End of hiatus

I jumped back in today after taking two weeks off. I got in about 90 minutes of revising and doubt I'll get in any more with the other work I have to do after lunch. At this rate, I'm not going to meet the somewhat arbitrary deadline of having everything in the shape I envision it can be in before Christmas when I hand it off to my reader.

Tackling Ch. 3 again. The basic problem here is that it is still basically a long sketch without a plot. I'm trying to find the organizing dramatic principle of it. I think I know what it is, but it means something akin to a rewrite. I have managed to cut 9-10 pages from it so far, but it still is one of the longest chapters. I'll be working on it tomorrow and probably on Wednesday too, and hopefully I'll make up the time somewhere else, but probably not.

My eye strain problem is continuing to bother me and make it difficult to get in even the two hours of work. I try to type with my eyes closed as much as possible, including most of htis blog entry.

I've been reading a ton, including an earlier book of James Wood, and some of the "hysterical realism" that he takes issue with. More on that another time, but in short the conflict over stylistic and formal issues that is on one side of is what I think I want to explore in my second novel, which I continue to daydream about.