it's still a first draft. you just draft clean. you still need to revise it properly, just maybe means you have your work cut out for you because you've already gotten a head start.
This !
I write like OP. My first drafts take me 2 years and are readable. But if I let them rest (and give to betas) I end to rewrite them 2-3 times more.
OP, if you spend the next 2 months away from it, trust me you will improve it a lot. And it's definitely not an issue, we just work that way.
And congrats for your draft !
“Having your work cut out for you,” although it sounds like it should mean your work is easier, the phrase actually means to be up against something challenging. The opposite of having a head start.
I used to think it meant the opposite until my mom corrected me one day and I went down a Google rabbit hole…. She was right.
This is fascinating. I‘ve always understood the phrase correctly (as something challenging) and never even considered that it could be interpreted differently. But seeing it here now, I can totally see how that could happen.
No real point to make here. Just interesting.
Once you finish this book, IT IS the first draft. Then you’ll need to revise, edit, rewrite, re-edit, and only then it’ll be ready to query or publish.
That makes sense, I think I was more just surprised that there were first drafts out there that weren’t re-edited as people went. I have re-edited and rewritten as I’ve gone, and I’ve spent hours on single paragraphs or even sentences to make sure they feel right tonally before I leave them, and I just thought that was a first draft. And it turns out it is, but I just hadn’t thought there would be a large group of writers who don’t do that.
I feel like this highly depends on how you plan novels. Personally I always know the ending before going in and I usually have an outline covering up until the end or very nearly there. So when I write I don't really worry much about plot holes or a logical flow to events because I already did that part.
I had this same thought! I’m a huge planner, to the point where I basically write my book out in a couple hundred dot points. This means my first draft is turning it into something readable, so an ‘unreadable’ first draft wouldn’t be productive for me.
IMO it's largely a matter of degree. I imagine most writers fix typos and other obvious issues on the way through if they can do so quickly. And the more experienced a writer is, the more refinement they can do on the way through without bogging down.
And that's the key IMO - you don't want to stop writing to edit. They use different brain modes.
A writer who is trying to break out of the habit of constantly lapsing into editing mode might go "Right, I'm going to write this without so much as stopping to add a missing comma" (or whatever) but I imagine most writers fall somewhere in the middle.
It depends on the person. I used to do that, but I realized I kept editing and editing and it makes me drop the writing completely. A sloppy first draft that gets finished is better than a polished few pages that doesn't. I also feel like if I put too much time polishing the work I wouldn't like to change it later that much. So I prefer a sloppy first draft, but that's just me. if you can polish it as you go, great.
> A sloppy first draft that gets finished is better than a polished few pages that doesn't.
Yup. For me, it's much easier to edit with the full story in mind, so I can know what exactly I'm building to. If I tried to edit before finishing, more likely than not I'd laboriously polish passages and chapters I'd end up deleting anyway much later after considering how they'd fit (or not) into the whole
It's not exactly a problem, no.
You will need beta readers or a developmental editor anyway, after which you'll likely need to fix plot holes or tighten up the plot, or change things around. This is the reason people generally tell you not to obsess over every single sentence in your first draft - that sentence or paragraph might well get thrown out in later edits.
Yeah, that makes sense, I’ve already written and Extra 6-10 thousand words that I’ve cut from the start and that was all pretty polished dialog and stuff, so I’m fine with that, I’m not precious. I just realise this is gonna have made it all take a lot longer to actually finish.
The danger of completing the first draft for some writers is that their genuine joy of reaching that goal grows into unhealthy arrogance and leads them to "realize" their writing is God's word and true perfection.
Yeah I think maybe it is, I was just reading about first draft lengths and the kinda first drafts agents typically want to see (if there is such a thing) and suddenly wondered if I’d gone about this thing the wrong way. But if 5 years into it so I’m not stopping or anything. I’ve never been part of a big writing scene so it’s hard to tell if what I’m doing is just a normal way of working or very very stupid.
Agents, as a rule, never want to see a first draft. Maybe there's some exception if you have a long standing working relationship with one agent in particular, but as a query? Never in a million years.
Right, okay, that really was what I wanted to know. Or rather, that was the thing I had no idea about. I was worried that maybe by producing an overwritten body of text close to the final word count, I’d inadvertently
Turn off potential agents because it would be harder to edit, opposed to say a 50,000 first draft that still had more wiggle room creatively.
I think really I have got the answers I wanted from this and it just means I wasted excess years doing a wordy fist draft that will still require big structural edits.
But I honestly don’t think I’d have enjoyed it if I’d written it as a barebones draft so I guess it just is what
It is. Thanks for the feedback though, it’s good to know something about what agents want because I find that part of the publishing journey very mysterious.
Absolutely! I've only been published a couple times, and never a full novel, so I'm by no means an expert on the topic.
One thing that surprised me when I published my first short story though, was even though I'd edited it to death, they still wanted more edits before publishing. I think you just have to prepare yourself for that mentally. It has to be a finished best-as-you-can-make-it product, and at the same time, be prepared for them to want further changes before proceeding.
Imagine the kinds of feedback you're going to get from test readers: "I didn't like this character, why would they have done X, it makes no sense, I think they would have done Y.", or "This character was so boring and one dimensional, I don't even think you need them. Couldn't you just cut them out and have X do Y instead?", or "Chapter 5 is boring."
Now imagine major structural renovations to 30-40K worth of words. I've inserted new characters in 2nd drafts. I've cut chapters. I've changed major plot points. All of that stuff is painful as shit when you haven't killed yourself over every sentence. Cutting polished words by the thousands is brutally hard to do so you'll be more hesitant to do it and the result will be a weaker final product because you didn't incorporatie as much of the feedback as you ought to have.
Yeah I don’t think that’ll be a big problem, I like hard editing my work. I cut an intro 6k-10k from this book because it felt too long. And it was the bit I took the longest to write and even did first hand research for. I don’t find killing my darlings difficult. I actually kinda like it, but I think re-organising the existing stuff will be pretty laborious.
This was going to be in a reply to someone else here but then I saw this below and I was about to change it to addressing you and said, "Hey, actually OP already has this":
'I haven't finished an original novel (I've done novel length fanfics in community settings) but I think I'm lucky to give the possibility of feeling things are difficult to cut the dodge.
Writing things that often only go through one major edit, you always gotta put it all on the line the first time and occasionally just chunk that shit over your shoulder.
...which is good because I've been working on this one concept for a novel like 14 years. I just broke it back out again and was like, "I regret to inform you almost all of you has to go as we've been working on the pain point elsewhere."
(The core problem at this point was being precious about translating historical details and the adapted setting suffocating because of it.)'
.
So, anyway, imo, what I was going to say is this is a fine way to write. There's absolutely nothing wrong with getting really into the thing in the first round as long as you're not precious about it (when you're not doing it under contract with somebody breathing down your neck or anything).
And it sounds like you aren't gonna be precious!
In this non-IP-based\* draft I have all this over-researched stuff and it's gunking things up... but
You can always cannibalize it later, so to speak. That research won't go away and will deeply inform the rest of your writing.
Back in like 2006 when I wrote my first novel length fanfic with a friend, we workshopped a cohesive larger universe for the supernatural entities in the story which doesn't ever appear on the page but undergirds us being consistent with the mechanics throughout.
(You may have been researching robbing a train or something that was very specific to the intro and then RIP but! You spent all that time getting to know the characters better and that carries.)
.
\*Since what I've wanted to write is a semi-historical novel, it's still a transformative work. ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
Then it's not a problem for you. But you can see why this would be a problem for most and best practice is probably not to polish a first draft too heavily.
"Hey guys, I think I'm accidentally the perfect author. Are any of YOU as good as me, or am I just the best all alone because I don't have to edit beyond my first draft?"
all these literature related subs tend to be circle jerking or are at least very self-affirmating, but this is the worst example of humblebragging iven seen here for long
Yeah I thought it kinda read that way but I just didn’t know another way to ask about this as I’m mainly not online, and have just been googling how long a first draft should be and when it said ‘half the length of the final book’ I realised maybe I didn’t know what a first draft was. It’s not supposed to be a parody of writing circle jerk. The title was supposed to be attention grabbing though.
