First Draft Of Game Over Finished!

About an hour ago, I completed the initial draft of Game Over, my first ever novel. That version is now with Julie (who's already read an earlier version that wasn't too terribly different) and Vicki (who's seen nothing of this book yet except for a few early pages that I read to her back in January to see what she thought of them). And now I wait...

Last night, I spent several hours with Julie, getting her take on what she'd read and brainstorming ideas for the book's Epilogue. Of most interest to me was her reaction to the final (pre-Epilogue) chapter, which I feel is perhaps the best writing I've ever done. I was hoping that Julie concurred, and was pleased to find that she agreed with that assessment. There are a lot of plot threads in Game Over, most of which had to be paid off in its final fifteen or so pages. I found that a very challenging task, but was extremely happy with the results after much editing and refining.

As for the Epilogue, it's potentially still a work in progress. I have one version in place now, and I'm reasonably happy with it. Julie believes that we can still make it better so I've left it with her to think about it some more now that she has the updated version, and we'll see what - if anything - comes of that. I warned Vicki that it was the portion of the book most likely to change while she was reading Draft 1, and that it shouldn't be much of a problem for her if it does.

Both ladies are pushing me to try to get this book published (rather than self publishing) but I'm on the fence there. Not only am I skeptical that any publisher would take it on, but I'm also reluctant to give up much in the way of control. Self-publishing three books already has probably spoiled me in terms of getting used to having the finished product be exactly what I want it to be. Compromise isn't a word I've had to get used to with my writing so far, and so I'm not sure how I'd do with that. But the jury's still out on this front at the moment.