Novel as Puzzle

Queries and Synopsis are hard, no one disputes that. They force the writer to boil the story down to the bare essentials. After finishing a story, I set them aside, make a few editing passes, then try to write a coherent query letter, submit it, rewrite it, submit it again, rewrite it again, more submissions, then start looking at the flaws in the plot.

AfterQuest was too long. I knew that. My last editing pass had the goal of under 150k words. I think I was going to make it, but before reaching 'the end', I started the edit over. One chance remark by one of my test readers (OK, so there's only one who's finished reading it) led me to changing the internal chronology of the story which would lead to the cutting of thousands of words (one cut scene, which I'd like to post here, is 7000 words).

So now, I'm flipping back and forth through the 'sacrificial' copy of the story to get the scenes, content, and dialogue into the new story and in the correct order. Complicating things - AfterQuest starts after the main characters return from an adventure in the other dimension and alternates chapters of the 'present' with chapters of the adventure a few months past. By changing the time they arrive in the other world, I hope to speed things up (now they arrive less than a week before the city is attacked) and keep them from getting comfortable there.

I tried using 3x5 cards when I started this process and stacked them up with the content that would make new chapters and set aside the chapters that would be cut. It kind of worked, but would have worked better if I'd included more details per chapter card.

Once it's done, I'll get back to the next query letter and resume the submit, reject, revise, submit... process.