In the Filtered Light of a Cloudy Morning . . .

. . . I find that I'm not being a scaredy cat. 

I went to the library yesterday and picked up 5 books from the mystery shelf.  I chose books whose authors I hadn't read, but had multiple books sitting there.  This morning, I read the first 5 pages of each of their books. 

Then I opened my ereader and did the same for the 4 Christian fiction novels I had downloaded this weekend.

All I can say is WOW!  With only a couple of the library books as exceptions, I was impressed with how succintly the authors told their stories and how quickly their action began - no back story.

I went back to my story.  My first five were actually pretty good, along the same lines as the ones I'd just read.  My only trouble is that they are all about someone besides the main character.  I noticed at least 1 of the Christian downloads did that, too, so I guess it is okay.

Nevertheless, if I'm only going to get to send the first 5 pages in with my query, then I want to at least MENTION my main character, so I started rewriting anyway.  I carved almost a full page of unneccessary movements, descriptions, and mentions along with material that was duplicated elsewhere and voila' the first page of chapter 2, and my main character's introduction, becomes part of my first 5.

But I learned something.  When I wrote this last month, I did it because I was enjoying the writing, not because I anticipated a career change - God is in His heaven; He does what pleases Him!  (So glad it pleases Him to love and bless us!)  The over the last 2 weeks when I rewrote huge sections and rearranged data, I was basically revising for understanding purposes, making sure that what I had written had made sense. 

Now I realize I need to do another rewrite.  I need to go through and analyze each section of my manuscript to make sure that what is there is pertinent or adds to the mood of the moment. 

I don't think I'm just being a procrastinating scaredy cat at this point.  I think I got a Heavenly foreboding because God knew I was jumping the gun.  I'm listening, Lord . . . and I'm still praying for those agents by name!