As per usual, a little bit of work makes the issues seem manageable--what a relief!! I do like the second half of rule 3 and I don't necessarily think the first half is awful on like, a structural level, as much as a skill one. I'm trying not to let a vague sense of unease dictate opinion too much if I can't verbalize it, and I'm still not entirely certain, but I think it's that issue I've talked about a lot in writing where everything feels a bit too "cinematic." I'm realizing that sense goes hand in hand with the most common issue of "skimming over" a scene--in any case, it's inattentiveness, either to the events or to the form.
I just finished rereading Annihilation, which I'll write about on here soon. What I like about that book is mostly the voice of its protagonist, but it also succeeds in something my favorite author of all time fails at, and I've been really looking forward to rereading the climax for that reason! The only consistent issue I have with Naomi Novik books is that her finales feel--not rushed, actually, because it's really the opposite issue of them going on too long--but not entirely lived in, either. There's always gotta be some big magic battle and any sense of interiority with the characters is lost, which really sucks because the thing she does best is voice. Spinning Silver was possibly my favorite book I read last year, and I would struggle to tell you what actually happened in the grand finale. Always makes me think of the Hobbit, when Bilbo literally passes out during the big final battle and we don't have to sit through the whole thing. Wish that would happen more often.
I'm sure some of this issue can be chalked up to me just losing steam as a reader--I am extremely prone to skimming when I get excited about being at the end of something! so this is a problem I have with a lot of the things I read--but Annihilation is special in maintaining my attention all the way through the end, and its climax is one of my favorites. It's such a simple moment when the events are just written out, but the sense of tension is maintained the entire time, and its descriptions are even more indulgent than the rest of the book (in a good way! the descriptions are one of the big draws to this one!!) There's exactly one line that I earmarked as awkwardly written, and the odd bit was, that awkwardness didn't detract from my enjoyment even a little bit. So maybe it would be more accurate to say, it should have been awkward by literally any account, but it wasn't, because the foundations were built so solidly that a single nail with its head showing was inconsequential to the integrity of the work.
This is, I'm slowly learning, the point of it all: Not to fix every single flaw, but to make something good enough that individual flaws seem insignificant. I think this whenever I read a Naomi Novik book because of how indulgently they're written--there are so many little things that I would find tiresome if a worse writer did them, and I can imagine a reader who doesn't like her books because of all those nitpicks added up, but for me, who is so unbelievably struck by the voice of her works, none of it factors into my actual opinion even slightly.
I can't pretend to have any of that; It's plainly a matter of skill, and skill isn't something anyone can do anything about in a single moment. But! A big part of it is, like I said, attentiveness. Every single scene should feel like the author enjoyed writing it--or like it enjoyed being written--if that feeling gets through, then the reader won't feel like their time is being wasted. Which means those scenes that aren't aware of their own form, and those scenes that feel begrudging, just need some TLC! You have to fall in love with every single one!
INCREDIBLY unserious for me to be thinking about all this so deeply with what I'm writing. It never matters that much, except that it does, because if it didn't then why would you do it? Anyway, this is just the second draft, so I'll let it be awkward for now--knowing you can fix a problem makes its presence soooooo much more tolerable!