Hey all,
I am working my way through my consistency edit for “The River City Chronicles.”
Yeah, I know, hobgoblin of little minds, and all that. But in a work of fiction, consistency is king. And in a serial story, it can be especially difficult to maintain, because a) it’s written over a relatively long period of time, and b) each chapter is published and essentially set in stone almost right away, so it’s harder to go back and fix things.
And for me, c) I jumped into this too quickly, didn’t get a good head start, and took lousy notes.
Hence the consistency edit.
I have already found two deceased characters who miraculously rose from the dead later in the book, a main character who changed names, and another who changed hair color, without dye or a trip to the stylist.
And so, though I am trying very hard to keep to the same story that was told in the original serial, some changes must be made to correct out and out mistakes in the story.
I’m almost two-thirds through, and am hoping no more zombies will appear in the streets of my beloved Sacramento.
And I now have a very nice series bible to help me keep track of all the details.
So for other authors…how do you make sure you jeep your story consistent, whether it’s a serial, a short story, a novella, novel or series?