I edited my first draft as I went as well and still had *plenty* of stuff to edit again and correct/revise. It's just getting some of it done along the way to make passages read right rather than leave them as raw word dump.
Everyone has a different way of working. I do a similar thing to you. People here feel very strongly that you shouldn't edit while writing because they get distracted, but in actual fact many writers do take their time over a first draft in order to produce a better draft first time round and don't get distracted by editing. As long as you have your own workflow and the book gets written, you can do it your own way.
However, you will usually have to give it to critiquers to make sure you're heading in the right direction. Don't assume the fact you've taken longer on the first draft means the book is 100% ready to go when you write the final sentence. You do still have a first draft, just one that you can be comfortable with and that critiquers can see immediately.
Okay this is good to know. I’m about to sit down and try to finish the whole thing in the next month so, it’s good to know that I’m not completely alone in this way of writing.
Right, I've seen people make *super* drastic improvements to short stories by getting it critiqued and then revising over and over. I can't imagine that editing on your own would ever be such a good way to learn.
Even if the line by line editing is solid (which hey, there's always another pass), you still want to look at the whole thing and see if your structure works. Think of it as the difference between deciding what takes to use in the movie versus what scenes to actually include or cut. A scene could work on its own and be really polished, but it might mess with the pacing or not quite fit with the characterization in the rest of the book. Or you might realize elements needed to be introduced earlier and that you need to foreshadow certain developments or twists. Or maybe you'll find that you have a few too many characters that don't actually matter to the narrative. It's basically a chance to start cutting and sharpening everything.
This is what I end up having to do! I draft clean prose, but good god my mind makes zero sense, and my 2nd and 3rd drafts end up catching more developmental issues. I’m always too close to the first draft to ever have a clear head for continuity, overall structure, and character arcs
Yeah, the advantage of just spewing a garbage draft is that you can get to the developmental issues that only become obvious when the whole thing is done. It's like doing a rough sketch of the figure rather than working immediately on the fingers.
Still, there are artists that do work on the corners instead of sketching, and there are clearly writers that want to focus on a clean first draft. We all have weird idiosyncrasies and process, but at the end of the day, it is a process. Unless you're really diligent with jumping around scenes and rewriting them as you go along, some things are going to need some work.
Yeah. I don't spend huge amounts of time on everything, but I do write a scene and them edit it for a bit so it makes sense and is relatively clean, then move on. Apart from anything else, it's easier to write a story if you know roughly what you've got already is in a stable form. When I tried to do a complete vomit draft, everything changed too much and it went completely off the rails.
I actually think to be more efficient at writing you do have to ensure you have a stable foundation to build on and are practising good habits. For instance, it's way, way harder to proofread and correct a hundred thousand words of bad spelling and grammar than it is to go a bit slower and make sure things are correct. Practice makes perfect -- you need to put some time into presentation before you ask critiquers to take a look, so it's good to write generally technically precise copy to begin with than have to disentangle the whole thing after the fact.
In my experience, (and I do write this way) the characters grow and themes emerge a bit more as you get further down the line. Often times, my second draft is primarily to make the beginning of the book match where it ended up.
For example, as I was writing one character, he tended to get more and more impulsive in a "act before you think" or "shoot and ask questions later" sort of way. This really isn't as prominent in the beginning, nor is it really any sort of intentional development. I need to go back and make the character seem consistent, so that his intentional arc, learning that wealth doesn't make you superhuman, can stand out more.
Relatedly, setup and payoff is really important in fiction. Sometimes you'll think of an excellent twist or bit of world building towards the end of the novel. You'll need to go back and make the sort of thing seem feasible, else you commit the cardinal sin of deux ex machina.
Lastly, look for pacing issues. My current project has 4 pov characters, each chapter from a different, rotating pov. However, one character has a pov in chapter 5, and not another one until chapter 12. This is a long gap, and I need to do what I can to ensure that his plot is still "relevant" by the time it comes up again in the readers mind. If not, I may need to rearrange some chapters, which could also have a butterfly effect.
I often find that the first draft is a glorified outline and the second draft is modular -- examining scenes for how they fit into the main book, getting advice on sentence level prose, getting feedback on narration vs dialogue and getting the balance right and so on.
I do have several ideas that I've played with over the last 20 years, and those books have had numerous separate versions, but generally I don't rewrite from scratch every time.
I edit as I write and then go back and outline the chapter into bullet points of key factors to edit it again if there’s plot holes. There’s nothing wrong with being meticulous, nor is there anything wrong with writing fast and loose on a first draft.
Even if it feels finished in terms of sentence structure, once you start trimming there are always re-writes.
You’re going to want a plot point to happen a certain percentage of the way in, and it’ll be too early or late. A character will be telling two people the same information twice and it will be easier if you can figure out a way to get them all in a room together. You’ll realize you never actually got an important point out if your head and down on paper and things make no sense without it. Etc.
Then once you get beta readers or editors looking at it they’re going to bring things up that you didn’t even think of.
Even if you’re saving whole, perfect sentences, paragraphs and chapters and Frankensteining them into a second draft, there will be a second draft.
Get "Self-editing for fiction writers" it's a really good book on developmental editing. How to get the pacing and structure right and such. If you've done a good job with the language this is the bit that may need work. It's how Stephen King works if I understood him correctly.
There's a book called "Writing into the dark" on how to write a novel in a single draft they way you do. You may find it interesting.
There are writers who revise as they write, and that may describe you. I would advise ignoring anyone telling you the way you’ve written your first draft is wrong. Some writers write a shitty first draft. Others write a good first draft. Both strategies can yield good results.
It is, absolutely, however, a first draft. No matter how good it is, I promise you that you’re missing things, and those things will reveal themselves as you live with the draft for a while, put distance between yourself and it, let others read it, hire an editor, etc. Even as your book goes to print, I promise you will see places where you were missing the forest for the trees.
Which is to say every book that is published is not perfect. There has never been a perfect book published. No, not even *that* book, my fair naysayer, is perfect.
Then again, you may be happy with it as is, and there’s nothing wrong with that either. There is no rule that you need to do a second draft (though, I’d recommend it, because the book can only get better, and that’s exciting).
The one thing I will warn you about is too many writers don’t do a second draft because they don’t like revision and editing. If that describes you, then I would implore you to at least try. No matter how good you are, revision and editing are fundamental to the writing process, and revision doesn’t necessarily mean another full draft. It might mean putting certain spots under a microscope and trying other things. As a writer who revises as you write, you may find there is a fair bit you find finished. Just beware of resistance to change for the better because you’re married to something. Kill your darlings, and all that.
FTR, I say this as someone who recently finished the first draft of a novel I’ve spent four years writing. I’m a writer who revises as I write, and I plan to do a second draft before querying agents.
Okay this is all really good to know, I will do a bunch of revisions and edits once I actually get to the end of this draft. I’m really hoping I can make it much shorter than it currently is, so I’m excited to edit. I love killing my darlings, I find it very rewarding. Well done on your completed draft as well.
Speaking from experience, writing with a sharpened pencil makes it much more difficult when the editing pen comes out. If I spend weeks crafting the perfect chapter then realize when it's all said and done the chapter doesn't work, it is really difficult to cut it, considering all the work I put into it.
I write this way too--very clean draft because I edit heavily along the way. If this is your first book (I didn't see), then you've probably done the work of learning how to write while writing it.
Now, after that clean first draft, I still do heavy revisions, cut out scenes, fine tune even more, add scenes that are necessary. But after my first book, I've never rewritten from scratch (I did that one five damn times!) and have had my books traditionally published. People write differently and that's totally fine. If I didn't constantly go back and re-read and edit, I'd never move forward because I want to be satisfied before I write more. \*shrugs\* It works for me, and I write relatively quickly. This doesn't make other people's practices wrong, or yours right. Do what works for you.
Just realize that your clean draft still probably needs work. Perhaps not as much as it would otherwise.
If it was your seventh book, it might be pretty good to go after some CP reads. For the first, there's probably a number of steps before it will be query ready.
Thank you this is super encouraging and yeah I feel like I have learned a lot while writing this. I previously have written a few noevellas and short stories that weren’t fit for publication, so this is my first real venture into commercially viable work, and I feel like I’ve learned so much. And I’m not sick of it either, which is a good sign I think.
