Writing is rewriting. The first draft of a novel is commonly riddled with mistakes: the beginning doesn't grip, the characters aren't consistent, the plot has holes, the story lacks suspense, turns aren't foreshadowed and appear ex machina, the ending is dissatisfying, and so on. But that is to be expected in the normal course of things, and a revision will smooth those imperfections out.
Sometimes one rewrite is not enough and it takes a few passes to finish a novel. Tolstoy famously rewrote War and Peace seven times. Hemingway rewrote the ending to Farewell to Arms fourtyseven times.
But sometimes even accomplished writers have to give up on a project, because no amount of rewriting can overcome what appear to be fundamental flaws. Sometimes a novel cannot be salvaged – or the time and effort necessary make it unfeasible.
But how do you know? How can you tell when it is better to abandon a project, move on, and write another book? What are the warning signs that indicate reliably – or at least with a high likelihood – that a project has failed and I should divorce myself from it?
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