I had to stop yesterday afternoon when I realized that I was about to reveal the person running the antagonists' show and it was someone who had never appeared in the book to that point. I consider that to be really rude and unfair. If a character is that important, he or she must at least show up in the early stages. It doesn't have to be in a particularly suspicious role at the time, which makes the big reveal a solid shocker, but the reader must already know of this character. The peak of the action is not the time to stop and introduce an entirely new character. That would be not only unfair to the reader, but it would ruin the pacing as well. I always want the reader to get to the climax, learn the true nature of the enemy, and say, "Why didn't I see that coming?"
Anyway, I had deleted some stuff from the older version of the book which introduced the knowledge of a baddie (notice, I'm not divulging the gender here), but it happened so late in the game, it still seemed weak and slightly underhanded. Instead, I needed someone who had already been mentioned and yet could fulfill the role I needed to fill. Last night, it hit me, but the decision required considerable editing of the old climax scene, plus insertion of another exchange, innocuous, closer to the start. Also, with the other changes, i.e., the time frame, I need to make sure that what is revealed in this climax fits with the revised plot lines.
Whew! Sometimes it's hard to write about the writing process without revealing too much!
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