I ran into this with my fourth book. It seemed to be a mess and every attempt to fix it only made the book worse.
My solution was to put it on the metaphorical shelf, and write a straightforward thriller set in the same world. Now that it’s about Eve released, I’m looking forward to getting back to the abandoned book to start a well structured rewrite.
I think that was a really clever strategy. Sometimes simply walking away (for now: luckily books don't go bad!) and giving yourself a more straightforward job that you're more confident you'll be able to do a decent job on, can make all the difference. (I use Itch posts in a similar way, sometimes!). And then, as you say, you get your energy and confidence back, and find the put-away project suddenly seems not only manageable, but actually quite alluring! Good luck!
I ran into this with my fourth book. It seemed to be a mess and every attempt to fix it only made the book worse.
My solution was to put it on the metaphorical shelf, and write a straightforward thriller set in the same world. Now that it’s about Eve released, I’m looking forward to getting back to the abandoned book to start a well structured rewrite.
I think that was a really clever strategy. Sometimes simply walking away (for now: luckily books don't go bad!) and giving yourself a more straightforward job that you're more confident you'll be able to do a decent job on, can make all the difference. (I use Itch posts in a similar way, sometimes!). And then, as you say, you get your energy and confidence back, and find the put-away project suddenly seems not only manageable, but actually quite alluring! Good luck!