meet me at the moon

katelyn; writing blog not ready to wake up, when real life feels like dreaming

[malewifegradyruewen]

writing is so fun

[malewifegradyruewen]

i hate writing so much

[malewifegradyruewen]

this is so frustrating

[malewifegradyruewen]

i’m a literal god at writing

[ofstcrlights]

is it still the bury your gays trope if the lesbian survives but the straight girl she had feelings for dies?

[childhoodgrave]

“omg how do u come up w this stuff” well ive been plagued by visions since birth

[romanticpreraphaelite]

when Oscar Wilde said “There seemed to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured by romance.” i felt that.

[valtsv]

girl help the character i created for a joke has a detailed tragic backstory and epic lore now

[ofstcrlights]

me: ruby and stella aren’t girlfriends also me: stella being able to recognise ruby by her perfume (even after years of not seeing each other and says that it’s something she’d recognise anywhere), being happiest to see ruby out of all of her old friends, ruby smiling one (1) time all day and it’s because of stella

and i’m still on the first page 

[liquidstar]

“rival” is just code for love interest 

[ayo-cowbelly]

nobody:

me trying to write:

[versenkt]

nothing feels as good as starting to read again when you haven’t held a book in your hand for such a long time and now the setting sun is in your room and there’s paper under your fingers and you feel so good about letting the words float into you again

[writeouswriter]

[thewritingwarrior]

STOP

Every time you see this post on your dash, open up your WIP and write one sentence. It doesn’t matter if the sentence is good, makes sense or works perfectly with your story. You can go back to edit it later. 

Congrats, you made some progress on your WIP!

Make sure to reblog to help fellow writers make progress on their wip!

[the-violet-writer]

Everytime this post comes up, I go “DAMNIT!” but then I end up writing a lot and I get proud of myself so. Keep reblogging this!

[buckysredhenley]

love me some enemies to friends to lovers trope

[missreinarabbit]

[s-graves-writes]

How to Edit a First Draft

Or, how my WIP evolved from the nightmare that was draft two to the almost novel-like draft three.

My method for editing first drafts usually takes about two steps. 

Read it over.

Scrap it and rewrite the whole thing. 

Well, it’s a bit more complicated than that. I know, I know. It sounds really, really harsh. But with a first draft, you aren’t really editing it, you’re rewriting it. Because first drafts? They suck. Especially if you’re just starting out. 

Finishing a first draft can feel so good. You just wrote a shit-ton of words, and now you’re done! That’s how I felt when I finished my first draft (or, rather, second draft in this case, but that’s only because my first draft was a half-finished pile of trash that I won’t be counting for the purposes of this post). 

I mean, it’s how I wanted to feel. I was proud of the 50,000-odd words that I’d written, but I knew that it was full of structural problems, pacing issues, and even characterization. (Plus my main villain sucked. Like, really sucked.) 

So, without further ado, here are the slightly less simplified steps to rewriting that first draft: 

1. Get out a notebook, read over your manuscript, and take notes. 

Take notes on every scene. Ask yourself, is this scene necessary? Is it well-written?

Take notes on any ideas you have for improving the story. Would it be better if the love interest was also secretly a spy? Great! Now you have an interesting subplot. Write it down. 

Don’t get caught up in the little things. Does it say a character has blue eyes on one page and claim they’re green on the next? Are there a lot of grammar mistakes? Who cares. Is one of your characters consistently acting out-of-character? That’s a problem you should take note of. 

2. Find what’s wrong with it. 

There’s probably something wrong with your first draft. There’s probably a lot of things wrong. Are the characters flat/inconsistent? Is it rushed? Is the plot nonexistent/all over the place? Recognizing the problems is the first step to fixing them. 

3. Re-Outline

Even if you don’t outline, after reading over your first draft, you should probably make one. Even if the plot of your first draft was perfect, you should still write down the progression of events and how they fit together.

This will help during rewriting, and also to work out any issues you have in the plot. 

For me, this included brainstorms, timelines, and character arcs. 

4. Take the salvageable scenes from the first draft and put them in a document labeled “Draft 1 Highlights.” 

You’ll be very tempted to take the scenes you like and copy-paste them directly into the new draft. DO NOT DO THIS. Just don’t. Chances are, by the time you get to them, the story will be shifted. You’ll also limit the freedom of taking the plot in a better direction if you feel obligated to include pre-written scenes. 

Make sure to hold onto the first draft. I’ve used the first draft as reference several times during the re-writing process, especially toward the end, where the first and second drafts overlap a bit more. Even so, even if the scenes are similar, never copy-paste. Open the first draft in a second window and look at it as you rewrite. Your second draft will be better for it. 

5. Start writing. 

You’re not going to get anywhere if you don’t start writing. When it came to my manuscript, I wrote about three or four first chapters before I found one that worked (and ended up using one of the earlier beginnings as a flashback later on.) And if you want, you can go out of order! It’s up to you, and everything depends on the level of revisions your WIP needs. 

I hope this helps!

[aye-write]

I have a Problem

[holistic-fandoms]

i don't care about the actual plot, as long as your story has a group of flawed yet loveable misfits who, despite all odds, find a family in each other, I will love it

[ofstcrlights]

how do you guys decide on a title for your books/wips?