Process Talk

I’m editing a first draft of a typical first week aboard a SSBN. I think that stands for submarine ship ballistic nuclear.
I’m doing a lot of slashing and burning, which is probably good. I don’t want it to bog things down but I need to let the audience in on how things are done and where thing are, give them a general overview of sub life so later on it doesn’t distract from what’s going on.

It’s been a very long process writing this novel and it’s kind of a relief seeing an end in sight. I’ve been working on it maybe ten years, off and on. Life and work kept getting in the way.

It started out as a first person thing. I was thinking Moby Dick. The first line was even, “Call me Paradise.” And I started out following Melville’s movement. I didn’t follow it close, but I thought about Moby Dick all the time. It’s still there floating around somewhere in my brain when I work on this, which might be the same thing as saying, when I’m awake. I don’t think my book would have been possible with out it. So, thanks, Herman.

I got 198 type-written, double space, 12 point pages before I decided it had to be third person. For one thing Danny Paradise couldn’t get the parts right when he got too drunk. There were also forces working behind the scenes that I wanted to comment on Danny knew nothing about. Danny is little more than a kid grappling with issues far beyond him and from his point of view he is just stumbling through. First person was too confining for the story I’m trying to tell.

I started over at the beginning. No cutting and pasting. I had the first person draft, which I had spent time polishing, at my side, but I retyped every word. Switching to third person opened the novel up far beyond Danny's ability to describe or comprehend. I think it will make for a better, weightier novel. Hopefully you will be able to tell me some day in the not to distant future.