From 27th April night, we have been in a
lockdown, which has now been extended till 7th June. This lockdown is longer
than the one we had last year, when Covid19 was declared a pandemic. We are
still in the second wave and the doctors are talking of a third wave that will
happen in October-November. I’m counting out this year too. I very much doubt
that normalcy will return anytime soon. I was just telling a friend that I may
become a senior citizen by the time Covid fizzles out.
This time round with the spate of bad news coming at
me from all directions, my writing has gone for a toss. My attention span has
been reduced to just editing my previous
stories. No energy to work on something new.
As IWSG rolled into view, I realized that we are five
months into 2021. IWSG (Insecure Writers Support Group) is an online group of
writers with members from all over the world. IWSG members post on the first
Wednesday of the month, building their posts on the question of the month, some
members post about other aspects of their writing. Do visit the IWSG website,
you will thank me for the wonderful and informative articles on writing that you
will see there.
IWSG was started by Ninja Captain Alex J Cavanaugh author of Amazon Bestsellers: CassaStar, CassaStorm, CassaFire and Dragon of the Stars, with many,
many more on the way. IWSG is the wonderful place all because of Mr Nice, Mr
Generous and Mr Helpful, aka Alex. Ever ready to help other writers find their
place in the sun.
My awesome co-hosts for the June 2 posting of the IWSG are J Lenni Dorner, Sarah Foster, Natalie Aguirre and Lee Lowery.
June 2 question - For how long do you
shelve your first draft, before reading it and re-drafting? Is this dependent
on your writing experience and the number of stories/books under your belt?
For my fantasy novels I usually shelve
the first draft for several days (atleast a week, many times more than that) before re-drafting, so that when I read it
again, I view it with a fresh perspective and with a better insight. But for
the last three books I worked on (all were commissioned by publishers and had a
strict deadline), I had no time whatsoever to leave the first draft aside for a
few days. Infact for one of the books, the second draft started the moment I
completed the first draft. For the other two books, the gap was very much
reduced due to time constraints.
What about you all? How long is your gap between
drafts? Hope all of you have got vaccinated? I got both my shots.
