Things change quickly when you’re in an edit phase. I’m currently in the “Story Structure” edit phase – a crucial edit phase most writers don’t know about and don’t do.
Yes, I’ll do a book in a year or so on the edit process – what it is and isn’t (fifteen steps you MUST DO) or some other gotcha title.
Anyway.
Inciting incident should be 8500 words. I knocked it back to 7900, so that I could add back in a vignette scene that was important. There’s a few more I’d like to add, but almost no way to add them in, unless I do a prequel. With the new scene, I now have to take out 489.
Act 1 should be at 21,250, and I need 1434 words after the inciting incident to make it right.
Act 2a is undersize by 8813 words.
Act 2b is undersize 2222 words.
Act 3 is oversized by 9327 words, so I either must cut out scenes or words. You definitely don’t want the ending to feel like it drags.
More progress coming soon.