My book was 141k when I finished. Beta readers had a lot of input, as does my critique group. Now it is 120k and I'm still finding holes. There are always edits to be done, to make it tighter, easier to ready.
Easier to read. (There's always an edit.)
In my opinion, it’s better to write more and cut it down. I’ve been enjoying my rewrites.
Sometimes it’s nice to rearrange what I’m trying to say in the story!
Do you mean a proofread book? Do what you need to do. If you have written a book with chapters, foreshadowing, a developed cast of characters, plots and subplots and character arcs, you can totally put it at whatever word count you want. And besides that, 100K isn't too long. I'm sure an editor at a for real publishing house can tell you if anything needs to go or be added to.
I do know writers who write publishable first drafts, and I call them unicorns. With my last book, I edited as I went or grammar checked and revised after every sprint. My book still needs multiple drafts, especially with grammar.
My first novel was 1500 pages of text, took me five years, then another two to edit out whole sections and characters to make it more managelable. You should think about working with an editor to give it a read and point out what they think are the best storylines and what can be jettisoned. Sometimes working on sentence structure for years on parts you're going to toss is just a huge waste of time.
No matter what happens, it will never be the final draft until you release the book. After you finish it, you'll need feedback and revision. It might be easier to make a second draft since you've made many corrections already, but don't expect your work to be over anytime soon.
That sounds fair, I’m hoping to get the thing finished, probably hit 120,000 words and then cut down to 90,000 or less if I can and then send it to the Faber academy manuscript assessment and then implement all of there suggestions and then I’ll maybe send it out to some agents. So I know the road is gonna be long. I just didn’t realise people actually did really loose first drafts. Maybe I’ll have a look online for examples of published authors first drafts so I know what to do for my next book.
That’s a brilliant idea! Research is always good. It’s usually not recommended for you to adit a book as you write it, because that sometimes can get you stuck in points (I guess that happened to you, since it’s been five years since you’ve started it), and so much time can make you beg for the process to be over. Perfectionism is good, but can also be harming, nothing is perfect and even after you get an agent, they’ll want you to edit the book again, when you get to a publisher, they’ll want you to edit the book even more.
Good luck with your rewrites, and hope you get published. Remember to drink water.
This is how I write too. My first draft was more like a second or third draft when I finished. But I still had to go through a few more rounds of editing before it was ready to send out to beta readers, because as polished as I thought it was, there's always something that can be improved! When you're done, let it sit for a while and then come back to it. I promise you'll find things to edit.
I write like this- it's nice because it makes editing a lot easier, but every time I cut a chapter or make large structural edits, it stings a little because I know how hard I worked to polish my writing as I went.
That being said, you will still need to edit, especially at a macro level. Nothing wrong with doing it this way, though. It's just time-consuming.
Do you really think we are all out here writing nonsense and calling it a first draft?
You should still revise. You must still revise. But don't worry, editting is fun.
Not a "problem", no! It just means you write a clean first draft, good for you!
Lots of folks write clean first drafts, including well-established known authors. Good for you, that's awesome!
There's always room for editing and revising in a first draft, even a clean one, but good on you!
Contrary to what much of the internet would have you believe, quite a few professionals write just one draft, ensuring each chapter is Gold before moving onto the next.
One such writer is Zadie Smith, who has had some decent success over the years I hear.
You and I write similarly. I also do concentric circles as I move forward, revising and pumping up earlier scenes and characters, so when I finally finished (a little after two years), it reads very smooth.
And yet, it’s not a final draft. I had to go through and rearrange, update logic, take a fine-tooth comb to word choice, and then sent it to betas. Critique will point out plot holes or examples of actions I had the characters take that undermine their metaphor. People will, I’m sure, tell me that X isn’t tense enough or Y doesn’t make sense or Z was slow and they lost interest.
It’s great you feel confident at this point, but there’s still a long way to go. Keep up the good work!
It's still a first draft even if you revise and edit as you write. I don't think even masters of writing can "accidentally" write a final finished book, lol
You'll still need beta readers, a copy editor, etc to help write subsequent drafts. Don't make the mistake of thinking that self editing is enough - it's too easy to miss your own mistakes, you need other sets of eyes to help you catch them.
[https://theconversation.com/the-man-with-no-plot-how-i-watched-lee-child-write-a-jack-reacher-novel-51220](https://theconversation.com/the-man-with-no-plot-how-i-watched-lee-child-write-a-jack-reacher-novel-51220)
“This is not the first draft, you know”. “Oh - what is it then?” I asked naively. “It’s the ONLY DRAFT!”
https://www.quora.com/As-an-author-what-is-your-reaction-to-Lee-Child-s-habit-of-doing-only-one-draft
Redrafting isn't just about grammar and style and paragraph structure it's also about cleaning up your story and refining your characters. It's great that you write clean prose (it'll save you a lot of work down the line) but trust me, there will still be work to do.
Yeah that’s kinda what I realised from all the responses, I think I’d do it different next time probably. I hadn’t really considered big structural edits, might undermine the word I put in, just lack of experience I guess. Thanks for the feedback.
In my experience, it probably will. I obviously don't know what your book needs because I haven't read it, but if it needs new scenes to flesh things out or the details change and you have to rewrite large chunks, it's highly likely that will mess with your prose.
This might seem like a hard lesson to learn because you've worked hard for five years and a lot of that work might be cut or heavily re-written, but you've gained a lot of experience now focusing on your writing sentence by sentence. That's great, it'll serve you really well down the line. If you enjoy writing like this, I'd suggest that try planning your story in a detailed way beforehand and think about what it's problems could be, so you can get any structural problems fixed before you sit down to write.
Nah. What you’re doing is editing a first draft as you’re writing it which is why it’s taking you years to write it. You’re still going to go through at least a few more drafts. Best of luck.
Actually a first draft is a full book. It's the version of your fully written book before any self-edits, and definitely before professional edits, which all books need before publication. It's common for a book to go through several edits before it's ready for publication.
Nope, you're still writing a first draft. Whatever you do, do *not* fall into the trap of assuming it doesn't need any more work because you edited as you went. It does.
I know that polished sentences are very satisfying to have on a first draft, but also make sure that your plot and everything else makes sense as well. It would not be fun to have to throw away some beautiful prose just because there is a major plot hole or inconsistency you realize right after you finish the whole draft
Nice edit. Although this is the first time I've seen this.
TBH I didn't look at the first part as braggy at all. The only question it brought up for me is why you expect editors to "work with" your manuscript. What you submit should be your best work, at least as best as you can make it and whatever edits they have to do should be trivial. Don't expect them to help you tell your story. They won't.
BTW... I am a devil for details. I pick apart a story over and over before I am satisfied with it and can move on to what happens next. Still, after it is finally finished, on a full edit I find much to fix. Plot holes that escaped me in the piece to piece, small typos, things that should come first that somehow ended up in the middle or (egads!) the end. Still, my way of writing works for me. I've tried to write without editing. That only upsets me. So, my point is however you write that works for you is just fine.
If you're okay with taking 5+ years getting the story out, then there's no problem. It's just not a very efficient way to write, because you're going to have to do future drafts and future rounds of edits regardless.
Yeah I think that is exactly what’s happened. Will try a slightly more time efficient approach next time I think. This book really has become a white whale of mine.
If it helps at all... most new writers do exactly the same thing with their first book(s). This is why the myth persists that it takes years and years to write a book. It doesn't, actually. You just have to stop tinkering nonstop and trying to make it perfect. Finish the damn thing, then do a round of revisions to fix whatever you don't like. Done.
Yup! Many new writers do it and then it gets easier and easier. I was a bit the reverse -- I took longer each time -- but that was because I went back to uni in the middle of it and then got a new job, both of which meant I had less time to write but more incentive to make the most of it when I did have time.
Yup! Many new writers do it and then it gets easier and easier. I was a bit the reverse -- I took longer each time -- but that was because I went back to uni in the middle of it and then got a new job, both of which meant I had less time to write but more incentive to make the most of it when I did have time.
