When it comes to editing and perfecting our novels, we need all the help we can get! Today, author and Municipal Liaison A.K. Child shares her advice for those NaNo novelists with a complete draft and who are wondering what comes next:
Whew! November is over, and if you were successful, you should have at least 50,000 words of novel sitting on your computer (and on the cloud, a few thumb drives, and in a hard copy, just in case!). And even if you didn’t quite reach 50,000, you still have the workings of a draft to your name. Some of you may have finished a novel, and others may have been working on something else, but finishing is key. Reaching those sweet, sexy words, “The End,” is just so satisfying.
For the sake of argument, let’s pretend you reached a “happily ever after,” and you have a full draft sitting there, teasing you. “You’ll never pick me up again,” it taunts in its whiney, ill-formed voice. “What will you do now?”
But that mocking pile of pages is so very wrong about your tenacity and dedication to creativity! You did manage to finish a draft. You did get to the coveted “The End.” It was all you. Don’t let that draft get the better of you now. Show it you are the master of your own destiny!
It’s time to edit!
1. Refresh
No! Wait…it might not actually be time to edit. It will be soon, I promise. First, you may want to take a break. Put your draft in the freezer. Think about something else. Binge watch all those shows you missed while you were writing in November. Detox from the caffeine overload.
Okay, now that you’ve had a rest, you can start the editing. Getting away from your piece for a little while does a couple of things. First, it keeps your mind from imploding. Second, it allows you to look at your story with fresh eyes to see the errors you might otherwise miss. Third, it gives you some time to think about things you may have skipped over, like names or that massive plot hole your characters decided it was best to cover with a tarp and never speak about.
2. Rearrange
So how does editing work? Well, that depends on your story. If you are like many writers, you may work on different scenes in random order. The first thing to do is put those scenes in logical order. Make a timeline! This will allow you to see where any gaps might exist. If you’re like me and have to write in logical order from beginning to end, you can skip this step, unless you just feel like rearranging stuff to procrastinate. Then go for it.
3. Reread
Now that you have your story put together, the best way to edit is to read it. You can do this on a screen or print out a hard copy, whatever works for you. You may want to read it aloud too (especially in public, because that’s always fun!), so you can hear the words as well as see them. The errors have a way of standing out if you perceive them differently. This is neither a fun nor fast process, but it is necessary if you expect to show your work to other people, especially if you want to publish it.
4. Review
Once you’ve gone through your story, it’s best to share the love. Find beta readers. Relatives are usually the worst, and friends aren’t much better. They may not know much about writing and may not give you critical feedback. Writer’s groups and other writers are the best reviewers, plus you’ll be able to sell your books to your friends and family and they can write reviews for you later.
I hope this gives you a small idea on how to move forward. Good luck, and let me know when you’ve published so I can read your masterpiece!
A.K. Child is originally from the West Coast but now lives on the East Coast, making a living by editing audit reports, and other writing. She has self-published two books, Steamroller and The Scow: Free Flight. A.K. is a regular participant in NaNoWriMo and is a co-Municipal Liaison for the Northern Virginia region. She also writes original graphic novels/comic books. Visit her online to learn more.
Top image licensed under Creative Commons from Sarah Browning on Flickr.
I know you don’t want to write the boring bridging scene and you think 1300 words is a pretty good word count for the first day and you don’t even have any ideas for that scene because you had ideas for the scene before and you have ideas for the scene after.
Screw that, write it anyway. Yes, it might be bad, yes you’re really not inspired and it feels very bland right now. Write it. WRITE IT. Get to 1700 words with a boring filler scene that is needed for context.
Because honestly, if you’re not into writing that boring scene now, you’re not gonna be happy to have to write it on day 25 with 8K words to catch up.
Nano isn’t about writing your best novel, you cannot always write your best, Nano is about writing the whole damn thing. Then you’ll edit and rewrite until you make it good, make it best.
2. Pay attention when you read.
I’m not saying read everyday, nobody got the energy for that, but when you do read, pay attention to the words. If the way someone blended dialogue and descriptions together flows well, write it down for later. There is only so many times you can use “As for”, “But her eyes”, “When she”. At some point you get really tired of the way you write things, it doesn’t feel like a style anymore but just the same bits of sentences, simply reorganized with different words.
So pay attention to others’ words. Being able to use a phrasing you liked in your own writing will suddenly make you feel a whole lot more talented than you felt ten seconds before. Ride the highs when you can.
