Kurt R.A. Giambastiani

As I’ve been working on this story, re-creating it from an older model, I’ve been watching over my work. Supervising, if you will.

Overall, the new version is half-again as long–originally around 8,000 words, it now clocks in at about 12,000–and I wondered if that was just because I added a scene here and there.

So I took the opening section. The action is the same. The first and last lines of the section are the same, like fenceposts. But the rest of it has been entirely rebuilt, rewritten, similar only in structure and in what happens. So, what’s the word-count for each version?

Original: 203 words.

Re-creation: 325 words.

Half-again as long.

This story is a character piece. In reading over the new version, it feels like a play; there aren’t many settings–office, home, lab–and no large action sequences. It’s my experimentation with characterization, with backstory, and with internal struggles and so it’s a quieter, more thoughtful piece than it would otherwise be. Lovers of action fiction will say that “nothing happens” and I’ll be okay with that. It has no explosions, no car chases, no gunfights. Not even any real shouting matches.

But it does have conflict. Plenty of conflict.

What I’m finding is that, as a young writer, I didn’t have much patience for thinking things through. As a result, neither did my characters. They looked at the situation, made a decision, and moved on with the plot. What I’ve always liked about this piece, though, is the depth of the ideas it contains, and so in this re-creation I’m giving that depth the inspection it deserves. That takes time.

About half-again as much, it seems.

k