conversation with ted

Me, worried: I’m at the climactic battle & I’m only 75k into the book.

Ted, phlegmatic: You’re at the end, Catie. It always takes you until the third draft to get the end right.

Me: But I don’t know if I’ve got 20k of wrap-up!

Me, hours later: Oh, shit, I see what he was saying. It DOES always take me multiple drafts to get the end right & this whole book is The End. Riiiiiiight. Okay. No wonder this is so messed up.

I have, in fact, completed the climactic battle, and all that’s left is the wrap-up. I then have to go back and fix it significantly, because it’s going to come in at about 85K for this draft (which is unheard of: I never come in that short. *Never*.), but I believe Ted nailed it. The whole The End factor here is really bolloxing me up.

But at this stage, basically? The Walker Papers are, in effect, done.