From earlier this evening (Friday…I realize that it’s now actually Saturday morning):
Starting word count: 251,218
Ending word count after revising Chapters 1 through 4: 248,678
# words cut: 2,540
There are 68 chapters in the book. If I can keep the same pace of cutting rougjly 2,500 words per 4 chapters (or 625 words per chapter, for the math challenged in the audience), I’ll be able to trim 42,500 words from my manuscript. I’d still need to trim another 10,000 words (roughly) to reach my goal, but this suddenly doesn’t seem as Sisyphean as it did. I’m still going to have to cut out a sizeable piece of the narrative somewhere to get that 10,000 word chunk, but that’s looking a lot more attractive than the 4 or 5 chunks I though I was going to have to get rid of before today. Or yesterday. Whatever.
I’m going to have to pick up the pace this weekend, though, if I’m going to get through this. And I’m still working on my pitch paragraph, so I have some a big task ahead of me.