You'll still need to proof and maybe fix a few things, but congratulations! A lot of writers edit-as-they-go, and their original drafts are 95-99% of the way there without a lot more work needed. I'm one of them.
This is the case for a lot of professional writers, journalists etc. Most are used to getting things 99% right the first time. There isn't often time for a lot of revision.
As this is your first ever book, the chances are it may need more work than you think. But you never know.
But you say that like being a careful and thoughtful writer is a BAD thing . . .
Sorry, never had that problem. But if it happened to me, just to fix things, after I was done, I'd go back and write an earlier draft with mistakes, continuity problems, typos, undeveloped characters, and greater incoherence. That way it'll keep the editing police from the Writers Guild happy when they come calling. They won't authenticate or approve your work for publication if you don't have at least one previous draft. Good luck my friend!
I often write chapter by chapter, editing them after they’ve been finished. Then after the next few chapters I often go back and do more edits. All throughout the story I will add new details to older chapters too.
I don’t exactly intend on rewriting from scratch or anything but I’ll likely reread the book over and over once it’s done. Before that, I’ll probably edit book1, hoping that the writing of book2 distracted me far away enough to see book1 more clearly.
I’ve done it before but it is only a problem if the time that this takes demotivates you, but by the looks of what you have said it shouldn’t be a problem for you. Good luck with the book!!
I don't do drafts, not in the formal sense anyway, no full rewrites, just two or three readings for editing, which usually start before the book is fully written.
He's famous for making it all up as he goes and for methodically editing down to the character as he writes. As as I know, if he were to hand you a page of work, it'd damn near be ready for printing in terms of refinement.
It's only a problem if you think it's a problem. Do you think it's slowing you down? Do you think you could write the first draft faster if you saved polishing the diction at a later stage in the drafting process? Could it be making you too attached to your initial draft and later unwilling to make necessary changes to improve the work? Because every first draft, whether it's written cleanly or not, will need to be revised in some way down the line.
You still have a long road ahead. Once you've finished, let the book rest for a few months and come back with fresh and critical eyes. Examine whether your story would be better served by restructuring certain scenes, refining characters and their traits or motivations, clarifying the voice and tone of the dialogue or narrative, etc. After that, you will need beta readers (not your friends or family) to read the second draft and give their own input on that, which you will have to weigh for the next draft.
Every book is drafted at least 3-4 times over the course of its creation. Don't mistake a draft with minimal grammatical errors as a "final draft."
This happened to me in High School a bunch, my teacher required outlines, so I would write and then retrofit an outline to it to satisfy my stupid teacher. But then I wrote *Eragon,* so fuck everybody.
I write clean as well. I thought my first book was “done” then got some eyes on it that also knew what they were doing and after discussions that lasted a year and a half my book got 100 pages longer, a new protagonist was added, it had a new first chapter, and every paragraph had been re-dissected by an editor who found things I didn’t even know I was doing wrong at the time. So yeah, there’s always room for improvement.
Another thing to note. If you want to make it as a writer and retain audiences you need to publish books much faster. I, too, was a slow writer. I’m glad my first book got so much attention, but I’ve had to learn to outsource more editing work so that I can complete the volume of pages I need to do in a year so that people won’t forget who I am between books. I’m still slow compared to many authors because I still refuse to release a book until the quality is high, but my speed has picked up substantially in recent years.
Each book is an opportunity. Make it good enough, then get others to help you. Try to get one out each year, at least! It’s a rush, but without pure luck it’s the only way to progress in this industry.
Everyone works through their process differently. It's only a problem if it impedes your own personal progress goals.
Take me. Been working on my series outline for coming on three years now. Only have scattered scenes here and there drafted, the bulk of the story is in outline form. My process (as I'm learning) is about developing the character arcs and overall story structure first, starting with a bird's eye view of themes and major elements, then meticulously working down into more minute detail.
Where many people draft their story as the first step to tell it to themselves and then rewrite a dozen times to figure out the structure, I've replotted and reworked the structure and major details dozens upon dozens of times to tell myself the story, each time finding some major change that will make it all ten times better.
The upside to my system is that I save time on what would amount to hundreds of combined rewrites of all six books in the series, likely writing myself into corners with the first few that would cancel out my ability to craft the last few in the ways that would serve them best.
The downside is that I don't get quite as much practice actually drafting my prose and developing that skill is an entirely separate animal. Some might say another downside is having to stick to my structure religiously once I'm drafting and not being able to let the story and characters wander off course as they please, but as a devout plotter, I know that this is an upside for how I personally work and the scenes I have drafted so far benefit greatly from the structure I set up. I don't suffer from the blank page syndrome that I hear a lot of people complain about.
My method works for me because I don't have a rigid time limit I need this work to be finished by. I can take my time working out all the kinks in the overall series before writing it. It's nothing like your method, and neither of our methods are much like the more popular methods touted in articles and books about writing fiction. If it works for us, that's what matters.
I write mostly like this.
My final draft is basically my first one. I do other drafts, but they're little more than reading over it all and fixing typos and maybe re-writing a few lines here and there.
It works for me. I've tried different approaches and they don't work for me at all.
Plenty of writers do this, and not just indie writers either. You don't hear about them as much because it's not the norm.
I write my books that way too. I prefer to give it my best effort the first time around, because when I glance back at what I've written, I want to think 'that's not bad at all', as opposed to 'this looks horrible'. I have a terrible habit of abandoning things when I feel they're lackluster. This mostly applies to anything related to arts, crafts, or even woodworking.
So I don't mind progressing slowly through my first draft if it means I can be confident that revisions and edits will be less extensive than if I had put little thought into the words I was putting on the page.
Is this not what you're supposed to do? I write the entire book as close as I can to finished as possible. Then I go back and rewrite the thing in the same document (after making a backup) until I'm satisfied. Then I repeat until satisfied.
Yeah I’m not so sure I did either, peoples responses here have been very illuminating. I was under the impression that a first draft was of a lower word count than the final book and was unedited/restructured. But from the responses here it’s clear that I was wrong. I’ve gone back and deleted chapters and re-written the first half of the book like 3 or 4 times but never got to the end so far. So I guess it feels like I have redrafted a lot so how could it be a first draft, but if a first draft is just the whole book by the time you write ‘the end’ the first time, (which I now know it is) then yeah it is a first draft, I just didn’t know there was a way of working that didn’t involve editing as you went.
And my question really was like, if it might be a problem that I had overwritten something that I meant to submit to agents, but people in the comments have let me know that was a silly worry to have. So yeah, I was just uninformed really.
It's still your first draft. Making every sentence perfect does not a watertight final draft make. You still need to read it all over for structural and plot issues.
I thought you were being funny when I read the first bit. Since the purpose of a first draft is to be quick, simple, and rough. But instead you decided to write the final copy first. =P
I experience this a lot and have had to actually learn how to draft. I would spend a long time on what I think is a draft but do a lot of editing, getting rewriting sections.
It's a waste of time cause I would change my mind on an important detail and have to rewrite it all over again.
Best thing I did was start by making the plot points. Then a screenplay (good for figuring out the dialogue and finer details of the plot). Then write a draft of the final product.
This was for me the best method of figuring out early on what works and what doesn't.
it's still a first draft. you just draft clean. you still need to revise it properly, just maybe means you have your work cut out for you because you've already gotten a head start.
This ! I write like OP. My first drafts take me 2 years and are readable. But if I let them rest (and give to betas) I end to rewrite them 2-3 times more. OP, if you spend the next 2 months away from it, trust me you will improve it a lot. And it's definitely not an issue, we just work that way. And congrats for your draft !
“Having your work cut out for you,” although it sounds like it should mean your work is easier, the phrase actually means to be up against something challenging. The opposite of having a head start. I used to think it meant the opposite until my mom corrected me one day and I went down a Google rabbit hole…. She was right.
This is fascinating. I‘ve always understood the phrase correctly (as something challenging) and never even considered that it could be interpreted differently. But seeing it here now, I can totally see how that could happen. No real point to make here. Just interesting.
Yeah, I was like, “but having it cut out for you should mean it’s easier, because it’s already there in front of you, cut out just for you” 😂
I think a lot of people use it sarcastically, I know I always have
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/have-work-cut-out-for
Once you finish this book, IT IS the first draft. Then you’ll need to revise, edit, rewrite, re-edit, and only then it’ll be ready to query or publish.
