One thing not to do when prewriting

I've started reading Holly Lisle's Secret Texts again. Fine ... but I'm also in the formative stages of a new fantasy world. There's no chance of the trilogy making an impact on Cold Witness (how different could the subject matter be?), but it's almost certain to influence worldbuilding for The Riven Path.

One big, ugly similarity I've noticed is the use of crater lakes and seas. Holly's world of Matrin is peppered with them, although most are over a thousand miles across. My western continent (that's Arca) has one big crater sea about 300 miles wide, plus an expanse of land known as Koiran's Belt that is covered with much smaller ones. The origin is different--the craters in Matrin were caused by the Wizard's War, whereas those in Arca were caused by a mixture of natural disaster and riven-nuclear bombardment--but they look damn similar on the map.

I'm proud to say that the magic system, social structure and technology of Arca is very different to that of Matrin. No chance of contamination there. But it's almost certain that something will pass between The Secret Texts and The Riven Path, probably without me even knowing it.

Good news: I'm out of my mini-block period and steaming toward the next major hurdle, the quarter-waypoint. Amazingly, although I'm adding material in the second draft, I'm currently ten pages behind the original in terms of length. This is great news! I always wanted to cut it down to size. I suppose this means my writing is tighter and less "waffly"? Only the coveted Final Draft will tell.