3. If you’re inspired to write more, write more.
Don’t settle for the 1667 words, if you’ve got a snippet of scene teasing at you, write it, a writer’s brain is a fickle thing and we don’t want you to forget why it had to happen this way, or this amazing dialogue you made up. If you write 2K today, that’s 200words you won’t have to force out on a bad day. Do it for future you.
Thea had spoken to most of her list. Several of the passengers had alibied out the others. Wilhelmina seemed equally frustrated. Neither of them were any closer than they had been before.
Unexpectedly the feels for my 2017 NaNo project Fragments of a Stranger hit me again, so I made a moodboard with Sirius and Marlene. Would anyone be interested in hearing more about them?
As a person who is currently participating in their 9th NaNoWriMo, here are some tips I’ve picked up along the way. These may not be for everyone, but this is a list of things that I’ve found have helped me throughout the years.
I’ve said it before, but it bares repeating: do not actually kill your inner editor, hold them hostage for 50,000 words, and then let them go wild
Sometimes, it’s okay to give the inner editor tidbits. In the same vein, if you are a person who is super used to editing as you go and are worried this is going to effect your word count here’s what you do: if you think of something you wanted to change, take some parentheses at the end of the scene, and write down all of your notes on it, and just leave it there. it adds to your word count, and also makes sure you don’t forget what you wanted to add
Commercial breaks. When I first started doing NaNo, I watched a shitload of TV when I got home from school. So I started trying to challenge myself to see how much I could write in a commercial break. And I did a lot of my writing that way. I no longer watch that much TV, as I don’t have cable, but I’ve kind of adapted it to the rest of life. There’s always going to be commercial breaks in life. The time you spend in line to get your coffee. The five minutes while you’re waiting for someone. Waiting Rooms. The time it takes for your pasta water to boil. Use life’s commercial breaks. Even if you only write 100 words in those 5 minutes, it’s more than you had before. And there’s a lot of waiting involved in life.
Find a writing buddy. Actually, find a lot of writing buddies. But most importantly, find a writing buddy who writes at the same pace as you. I’ve found that I like to have the highest word count, and when I have someone who is always within a few hundred words of me, it pushes me to write that extra 100 words.
Small amounts of writing add up. This is kind of the point of the last two points, but it bares repeating. 50,000 words is a daunting task. 1,667 words a day feels like a lot less. But really, when you break it down, it’s just a 5 or 6 sessions of a few hundred. If you write 300 or so (which is my average for a 5 minute-ish commerical break, but use your own numbers), you can write almost all of your words in an hour long show.
Tell people you’re doing NaNo. Everyone in my life knows I’m doing NaNo.They know that in November, I’m always writing and not to pressure me to do things until my word counts are done for the day. Telling people helps them encourage you to do more of what you can. If you have told people you’re doing it, it makes you more likely to finish to.
Write chatty characters. This may not seem like a relevant thing, but if you’re really not feeling confident in your ability to write this many words and it just seems daunting, write chatty characters. You can always cut them down later, and along the way you may find out more about them, and more about your story itself. That’s what a first draft is about anyway. Finding out more about your story, and discovering it. So get yourself a blabbermouth, a character who is literally just talking about everything to everyone always. We all know people like that in real life. It can give your story comedic value as well, depending on what they say. I started off my very first NaNo with a character that just likes to talk all the time. And it’s great, because you can get a lot of words that way, and the ones you don’t need, you can get rid of in editing.
Along the same vein, if you write about a writer, it really helps if you have a hard time focusing on your story itself for longer stretches of time. Because then you can always write something that they wrote when you’re not feeling it, and sometimes you can find that those stories end up being really significant.
Subplots. If you’re someone who tends to get bored of writing the same thing for a longer stretch of time, subplots are your best friend. Really not feeling your MC? Well, write about one of the other characters! Give them a subplot! Why not? Sometimes those subplots can grow to be something that matters to the story. Which is great. Sometimes they don’t and that’s okay.
I’m sure I’ll have more to add at some point, but this is what I got for now.
I could not find a NaNo 2017 calendar I liked for the life of me. And the calendars I did find were either super colorful or funky in some other way.
So here are 15 calendars (as of now) you’re free to print! If you have a particular Google Font you admire, message me and I’ll make you a calendar with it. It’ll take, like, two seconds.
@writeblrconnections, and anyone else, feel free to spread the word!
To all of you who are doing Nano this year, don’t forget to search through our archives here at daily-prompts when you get stuck. We have lots of scene ideas for you, character development prompts, and MUCH more.