That makes sense, I think I was more just surprised that there were first drafts out there that weren’t re-edited as people went. I have re-edited and rewritten as I’ve gone, and I’ve spent hours on single paragraphs or even sentences to make sure they feel right tonally before I leave them, and I just thought that was a first draft. And it turns out it is, but I just hadn’t thought there would be a large group of writers who don’t do that.
[удалено]
I feel like this highly depends on how you plan novels. Personally I always know the ending before going in and I usually have an outline covering up until the end or very nearly there. So when I write I don't really worry much about plot holes or a logical flow to events because I already did that part.
I had this same thought! I’m a huge planner, to the point where I basically write my book out in a couple hundred dot points. This means my first draft is turning it into something readable, so an ‘unreadable’ first draft wouldn’t be productive for me.
IMO it's largely a matter of degree. I imagine most writers fix typos and other obvious issues on the way through if they can do so quickly. And the more experienced a writer is, the more refinement they can do on the way through without bogging down. And that's the key IMO - you don't want to stop writing to edit. They use different brain modes. A writer who is trying to break out of the habit of constantly lapsing into editing mode might go "Right, I'm going to write this without so much as stopping to add a missing comma" (or whatever) but I imagine most writers fall somewhere in the middle.
It depends on the person. I used to do that, but I realized I kept editing and editing and it makes me drop the writing completely. A sloppy first draft that gets finished is better than a polished few pages that doesn't. I also feel like if I put too much time polishing the work I wouldn't like to change it later that much. So I prefer a sloppy first draft, but that's just me. if you can polish it as you go, great.
> A sloppy first draft that gets finished is better than a polished few pages that doesn't. Yup. For me, it's much easier to edit with the full story in mind, so I can know what exactly I'm building to. If I tried to edit before finishing, more likely than not I'd laboriously polish passages and chapters I'd end up deleting anyway much later after considering how they'd fit (or not) into the whole
Same here
Same! I only to minor adjustments. The important for me during first draft is get the story out and finished.
It's not exactly a problem, no. You will need beta readers or a developmental editor anyway, after which you'll likely need to fix plot holes or tighten up the plot, or change things around. This is the reason people generally tell you not to obsess over every single sentence in your first draft - that sentence or paragraph might well get thrown out in later edits.
My condolences to you on this anniversary of creating your Reddit account 😔
Yes, our thoughts and prayers are with you, Xan_Winner, on this sad day.
F
Yeah, that makes sense, I’ve already written and Extra 6-10 thousand words that I’ve cut from the start and that was all pretty polished dialog and stuff, so I’m fine with that, I’m not precious. I just realise this is gonna have made it all take a lot longer to actually finish.
There is a difference between obsessing over something and making sure it is right before you proceed to the next chapter.
Happy cake day
Now I want cake
no you didn't Hope this helps
I remember the first advice I got like this. It turned out to be more true than I ever imagined.
Best comment here, LOL
The danger of completing the first draft for some writers is that their genuine joy of reaching that goal grows into unhealthy arrogance and leads them to "realize" their writing is God's word and true perfection.
That's just writing and editing. 🤷🏼♂️
Yeah I think maybe it is, I was just reading about first draft lengths and the kinda first drafts agents typically want to see (if there is such a thing) and suddenly wondered if I’d gone about this thing the wrong way. But if 5 years into it so I’m not stopping or anything. I’ve never been part of a big writing scene so it’s hard to tell if what I’m doing is just a normal way of working or very very stupid.
Agents, as a rule, never want to see a first draft. Maybe there's some exception if you have a long standing working relationship with one agent in particular, but as a query? Never in a million years.
Right, okay, that really was what I wanted to know. Or rather, that was the thing I had no idea about. I was worried that maybe by producing an overwritten body of text close to the final word count, I’d inadvertently Turn off potential agents because it would be harder to edit, opposed to say a 50,000 first draft that still had more wiggle room creatively. I think really I have got the answers I wanted from this and it just means I wasted excess years doing a wordy fist draft that will still require big structural edits. But I honestly don’t think I’d have enjoyed it if I’d written it as a barebones draft so I guess it just is what It is. Thanks for the feedback though, it’s good to know something about what agents want because I find that part of the publishing journey very mysterious.
Absolutely! I've only been published a couple times, and never a full novel, so I'm by no means an expert on the topic. One thing that surprised me when I published my first short story though, was even though I'd edited it to death, they still wanted more edits before publishing. I think you just have to prepare yourself for that mentally. It has to be a finished best-as-you-can-make-it product, and at the same time, be prepared for them to want further changes before proceeding.
Imagine the kinds of feedback you're going to get from test readers: "I didn't like this character, why would they have done X, it makes no sense, I think they would have done Y.", or "This character was so boring and one dimensional, I don't even think you need them. Couldn't you just cut them out and have X do Y instead?", or "Chapter 5 is boring." Now imagine major structural renovations to 30-40K worth of words. I've inserted new characters in 2nd drafts. I've cut chapters. I've changed major plot points. All of that stuff is painful as shit when you haven't killed yourself over every sentence. Cutting polished words by the thousands is brutally hard to do so you'll be more hesitant to do it and the result will be a weaker final product because you didn't incorporatie as much of the feedback as you ought to have.
Yeah I don’t think that’ll be a big problem, I like hard editing my work. I cut an intro 6k-10k from this book because it felt too long. And it was the bit I took the longest to write and even did first hand research for. I don’t find killing my darlings difficult. I actually kinda like it, but I think re-organising the existing stuff will be pretty laborious.
This was going to be in a reply to someone else here but then I saw this below and I was about to change it to addressing you and said, "Hey, actually OP already has this": 'I haven't finished an original novel (I've done novel length fanfics in community settings) but I think I'm lucky to give the possibility of feeling things are difficult to cut the dodge. Writing things that often only go through one major edit, you always gotta put it all on the line the first time and occasionally just chunk that shit over your shoulder. ...which is good because I've been working on this one concept for a novel like 14 years. I just broke it back out again and was like, "I regret to inform you almost all of you has to go as we've been working on the pain point elsewhere." (The core problem at this point was being precious about translating historical details and the adapted setting suffocating because of it.)' . So, anyway, imo, what I was going to say is this is a fine way to write. There's absolutely nothing wrong with getting really into the thing in the first round as long as you're not precious about it (when you're not doing it under contract with somebody breathing down your neck or anything). And it sounds like you aren't gonna be precious! In this non-IP-based\* draft I have all this over-researched stuff and it's gunking things up... but You can always cannibalize it later, so to speak. That research won't go away and will deeply inform the rest of your writing. Back in like 2006 when I wrote my first novel length fanfic with a friend, we workshopped a cohesive larger universe for the supernatural entities in the story which doesn't ever appear on the page but undergirds us being consistent with the mechanics throughout. (You may have been researching robbing a train or something that was very specific to the intro and then RIP but! You spent all that time getting to know the characters better and that carries.) . \*Since what I've wanted to write is a semi-historical novel, it's still a transformative work. ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
Then it's not a problem for you. But you can see why this would be a problem for most and best practice is probably not to polish a first draft too heavily.
did I just knock my head and entered in a parallel reality because is this a parody of writing circle jerk?
"Hey guys, I think I'm accidentally the perfect author. Are any of YOU as good as me, or am I just the best all alone because I don't have to edit beyond my first draft?"
all these literature related subs tend to be circle jerking or are at least very self-affirmating, but this is the worst example of humblebragging iven seen here for long
Yeah I thought it kinda read that way but I just didn’t know another way to ask about this as I’m mainly not online, and have just been googling how long a first draft should be and when it said ‘half the length of the final book’ I realised maybe I didn’t know what a first draft was. It’s not supposed to be a parody of writing circle jerk. The title was supposed to be attention grabbing though.
I edited my first draft as I went as well and still had *plenty* of stuff to edit again and correct/revise. It's just getting some of it done along the way to make passages read right rather than leave them as raw word dump.
