The Rubber Fence<\/strong><\/a>. So not all was lost, but I could’ve got there sooner.<\/p>\nPablo Picasso once famously said, “Woe to you the day it is said that you are finished! To finish a work? To finish a picture? What nonsense! To finish it means to be through with it, to kill it, to rid it of its soul \u2013 to give it its final blow; the most unfortunate one for the painter as well as for the picture.<\/p>\n
<\/h3>\n<\/h3>\nREVISIONS<\/h3>\n
I’ve just finished my sixth serious revision (or is it seventh?) of my historical novel, inspired by my mother’s tales around the kitchen table. It’s a hybrid novel (historical fiction\/family saga) about my baba’s time in Russia, 1915-1929. By serious revision, I mean reading the whole novel, (88,000 words) and tweaking, deleting and adding sentences throughout. My next step will be to find a good editor. And then, yes, more revisions.<\/p>\n
READING YOUR WORK OUT LOUD<\/h3>\n
Revisions are best helped through reading your book out loud. It helps you find sentences that\u00a0aren’t as clear as they need to be. You can pick up on dialogue that doesn’t ring true. And since you are hopefully reading your novel right through, from beginning to end, stopping only to make those corrections, you get a good sense of the whole. You can pick up on any problems in continuity or story sense (what’s working, what’s not) or character behaviour.<\/p>\n
WHEN TO STOP REVISING<\/h3>\n
I think Picasso said it best. Basically you stop when you are sick of it and\/or you feel you’ve done the best job you can and it’s time to put it out in the world.<\/p>\n
I’d love your thoughts on revisions. How much do you revise? Do you revise as you go along or write it all out first and then go back to revise? And when do you stop?<\/h5>\n
<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Can you revise your story too much? Based on my previous experience with a screenplay I had written, I would say yes. I ended up wringing all the juice out… <\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3410,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[78,967,968,415,812],"class_list":["post-3407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-writing","tag-diana-stevan","tag-historical-novel","tag-pablo-picasso","tag-revisions","tag-the-rubber-fence"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/Picasso-26-1-Yves-Manciet.jpg?fit=640%2C360&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1LuVB-SX","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2375,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2015\/therapy-2\/cover-reveal-for-the-rubber-fence\/","url_meta":{"origin":3407,"position":0},"title":"Cover Reveal for THE RUBBER FENCE","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"26 \u041b\u0438\u0441\u0442\u043e\u043f\u0430\u0434\u0430, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm very excited to announce the cover reveal for The Rubber Fence, my second novel.\u00a0The cover was designed by Ares Jun. The story, which largely takes place on a psychiatric ward in 1972, was inspired by my work on such a hospital ward in Winnipeg, Manitoba. I had just graduated\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Books"","block_context":{"text":"Books","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/books\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"cover reveal of THE RUBBER FENCE","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Rubber-Fence-The-Diana-Stevan-2-200x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":6263,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2023\/writing\/finding-your-voice\/","url_meta":{"origin":3407,"position":1},"title":"Finding Your Voice","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"13 \u041b\u0438\u043f\u043d\u044f, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Finding your voice is what our granddaughter Chloe Matamoros underlines in her one-woman show, VOICE: SONG and SCREAM for the Toronto Fringe Festival. Yesterday, she had a standing ovation. I\u2019ve done some acting in my time, but Chloe is something else. She sings selections from operas, a musical, and folk\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Theatre"","block_context":{"text":"Theatre","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/theatre-2\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Finding Your Voice","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/IMG_607932622.jpg?fit=539%2C640&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/IMG_607932622.jpg?fit=539%2C640&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/IMG_607932622.jpg?fit=539%2C640&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2519,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2016\/therapy-2\/book-launch-of-the-rubber-fence\/","url_meta":{"origin":3407,"position":2},"title":"Book Launch of THE RUBBER FENCE","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"3 \u0411\u0435\u0440\u0435\u0437\u043d\u044f, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"It's official! The day has arrived for my book launch of \u00a0THE RUBBER FENCE\u00a0online. It's\u00a0now on sale on Amazon and will be available at other booksellers in time.\u00a0 Inspired by my work on a psychiatric ward in 1972, it covers a time when feminism was being born, shock treatment was\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Therapy"","block_context":{"text":"Therapy","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/therapy-2\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Book Launch THE RUBBER FENCE","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/150-rubber-fence-ebook-cover.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2481,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2016\/writing\/2481\/","url_meta":{"origin":3407,"position":3},"title":"My Novel’s Labour Pains","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"15 \u041b\u044e\u0442\u043e\u0433\u043e, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"My second novel, THE RUBBER FENCE,\u00a0general fiction, will be published on March 3rd.\u00a0 It\u2019s the baby who didn\u2019t want to come out for the longest time. My novel's labour pains were hard and went on too long. I initially wrote the story as a screenplay back in the 1990s, had\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Books"","block_context":{"text":"Books","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/books\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"my novel's labour pains","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Rubber-Fence-The-Diana-Stevan-2-200x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4474,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2023\/writing\/the-mad-among-us\/","url_meta":{"origin":3407,"position":4},"title":"The Mad Among Us","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"12 \u0421\u0456\u0447\u043d\u044f, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"For my first blog post of 2023, I thought I'd write about the mad among us. It seems fitting when I think about all the crazy stuff we read on the internet, all the distortions and lies, whether it's about covid and vaccinations or the unhinged views of some politicians.\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Life"","block_context":{"text":"Life","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/life\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"The Rubber Fence","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/rubber-fence-revised3-high-resolution-Copy-scaled.jpg?fit=821%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/rubber-fence-revised3-high-resolution-Copy-scaled.jpg?fit=821%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/rubber-fence-revised3-high-resolution-Copy-scaled.jpg?fit=821%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/rubber-fence-revised3-high-resolution-Copy-scaled.jpg?fit=821%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":3015,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2017\/uncategorized\/writing-the-setting\/","url_meta":{"origin":3407,"position":5},"title":"Writing Settings For A Novel That Engages The Reader","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"18 \u0421\u0456\u0447\u043d\u044f, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Writing the settings for a novel is one feature of a Novel Writing Workshop I'll be giving at the North Vancouver library.\u00a0In thinking about my presentation, I thought I'd share a few things I've learned over time. Setting is the world of our characters. Without a backdrop, characters would have\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Writing"","block_context":{"text":"Writing","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/writing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"writing the setting","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/different-nationalities-1743392_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C793&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/different-nationalities-1743392_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C793&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/different-nationalities-1743392_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C793&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/different-nationalities-1743392_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C793&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/different-nationalities-1743392_1920.jpg?fit=1200%2C793&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3407\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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