Red Ice -- The Rewrite Begins.....

I started the rewrite of Red Ice on Wednesday, and I've finished the Prologue, Chapters 1&2, and most of Chapter 3.

I read somewhere the following: "You can't edit a blank sheet of paper." I translate that into "Finish what you start. It doesn't have to be perfect, polished or ready to be published, just done." The first draft is a piece of stone, and I have to sculpt my final draft out of that stone.

I have said before I do not write perfectly. The writing is rough, extra words pop up in the paragraphs, plot lines are dangled but are not followed up on, exposition need to be made, and scenes trimmed. Bits and pieces came to me deep into the writing. Sometime, I go back and something into the story before, other times, I move on and make note of where to go back. Things like foreshadowing events, introduction of characters and locations earlier in the storyline.

For example, in Red Ice, the Main Bad Guy (MBG) attends a meeting with his allies in crime in Chapter 7. I wrote the MBG being accompanied by two of his own men. After that, I found myself using these two characters more and more and near the end I realized these two were the MBG's chief lieutenants. In the rewrite, I being my introduction of them early in Chapter 2 and flesh them out more in a new scene in Chapter 3. I also plan to expand of one of the main plot lines in the novel, and alter a few other things to bring them into line with the new flow.

What it all means is that I have only done half of what I need to do; I have my Stone; now I need to create the story as a smoothly-running novel.

And for this weeks' snapshot of AF's current standings:

Amazon Best Sellers Rank:  

#240,765 Paid in Kindle Store
#593 in Kindle Store > eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Military
#1441 in Kindle Store > eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Action & Adventure > War & Military
#1494 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Military

The sales are still strong (Believe it or not) but the borrow amounts are still way off. Hopefully, the Borrows will pick up in the last week.

As for overseas.....Amazon.uk

#118,973 Paid in Kindle Store

#319 in Kindle Store > Books > Crime, Thriller & Mystery > Thrillers > Military
#1725 in Kindle Store > Books > Crime, Thriller & Mystery > Thrillers > Action & Adventure
#1988 in Kindle Store > Books > Literature & Fiction > Action & Adventure > War & Military

A corresponding drop in the sales rankings over here too, but I think sales will leap again, as they have in the past.

If you are a member of Amazon Prime, Outcast Ops: African Firestorm is on Kindle Direct! Use this link! African Firestorm on Amazon! For Amazon UK, click here! And  please check out the other two (soon to be three) novels in the series!

Back to (re)writing!

Craig

Red Ice is finished!

At least the first draft is done. . . .

I finished the first draft this afternoon. It's a little longer than I expected, and a couple of decisions will have to be made after I go through and rewrite it. I'm going to lay this off to the side for a couple of days, then dive back in and rewrite it and see what happens.

Red Ice took me 108 days to write -- a little more than three months. A bit longer than I expected or planned. But I pushed through (one of the reason why I haven't posted in three weeks) and it's done.

Right now, I want to rewrite this and get it into Rick Chesler's hands before the end of the month. If everything goes right (Murphy, he whose law rules supreme, is a writer), I hope to see Red Ice up on Amazon by mid-September.

And the snapshot of AF's current standings:


Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #164,430 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
#479 in Kindle Store > eBooks > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers > Military
#1104 in Kindle Store > eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Action & Adventure > War & Military
#1217 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Military

Again, watching the sales raking going up and down is like watching an insane roller coaster. The funny things is while sales are ahead of last month, the borrow rate is way off from July -- off by over 3,000 pages. There was a glitch on Amazon earlier in the week which did screw up the page count. We'll have to see if that comes back, or if it's a lingering problem in Amazon's system.

As for overseas.....Amazon.uk

#61,928 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
#224 in Kindle Store > Books > Crime, Thriller & Mystery > Thrillers > Military
#1141 in Kindle Store > Books > Crime, Thriller & Mystery > Thrillers > Action & Adventure
#1216 in Kindle Store > Books > Literature & Fiction > Action & Adventure > War & Military

Remember, if you are a member of Amazon Prime, Outcast Ops: African Firestorm is on Kindle Direct! Use this link! African Firestorm on Amazon! For Amazon UK, click here! And check out the other two (soon to be three) novels in the series!

Red Ice Final Stats (First Draft):

Done: Prologue, Chapter 1-41, Epilogue
Words Written the last twenty-two days: 18,985
Total Word Count: 72,400 (111.38% of 65,000 words)
Average Words Written per day: 670/day (+49)

Later!

Craig