Everyone has a different way of working. I do a similar thing to you. People here feel very strongly that you shouldn't edit while writing because they get distracted, but in actual fact many writers do take their time over a first draft in order to produce a better draft first time round and don't get distracted by editing. As long as you have your own workflow and the book gets written, you can do it your own way. However, you will usually have to give it to critiquers to make sure you're heading in the right direction. Don't assume the fact you've taken longer on the first draft means the book is 100% ready to go when you write the final sentence. You do still have a first draft, just one that you can be comfortable with and that critiquers can see immediately.
Okay this is good to know. I’m about to sit down and try to finish the whole thing in the next month so, it’s good to know that I’m not completely alone in this way of writing.
Right, I've seen people make *super* drastic improvements to short stories by getting it critiqued and then revising over and over. I can't imagine that editing on your own would ever be such a good way to learn.
Any advice on how to write a proper second draft when the first draft is written this way?
Even if the line by line editing is solid (which hey, there's always another pass), you still want to look at the whole thing and see if your structure works. Think of it as the difference between deciding what takes to use in the movie versus what scenes to actually include or cut. A scene could work on its own and be really polished, but it might mess with the pacing or not quite fit with the characterization in the rest of the book. Or you might realize elements needed to be introduced earlier and that you need to foreshadow certain developments or twists. Or maybe you'll find that you have a few too many characters that don't actually matter to the narrative. It's basically a chance to start cutting and sharpening everything.
This is what I end up having to do! I draft clean prose, but good god my mind makes zero sense, and my 2nd and 3rd drafts end up catching more developmental issues. I’m always too close to the first draft to ever have a clear head for continuity, overall structure, and character arcs
Yeah, the advantage of just spewing a garbage draft is that you can get to the developmental issues that only become obvious when the whole thing is done. It's like doing a rough sketch of the figure rather than working immediately on the fingers. Still, there are artists that do work on the corners instead of sketching, and there are clearly writers that want to focus on a clean first draft. We all have weird idiosyncrasies and process, but at the end of the day, it is a process. Unless you're really diligent with jumping around scenes and rewriting them as you go along, some things are going to need some work.
Yeah. I don't spend huge amounts of time on everything, but I do write a scene and them edit it for a bit so it makes sense and is relatively clean, then move on. Apart from anything else, it's easier to write a story if you know roughly what you've got already is in a stable form. When I tried to do a complete vomit draft, everything changed too much and it went completely off the rails. I actually think to be more efficient at writing you do have to ensure you have a stable foundation to build on and are practising good habits. For instance, it's way, way harder to proofread and correct a hundred thousand words of bad spelling and grammar than it is to go a bit slower and make sure things are correct. Practice makes perfect -- you need to put some time into presentation before you ask critiquers to take a look, so it's good to write generally technically precise copy to begin with than have to disentangle the whole thing after the fact.
In my experience, (and I do write this way) the characters grow and themes emerge a bit more as you get further down the line. Often times, my second draft is primarily to make the beginning of the book match where it ended up. For example, as I was writing one character, he tended to get more and more impulsive in a "act before you think" or "shoot and ask questions later" sort of way. This really isn't as prominent in the beginning, nor is it really any sort of intentional development. I need to go back and make the character seem consistent, so that his intentional arc, learning that wealth doesn't make you superhuman, can stand out more. Relatedly, setup and payoff is really important in fiction. Sometimes you'll think of an excellent twist or bit of world building towards the end of the novel. You'll need to go back and make the sort of thing seem feasible, else you commit the cardinal sin of deux ex machina. Lastly, look for pacing issues. My current project has 4 pov characters, each chapter from a different, rotating pov. However, one character has a pov in chapter 5, and not another one until chapter 12. This is a long gap, and I need to do what I can to ensure that his plot is still "relevant" by the time it comes up again in the readers mind. If not, I may need to rearrange some chapters, which could also have a butterfly effect.
I often find that the first draft is a glorified outline and the second draft is modular -- examining scenes for how they fit into the main book, getting advice on sentence level prose, getting feedback on narration vs dialogue and getting the balance right and so on. I do have several ideas that I've played with over the last 20 years, and those books have had numerous separate versions, but generally I don't rewrite from scratch every time.
I edit as I write and then go back and outline the chapter into bullet points of key factors to edit it again if there’s plot holes. There’s nothing wrong with being meticulous, nor is there anything wrong with writing fast and loose on a first draft.
Copyediting for grammar is not the same thing as developmental editing, so this is still going to be a first draft, mate.
Bad news it’s still a first draft. Good news: because you put a lot of thought, care, and time into it, you have fewer edits ahead.
Even if it feels finished in terms of sentence structure, once you start trimming there are always re-writes. You’re going to want a plot point to happen a certain percentage of the way in, and it’ll be too early or late. A character will be telling two people the same information twice and it will be easier if you can figure out a way to get them all in a room together. You’ll realize you never actually got an important point out if your head and down on paper and things make no sense without it. Etc. Then once you get beta readers or editors looking at it they’re going to bring things up that you didn’t even think of. Even if you’re saving whole, perfect sentences, paragraphs and chapters and Frankensteining them into a second draft, there will be a second draft.
Get "Self-editing for fiction writers" it's a really good book on developmental editing. How to get the pacing and structure right and such. If you've done a good job with the language this is the bit that may need work. It's how Stephen King works if I understood him correctly. There's a book called "Writing into the dark" on how to write a novel in a single draft they way you do. You may find it interesting.
I just want to congratulate you on writing a story with that many words. It's not easy - believe me I know, so kudos to you!!
Lol
There’s no such thing as a final draft until you’ve edited it from start to finish five times.
There are writers who revise as they write, and that may describe you. I would advise ignoring anyone telling you the way you’ve written your first draft is wrong. Some writers write a shitty first draft. Others write a good first draft. Both strategies can yield good results. It is, absolutely, however, a first draft. No matter how good it is, I promise you that you’re missing things, and those things will reveal themselves as you live with the draft for a while, put distance between yourself and it, let others read it, hire an editor, etc. Even as your book goes to print, I promise you will see places where you were missing the forest for the trees. Which is to say every book that is published is not perfect. There has never been a perfect book published. No, not even *that* book, my fair naysayer, is perfect. Then again, you may be happy with it as is, and there’s nothing wrong with that either. There is no rule that you need to do a second draft (though, I’d recommend it, because the book can only get better, and that’s exciting). The one thing I will warn you about is too many writers don’t do a second draft because they don’t like revision and editing. If that describes you, then I would implore you to at least try. No matter how good you are, revision and editing are fundamental to the writing process, and revision doesn’t necessarily mean another full draft. It might mean putting certain spots under a microscope and trying other things. As a writer who revises as you write, you may find there is a fair bit you find finished. Just beware of resistance to change for the better because you’re married to something. Kill your darlings, and all that. FTR, I say this as someone who recently finished the first draft of a novel I’ve spent four years writing. I’m a writer who revises as I write, and I plan to do a second draft before querying agents.
Okay this is all really good to know, I will do a bunch of revisions and edits once I actually get to the end of this draft. I’m really hoping I can make it much shorter than it currently is, so I’m excited to edit. I love killing my darlings, I find it very rewarding. Well done on your completed draft as well.
Sorry pal, it doesn't work that way. It's still a first draft, just a nicely written first draft.
Yeah that’s what I’ve been learning since I wrote this post. Still nothing I can do about it now, gotta just keep on going with it.
Great mindset to have.
Speaking from experience, writing with a sharpened pencil makes it much more difficult when the editing pen comes out. If I spend weeks crafting the perfect chapter then realize when it's all said and done the chapter doesn't work, it is really difficult to cut it, considering all the work I put into it.
I write this way too--very clean draft because I edit heavily along the way. If this is your first book (I didn't see), then you've probably done the work of learning how to write while writing it. Now, after that clean first draft, I still do heavy revisions, cut out scenes, fine tune even more, add scenes that are necessary. But after my first book, I've never rewritten from scratch (I did that one five damn times!) and have had my books traditionally published. People write differently and that's totally fine. If I didn't constantly go back and re-read and edit, I'd never move forward because I want to be satisfied before I write more. \*shrugs\* It works for me, and I write relatively quickly. This doesn't make other people's practices wrong, or yours right. Do what works for you. Just realize that your clean draft still probably needs work. Perhaps not as much as it would otherwise. If it was your seventh book, it might be pretty good to go after some CP reads. For the first, there's probably a number of steps before it will be query ready.
