How to Write a Novel in 37 Easy Steps- Part Three

Here's a lesson I hope most junior high school kids learn- the first draft is not the final draft. It should be nowhere near what you hand in! As a writer, that's even more true.

In part two of this series, I had just finished writing and assembling the rough/first draft. All of the individual chapters were done and sewn together into one manuscript. Now that my tears of joy have subsided, what next?

I take a week or two off and step away from it. That may not work for your 9th-grade English paper, but for me, it lets me see it with fresher eyes. Even after a week or two I can go back, read my work, and say, "Wow, I wrote that?" It's truly amazing what fresh eyes will do. Foreshadowing- I'll say that again someday!

I read through, looking for continuity issues. If they're walking on one page and flying in the next, I'd better have written about them getting on the plane! I am also on the lookout for grammar/spelling issues. And for what they call "echoes" in the biz. It's when an author fixates on a particular word and uses it several times in describing the same scene.  

More importantly, I'm looking for plot and how the story flows. Big-picture ideas that will have to be addressed on a major scale. If something big is wrong, how am I to fix it?

First drafts suck. There's simply no other way to say it. Once I realized that, I also realized that they're meant to be revised. This is where the craft of writing comes into play. What makes a good scene? What makes good writing? Does this add to the story? Are the characters who I want them to be? My goodness, the list of questions is long!

So now begins a painstaking, page-by-page, paragraph-by-paragraph, reread and rewrite, looking for ways to make things better. It may be as simple as providing a little backstory to a character. I have an antagonist who is obsessed with stopping my protagonists...but why? I didn't appreciate how that wasn't clear until this read-through. It took a couple of short bits of writing to introduce his wife and three little girls AND how he was afraid of them not having a future. He was scared and wanted to make sure they had a life. Now he's not just a cookie-cutter bad guy. 

Other times, less is more. I had a draft chapter that was nothing more than talking heads. Just two people talking about stuff. No matter how brilliant that dialogue is, it's boring! Even I cringed. The first step was to cut/erase words. Lots of words. Words that didn't matter. Then I changed it to them doing something active, which inspired some conversation. That conversation let them play off one another's ideas and move the story forward. It turned out to be about 1/2 page less writing. 

Russian writer Anton Chekov famously said, "Don't tell me the moon was full, tell me of the moonlight's reflection on the broken glass." That was his way of saying "show, don't tell."  For example, "the sky was pretty." B-O-R-I-N-G! But seeing it in the draft lets me say, "The clouds were backlit by the sun, turning them into cotton candy-colored puffs that drifted across the pastel blue sky. The rising sun eased its way above the horizon, casting its rays on the placid water. Blinding? Yes, but the beauty was worth a quick look, and always would be." The skeleton of the first draft is getting some muscle! 

I've learned that "filler words" are bad. Words like "very" and "just" are good examples. We use them every day when we speak, but in writing they just aren't very good. Oh, wait, let me rephrase that! In writing, those words are weak and should be replaced by stronger, more meaningful words. See how the second draft of that sentence is more descriptive? Me, too.

That idea then rolls into other words. "They walked to the store." Changing "walked" to something else can change and describe a lot. What if they hurried to the store? Or if they strolled. Or staggered, strutted, or tromped? All of those convey something that can add to a story. And yes, I'd like to thank the good folks at Merriam-Webster.com for all of their help.

Adverbs- the bane of every writer's existence. Adverbs are easily and quickly written. Dang it, I mean they are words that have minimal descriptive value and the author can get them on the page as fast as their fingers can type. Still, I would argue that sometimes using the lowly adverb is the way to go. Sometimes you want to say "he danced clumsily across the floor," and move on to the next idea that's the more important one. The beautiful thing about writing is that in the end, the final decisions are mine. All mine.

Last but not least, I let the machines help. I run spellcheck over the whole document and then run it through a program called "Grammarly" which helps identify grammar issues. I then take or leave what they suggest. 

Next time, we'll move on to the much scarier part of writing! Letting other people read it.