man said, his voice now dragging. Jazlin heard the strangers poke lazily through other trees as they ambled away.

She continued to wait long after the strangers had left and the squirrels and doves returned. She sat, back to tree, and silently thanked the Kenirnal just like Daddy had taught her, thanked the Kenirnal first for life, then for hope, and finally for love. She named all ten Kenflati, in order, and thanked them for their protection. And she begged them to send Daddy back to her. At intervals she slept. One time she woke, ashamed that she’d soiled her pants like a toddler.

She waited, huddled against the tree, through two nights. Her stomach ached from its constant grumblings, and her parched mouth was teased by the rippling of the stream just out of her reach. Stay here, Daddy had commanded. Daddy’s never coming back, she thought. Hot tears scalded her face and splashed onto her tunic. Daddy’s gone. She sobbed and wailed her despair, crying for Daddy and home and food and water.

When her tears had subsided to bone-shaking sniffles, she crawled stiffly from the sheltering branches.

. . . the road meandered along hills lined with the soft grey-brown of winter trees stitching a white sky to the ground.
— from Mappa Mundi by Justina Robson

I work from sentence to sentence. The first sentence of a chapter sets the tone and tells me where to go. I’m lost until that first sentence is hammered out.

The clean smell of Nolfetul floated across the water. The breeze carried the scents of spices and fruits neglected in Bafguva, and of creature wastes untainted by flesh products. Jazlin luxuriated in the

The scent of Nolfetul floated across the water. For so long Jazlin had missed these smells, the spices and fruits not cultivated in Bafguva, creature wastes untainted by flesh products

The scent of Nolfetul floated across the water. Jazlin luxuriated in the smells of spices and fruits unknown in Bafguva, of creature wastes untainted by flesh products.

The crisp scent of Nolfetul — long-missed spices and fruits, untainted creature wastes–floated across the water. Jazlin would know that smell had

Okay, that wasn’t the right starting place.

The river tugged them downstream. Jazlin worked the footcrank, as Helfijek commanded, while at the tiller Helfijek guided the boat toward the riverbank.

The river tugged them downstream. Jazlin worked the footcrank steadily while Helfijek guided the tiller, and they

Jazlin worked the footcrank steadily, yet still the river tugged them downstream.

You know, we’ve already done enough water stuff in this manuscript — let’s start even later. (Us = the characters and me.)

Jazlin slipped over the boat’s side into the chest-deep water and caught the painter that Helfijek tossed

Now I think I’ve got a handle on it.

A lot of people like to write out their first draft before coming back to touch up their prose. Well, I like to do that too. I find all sorts of infelicities. But, for me, the words need to have a certain rightness before I can go any further. I can’t imagine trying to clean up a whole 100k words of really shitty first draft. I’d be too discouraged to even begin.

These snips below are an example of why I write so slow. All came from the same writing session, and they’re typical of my writing practice.

Plop plop plop — all around her water was dripping off the leaves, splashing her, spattering onto the leaves crackling underfoot, draining into radiant green moss. Thin wisps of steam climbed up sunbeams.

becomes

Plop plop plop — all around her water was dripping off the leaves, splashing her, spattering onto the leaves crackling underfoot. Thin wisps of steam floated up from radiant green moss.

and then

Plop plop plop — all around her water was dripping off the leaves, splashing her, spattering onto the leaves crackling underfoot, draining into radiant green moss. Wisps of shimmering steam drifted upward.

changes to

Plop plop plop — all around her water was dripping off the leaves, splashing her, spattering onto the leaves crackling underfoot, draining into radiant green moss. Wisps of steam shimmered upward.

and yet another (probably the last till revision time)

Plop. Plop plop. Plop. All around her water was dripping off the leaves, splashing her, spattering onto the leaves crackling underfoot, draining into radiant green moss. Wisps of steam shimmered upward.