Ripping it out and starting over

So I was four chapters into my new novel ("Project X") and things were flowing--it was a pleasure to write, the words were coming without effort, yadda yadda etc.

And then I realized that I'd taken a wrong turn (or, more precisely, a wrong tone), so I dismantled it, ripped it all out, and started over, using some of the stuff from the first draft, but throwing most of it away.

It's better now. Much better. But it doesn't flow out of me any more; each sentence takes a tremendous effort, as if I'm polishing while I go.

I wish I was one of those writers who could do what Calvin Trillin called a "vomit out"--where you just get a manuscript down on the page and then polish and torture it to death later. But I can't; each sentence, each paragraph, gets edited as it goes, which is probably a side effect of so many years writing for newspapers.

How do you work? Is there a "vomit out" and a series of polishes later, or is it edit-as-you-go? Because this feels terribly...well, inorganic, for lack of a better word.

Comments

I spew and then polish. Sometimes it shows, but for the most part it works for me.

I also write in linear fashion. If I don't have the first line, I can't write the story. It can sometimes take days to come up with the right one, but unless I have it, the story goes nowhere.

R