Oh thank goodness

I had a revelation about my revisions today. WOOOOO!!! Thank god. I mean, it's the kind of revelation that means I'll be hacking out a good third of the book at least and rewriting about half of what's remaining but really, what's a thousand hours of bleeding on the keyboard in the name of a better story?

Turns out? I have two books crammed into one. AS I HAVE LONG SUSPECTED. *nods wisely* It just took me a while to figure out where the first book ended and the second book began. Which is sort of the same as dividing a plate of spaghetti, when you get right down to it, but I've mostly gotten it straightened out in my head now. Also, (added bonus!) I now have a pretty concise three book arc. Boo-yah! I loves me a series, I do.

The last loose end to tie up before I fire up the chain saw is to reinvent my antagonist*. He was a lion when I imagined him and I wrote him as a lamb. That's NOT HELPFUL. So, I have to figure out how to lionize him again (what?) and then I'll be ready to roll up my sleeves and dig in to the dirty work.

*marches off humming victory tune* *wearing mountain lion hat, natch*


*I feel I should mention that I first typed the word 'villain' here, mostly because I love that word and the images it conjures and prefer it to stuffy literary terms like 'antagonist.' But... it's just not quite an apt description for this dude or the role he plays in my story or my main character's life, so I changed it to antagonist. And I find that, itself, interesting. Perhaps that's why I had the whole lion-to-lamb deflation to begin with. *strokes chin thoughtfully*