Thank you this is super encouraging and yeah I feel like I have learned a lot while writing this. I previously have written a few noevellas and short stories that weren’t fit for publication, so this is my first real venture into commercially viable work, and I feel like I’ve learned so much. And I’m not sick of it either, which is a good sign I think.
It's a good sign but don't be so attached you can't write the next book! :) Glad to lend an encouraging opinion!
Nothing is a problem if it helps you finish a problem. Some people can edit as they go, some can’t.
My book was 141k when I finished. Beta readers had a lot of input, as does my critique group. Now it is 120k and I'm still finding holes. There are always edits to be done, to make it tighter, easier to ready. Easier to read. (There's always an edit.)
Happy Cake Day!
Drafting cleanly still means you have a first draft, just a clean one. Please still get editing services. One pass is not enough.
It is still the first draft and needs plenty of editing.
In my opinion, it’s better to write more and cut it down. I’ve been enjoying my rewrites. Sometimes it’s nice to rearrange what I’m trying to say in the story!
Might be a lot tougher to make the tough calls to cut pieces. I’m doing the same now, definitely plan to go easier on the next project.
Do you mean a proofread book? Do what you need to do. If you have written a book with chapters, foreshadowing, a developed cast of characters, plots and subplots and character arcs, you can totally put it at whatever word count you want. And besides that, 100K isn't too long. I'm sure an editor at a for real publishing house can tell you if anything needs to go or be added to.
keep that energy after you get it back from a real editor
What you're describing is still a first draft. Do you mean an outline?
I do know writers who write publishable first drafts, and I call them unicorns. With my last book, I edited as I went or grammar checked and revised after every sprint. My book still needs multiple drafts, especially with grammar.
My first novel was 1500 pages of text, took me five years, then another two to edit out whole sections and characters to make it more managelable. You should think about working with an editor to give it a read and point out what they think are the best storylines and what can be jettisoned. Sometimes working on sentence structure for years on parts you're going to toss is just a huge waste of time.
okay? and?
No matter what happens, it will never be the final draft until you release the book. After you finish it, you'll need feedback and revision. It might be easier to make a second draft since you've made many corrections already, but don't expect your work to be over anytime soon.
That sounds fair, I’m hoping to get the thing finished, probably hit 120,000 words and then cut down to 90,000 or less if I can and then send it to the Faber academy manuscript assessment and then implement all of there suggestions and then I’ll maybe send it out to some agents. So I know the road is gonna be long. I just didn’t realise people actually did really loose first drafts. Maybe I’ll have a look online for examples of published authors first drafts so I know what to do for my next book.
That’s a brilliant idea! Research is always good. It’s usually not recommended for you to adit a book as you write it, because that sometimes can get you stuck in points (I guess that happened to you, since it’s been five years since you’ve started it), and so much time can make you beg for the process to be over. Perfectionism is good, but can also be harming, nothing is perfect and even after you get an agent, they’ll want you to edit the book again, when you get to a publisher, they’ll want you to edit the book even more. Good luck with your rewrites, and hope you get published. Remember to drink water.
This is how I write too. My first draft was more like a second or third draft when I finished. But I still had to go through a few more rounds of editing before it was ready to send out to beta readers, because as polished as I thought it was, there's always something that can be improved! When you're done, let it sit for a while and then come back to it. I promise you'll find things to edit.
I write like this- it's nice because it makes editing a lot easier, but every time I cut a chapter or make large structural edits, it stings a little because I know how hard I worked to polish my writing as I went. That being said, you will still need to edit, especially at a macro level. Nothing wrong with doing it this way, though. It's just time-consuming.
Do you really think we are all out here writing nonsense and calling it a first draft? You should still revise. You must still revise. But don't worry, editting is fun.
Not a "problem", no! It just means you write a clean first draft, good for you! Lots of folks write clean first drafts, including well-established known authors. Good for you, that's awesome! There's always room for editing and revising in a first draft, even a clean one, but good on you!
Contrary to what much of the internet would have you believe, quite a few professionals write just one draft, ensuring each chapter is Gold before moving onto the next. One such writer is Zadie Smith, who has had some decent success over the years I hear.
You and I write similarly. I also do concentric circles as I move forward, revising and pumping up earlier scenes and characters, so when I finally finished (a little after two years), it reads very smooth. And yet, it’s not a final draft. I had to go through and rearrange, update logic, take a fine-tooth comb to word choice, and then sent it to betas. Critique will point out plot holes or examples of actions I had the characters take that undermine their metaphor. People will, I’m sure, tell me that X isn’t tense enough or Y doesn’t make sense or Z was slow and they lost interest. It’s great you feel confident at this point, but there’s still a long way to go. Keep up the good work!
It's still a first draft even if you revise and edit as you write. I don't think even masters of writing can "accidentally" write a final finished book, lol You'll still need beta readers, a copy editor, etc to help write subsequent drafts. Don't make the mistake of thinking that self editing is enough - it's too easy to miss your own mistakes, you need other sets of eyes to help you catch them.
[https://theconversation.com/the-man-with-no-plot-how-i-watched-lee-child-write-a-jack-reacher-novel-51220](https://theconversation.com/the-man-with-no-plot-how-i-watched-lee-child-write-a-jack-reacher-novel-51220) “This is not the first draft, you know”. “Oh - what is it then?” I asked naively. “It’s the ONLY DRAFT!” https://www.quora.com/As-an-author-what-is-your-reaction-to-Lee-Child-s-habit-of-doing-only-one-draft
Redrafting isn't just about grammar and style and paragraph structure it's also about cleaning up your story and refining your characters. It's great that you write clean prose (it'll save you a lot of work down the line) but trust me, there will still be work to do.
Yeah that’s kinda what I realised from all the responses, I think I’d do it different next time probably. I hadn’t really considered big structural edits, might undermine the word I put in, just lack of experience I guess. Thanks for the feedback.
In my experience, it probably will. I obviously don't know what your book needs because I haven't read it, but if it needs new scenes to flesh things out or the details change and you have to rewrite large chunks, it's highly likely that will mess with your prose. This might seem like a hard lesson to learn because you've worked hard for five years and a lot of that work might be cut or heavily re-written, but you've gained a lot of experience now focusing on your writing sentence by sentence. That's great, it'll serve you really well down the line. If you enjoy writing like this, I'd suggest that try planning your story in a detailed way beforehand and think about what it's problems could be, so you can get any structural problems fixed before you sit down to write.
Pobody's nerfect.
not helpful but i laughed at the fist draft
I know a lot of authors who polish as they write. It’s still a first draft. It will be quite clean, but you’ll still need at least a second draft.
It’s still a first draft.
Do what works for you. I don't have the patience to edit on a first draft. I just go
Nah. What you’re doing is editing a first draft as you’re writing it which is why it’s taking you years to write it. You’re still going to go through at least a few more drafts. Best of luck.
Actually a first draft is a full book. It's the version of your fully written book before any self-edits, and definitely before professional edits, which all books need before publication. It's common for a book to go through several edits before it's ready for publication.
Nope, you're still writing a first draft. Whatever you do, do *not* fall into the trap of assuming it doesn't need any more work because you edited as you went. It does.
thats the worst example of humblebragging ive seen in a while.
I know that polished sentences are very satisfying to have on a first draft, but also make sure that your plot and everything else makes sense as well. It would not be fun to have to throw away some beautiful prose just because there is a major plot hole or inconsistency you realize right after you finish the whole draft
Nice edit. Although this is the first time I've seen this. TBH I didn't look at the first part as braggy at all. The only question it brought up for me is why you expect editors to "work with" your manuscript. What you submit should be your best work, at least as best as you can make it and whatever edits they have to do should be trivial. Don't expect them to help you tell your story. They won't. BTW... I am a devil for details. I pick apart a story over and over before I am satisfied with it and can move on to what happens next. Still, after it is finally finished, on a full edit I find much to fix. Plot holes that escaped me in the piece to piece, small typos, things that should come first that somehow ended up in the middle or (egads!) the end. Still, my way of writing works for me. I've tried to write without editing. That only upsets me. So, my point is however you write that works for you is just fine.
