Post the Nineth: A-Version Therapy

Apologies for the lack of posts lately.  It's been a mad month in the Day Job, as well in the Personal Life, and quite frankly I'm still not sure how I woke up this morning to find myself only a few days away from the clocks going back.  I'm sure someone owes me a large portion of October somewhere down the line.  Things will calm down soon hopefully and I'll be able to get into some kind of routine of publishing posts.

The Manuscript - in all its imperfect glory!
(photo: Jack Gilbert)

So what have you missed? Well, the good news is that my Proof Reader has finished proof-reading THE WICKEDEST WAR, thus becoming the second person (one of my beta-readers was the first) to have read both the 1994 original version and the 2014 reboot.  The general feedback was very positive. That was a huge relief to me, especially when you consider that his main observation of the original was "it's a good yarn full of thud and blunder".

So, I took a break from compiling the TWW bible - yes, it's taking much longer than I thought it would - and I started going through the marked-up manuscript.

There's only one marked-up manuscript, which is just as well because when I came to correct the electronic copy I found that it the digital versions have been fruitful and multiplied.


I'm not intending that to be some clever metaphor, I really do believe that my novel has been secret procreating on my hard disk whenever my back is turned.  OK, I don't totally believe that but it's looking pretty credible compared to the alternatives.  I mean, how else could I find five different copies of the first draft of the first twelve chapters?  I'm sure there was just the one master copy.  No, it appears I've got over twenty!

Ah.  Yes.  Hmmm.

Hello, my name is Jack Gilbert and I have a version control problem. I think the only way to deal with it is version therapy (as apposed to aversion therapy).

The problem appears to be down to the different environments the book has to occupy and the different reasons certain versions have to exist.  For example when I'm writing it I work with individual chapters so that I don't have to wade through lots of text to find where I was.  It also helps focus the mind on the relevant section being written.  It's also less taxing for my ageing netbook.  There are also dead ends where the story goes in a direction that doesn't feel right at the time, but is too good to throw away.  Just in case.

And then there are the various devices on which I write, read and store the novel.  I mostly write on my netbook, but sometimes I write on the PC because the screen is bigger and the desk arrangement is more comfortable.  Or if I'm really travelling light on my tablet, or phone (although I've yet to try actually writing anything more than a note on my phone).

Then there are the epub versions for reading it on the Kobo to see if reading it like a book - rather than a report on a monitor screen - exposes any previously undiscovered insights.  But where there's an epub version there's a Word DOCX document not far behind because not every application likes the open source ODF format.

Then there are the various drafts, the back-ups and the versions with comments. Oh, the list seems never-ending.  So you see why I feel like my novel has turned into an infestation of words that's breeding when I'm not looking,

The answer is, of course, very simple.  I've got to be more disciplined and better organised.  For a start I've got to cut down on the number so places I keep copies and I've got to identify each version very clearly.  There seems to be a veritable mountain of advice on the Internet regarding document version control and sorting the chaff from the wheat is an interesting challenge in its own right.  So if you have any advice, or methods that work for you please do let me know.  The theory is all fine, but it's even better when it's been actually been used by someone.

At least I now have a definitive Second Draft (Beta 2.0) copy of THE WICKEDEST WAR.  It's just a shame that once the Beta Readers have finished with it I'll have to change it all again for the Third Draft.

Roll on version 2.1

Or should that be 3.0?

Oh, no.  Here we go again...