Oh, good luck with your novel, anon! I accidentally wrote "good love" at first--well, that too!

Yes, thwacking. With beading, I would think, you have to take everything apart, which is a lot more like starting over. Though actually, what thwacking really is is working with pieces, and putting them in the right order, sometimes adding pieces to enhance other pieces, which I would imagine is a lot like beading. COOL.