First Draft Finished Blues

So, yesterday i said i might get a few thousand words done. This was considering i had much more of my 3rd book to finish. That afternoon i was hit with a curve ball when i finish the first draft suddenly.

I donno if its the same for every writer, if im a freak, or if its just something that happens. For me its happened twice. My book ends when i hadnt planned it to. im actually only 39,000 words into this one and that, to me, is just not enough. but there in lie the joys of first drafts.

while my book ended in a few short paragraphs where i hadnt planned it to, the whole book will undergo many many more drafts at my hands where i can add in all the detail and fill in holes and fix problems already pointed out to me by my lovely first reader.

here i am, finally have time to get started 4 hours later than i planned, and i sit down, start writing, get girl out of house and into vehicle and then. im done. and im sitting here going, "but...but...its only this long..." in all honesty i had no idea where i was going at the moment with it. im one of those dive in with little knowledge writers.

but the cool thing about writing fiction is that the characters tend to take you where theyre going without your planning. when you design a person in your book you design every bit of them. in your mind you know what they would and wouldnt do. you know what they would and wouldnt wear and you know what they would or wouldnt say. so even if you have your whole book lain(laid?) out ahead of time, how you want it to go, your characters could come in and flamboozle(its a word) the whole thing!

its crime! and a joy. mostly joy. ^_^ i love love love when i have someone i have made up out of thin air take on such a personality that they take over the story themselves. its like...magic.

so all this just to document a writing freak(or common...i donno) occurrence. characters finishing the book before the writer planned it.

now as for the blues: its a heart fluttering pleasure to finish your book for the first time (if you dont understand the "first time" part...you will) and i encourage you to enjoy that feeling as long as you can. its followed by a feeling of yuck.

because once youre done, you must go through it again and edit. some people LOVE editing. not this gal. but thats just because its hard for me to separate myself from the story and work on technical things. and once you have done it a second time you must do it again.

so thats where i am. im enjoying being done with my third book (though it will require a sequel) but i also know that i have to go through it all again and rework reword reorganize add subtract and bring more life to the first draft. and the longer i shelve it the longer it will take to be complete. This, my friends, is the First Draft Finished Blues.

the best news, my book being edited by a dear friend is getting along there. its a little over half done and im excited to have it finished and read it in my critique group in a few months. yeay!

what is your favorite tense to write/read in?