First draft word count: 139,000
Oh lordy, I’ve got my work cut out cutting work out for this one. Not sure how it got so big. I mean, I know there are things I can cut. Mostly characters. I’ve got one person who doesn’t even appear in the second half and another who only existed for a romantic subplot which I only got halfway on once I realized how long this was going to be.
And I always overwrite the first draft. Stephen King said to be a cutter-outter, not a putter-inner. So I’ve modeled my writing style to compliment that strategy. He said the second draft should equal the first draft minus ten percent. Meaning, if I can cut about 14,000 words out, maybe more, I can get it under 120,000, which is about the max for a sci-fi debut novel. I can swing that, right?
