Two years ago I began writing a collection of Palestinian folktales. I finished the rough draft of volume one: retellings of Palestinian fables and animal stories when I had to change computers. I was using Scrivener and *thought* I had responsibly backed up the file. I had not. It was gone.
Undaunted, I started over. In praise of beat sheets, I had kept a notebook filled with beats for each and every story in the collection so rewriting them was more pleasure than pain. There’s a property of revision I like to call ‘pancaking.’ If I write the same piece over a few times, not editing–completely rewriting it–I discover new angles that enrich the piece. Still, it was just a bit disheartening to have the whole book ahead of me, again.
Until now, because I found the draft! I can finally fully move on to the second draft phase. I’ve refilled my pen with Noodler’s Antietam, which is a amusing shade of red that is very like blood (I sent some to a friend who was then forbidden to use it at work because smears looked a little disturbing).
As it stands, the restored draft is ninety pages long, and contains fourteen short stories based on Palestinian fables and animal stories. Most of the sources come from the Ottoman period, but there are one or two from more recent collections. Additionally, there are a dozen or so pages of pancakes that will get folded in. They’re good pancakes.
It’s editing time! And… time to fret over the illustrations. Be sure to follow this blog to hear more about the process of bringing this book together!
Leave a Reply