The participants of NaNoWriMo (and congratulations to you all, whether you hit 50,000 words or not) now have the editing to do. Like childbirth, getting the new creation out is only the first part of the job. Next comes the sorting and training, the snipping and shearing, dressing up and dressing down.
For those of us who write fiction, editing – like parenting – is when we get to know the characters we’ve brought into the world. While we might have copious notes about them, there is always room for them to surprise us. One of my critique buddies announced that in his next revision he will make a character he considered secondary the main protagonist. His current main protagonist will have to wait for another book.
As the year dashes to its conclusion, let us take a deep breath and resolve to embrace the sensations of rewriting, even if they aren’t always pleasant. If writing is an adventure, editing is a safari. Somewhere in the wilds of our manuscript something magnificent is hiding, waiting for us to discover it.