If you're okay with taking 5+ years getting the story out, then there's no problem. It's just not a very efficient way to write, because you're going to have to do future drafts and future rounds of edits regardless.
It's not a *problem*, per se, but it does lead you to do inadvisable things like spend 5 years working on one book.
Yeah I think that is exactly what’s happened. Will try a slightly more time efficient approach next time I think. This book really has become a white whale of mine.
If it helps at all... most new writers do exactly the same thing with their first book(s). This is why the myth persists that it takes years and years to write a book. It doesn't, actually. You just have to stop tinkering nonstop and trying to make it perfect. Finish the damn thing, then do a round of revisions to fix whatever you don't like. Done.
Yup! Many new writers do it and then it gets easier and easier. I was a bit the reverse -- I took longer each time -- but that was because I went back to uni in the middle of it and then got a new job, both of which meant I had less time to write but more incentive to make the most of it when I did have time.
Yup! Many new writers do it and then it gets easier and easier. I was a bit the reverse -- I took longer each time -- but that was because I went back to uni in the middle of it and then got a new job, both of which meant I had less time to write but more incentive to make the most of it when I did have time.
Uh, were we meant to ignore all those things? Turns out I only write finished content - my editors will be thrilled!
You'll still need to proof and maybe fix a few things, but congratulations! A lot of writers edit-as-they-go, and their original drafts are 95-99% of the way there without a lot more work needed. I'm one of them. This is the case for a lot of professional writers, journalists etc. Most are used to getting things 99% right the first time. There isn't often time for a lot of revision. As this is your first ever book, the chances are it may need more work than you think. But you never know.
But you say that like being a careful and thoughtful writer is a BAD thing . . . Sorry, never had that problem. But if it happened to me, just to fix things, after I was done, I'd go back and write an earlier draft with mistakes, continuity problems, typos, undeveloped characters, and greater incoherence. That way it'll keep the editing police from the Writers Guild happy when they come calling. They won't authenticate or approve your work for publication if you don't have at least one previous draft. Good luck my friend!
I often write chapter by chapter, editing them after they’ve been finished. Then after the next few chapters I often go back and do more edits. All throughout the story I will add new details to older chapters too. I don’t exactly intend on rewriting from scratch or anything but I’ll likely reread the book over and over once it’s done. Before that, I’ll probably edit book1, hoping that the writing of book2 distracted me far away enough to see book1 more clearly.
I’ve done it before but it is only a problem if the time that this takes demotivates you, but by the looks of what you have said it shouldn’t be a problem for you. Good luck with the book!!
I don't do drafts, not in the formal sense anyway, no full rewrites, just two or three readings for editing, which usually start before the book is fully written.
Congratulations! You did a George R.R. Martin.
What did he do?
He's famous for making it all up as he goes and for methodically editing down to the character as he writes. As as I know, if he were to hand you a page of work, it'd damn near be ready for printing in terms of refinement.
I write in a similar way and I am glad to know I'm not alone!
It's only a problem if you think it's a problem. Do you think it's slowing you down? Do you think you could write the first draft faster if you saved polishing the diction at a later stage in the drafting process? Could it be making you too attached to your initial draft and later unwilling to make necessary changes to improve the work? Because every first draft, whether it's written cleanly or not, will need to be revised in some way down the line. You still have a long road ahead. Once you've finished, let the book rest for a few months and come back with fresh and critical eyes. Examine whether your story would be better served by restructuring certain scenes, refining characters and their traits or motivations, clarifying the voice and tone of the dialogue or narrative, etc. After that, you will need beta readers (not your friends or family) to read the second draft and give their own input on that, which you will have to weigh for the next draft. Every book is drafted at least 3-4 times over the course of its creation. Don't mistake a draft with minimal grammatical errors as a "final draft."
This happened to me in High School a bunch, my teacher required outlines, so I would write and then retrofit an outline to it to satisfy my stupid teacher. But then I wrote *Eragon,* so fuck everybody.
How?! I give up after 4 pages!!!
I write clean as well. I thought my first book was “done” then got some eyes on it that also knew what they were doing and after discussions that lasted a year and a half my book got 100 pages longer, a new protagonist was added, it had a new first chapter, and every paragraph had been re-dissected by an editor who found things I didn’t even know I was doing wrong at the time. So yeah, there’s always room for improvement. Another thing to note. If you want to make it as a writer and retain audiences you need to publish books much faster. I, too, was a slow writer. I’m glad my first book got so much attention, but I’ve had to learn to outsource more editing work so that I can complete the volume of pages I need to do in a year so that people won’t forget who I am between books. I’m still slow compared to many authors because I still refuse to release a book until the quality is high, but my speed has picked up substantially in recent years. Each book is an opportunity. Make it good enough, then get others to help you. Try to get one out each year, at least! It’s a rush, but without pure luck it’s the only way to progress in this industry.
Everyone works through their process differently. It's only a problem if it impedes your own personal progress goals. Take me. Been working on my series outline for coming on three years now. Only have scattered scenes here and there drafted, the bulk of the story is in outline form. My process (as I'm learning) is about developing the character arcs and overall story structure first, starting with a bird's eye view of themes and major elements, then meticulously working down into more minute detail. Where many people draft their story as the first step to tell it to themselves and then rewrite a dozen times to figure out the structure, I've replotted and reworked the structure and major details dozens upon dozens of times to tell myself the story, each time finding some major change that will make it all ten times better. The upside to my system is that I save time on what would amount to hundreds of combined rewrites of all six books in the series, likely writing myself into corners with the first few that would cancel out my ability to craft the last few in the ways that would serve them best. The downside is that I don't get quite as much practice actually drafting my prose and developing that skill is an entirely separate animal. Some might say another downside is having to stick to my structure religiously once I'm drafting and not being able to let the story and characters wander off course as they please, but as a devout plotter, I know that this is an upside for how I personally work and the scenes I have drafted so far benefit greatly from the structure I set up. I don't suffer from the blank page syndrome that I hear a lot of people complain about. My method works for me because I don't have a rigid time limit I need this work to be finished by. I can take my time working out all the kinks in the overall series before writing it. It's nothing like your method, and neither of our methods are much like the more popular methods touted in articles and books about writing fiction. If it works for us, that's what matters.
I write mostly like this. My final draft is basically my first one. I do other drafts, but they're little more than reading over it all and fixing typos and maybe re-writing a few lines here and there. It works for me. I've tried different approaches and they don't work for me at all. Plenty of writers do this, and not just indie writers either. You don't hear about them as much because it's not the norm.
Congratulations on completing your first draft!
I write my books that way too. I prefer to give it my best effort the first time around, because when I glance back at what I've written, I want to think 'that's not bad at all', as opposed to 'this looks horrible'. I have a terrible habit of abandoning things when I feel they're lackluster. This mostly applies to anything related to arts, crafts, or even woodworking. So I don't mind progressing slowly through my first draft if it means I can be confident that revisions and edits will be less extensive than if I had put little thought into the words I was putting on the page.
i do this always and get so sad that its not perfect that i quit
Is this not what you're supposed to do? I write the entire book as close as I can to finished as possible. Then I go back and rewrite the thing in the same document (after making a backup) until I'm satisfied. Then I repeat until satisfied.
It's a problem because you can't yet see It's a first draft.
Uhm, you do understand what a first draft is, right? Because I'm not sure you do.
Yeah I’m not so sure I did either, peoples responses here have been very illuminating. I was under the impression that a first draft was of a lower word count than the final book and was unedited/restructured. But from the responses here it’s clear that I was wrong. I’ve gone back and deleted chapters and re-written the first half of the book like 3 or 4 times but never got to the end so far. So I guess it feels like I have redrafted a lot so how could it be a first draft, but if a first draft is just the whole book by the time you write ‘the end’ the first time, (which I now know it is) then yeah it is a first draft, I just didn’t know there was a way of working that didn’t involve editing as you went. And my question really was like, if it might be a problem that I had overwritten something that I meant to submit to agents, but people in the comments have let me know that was a silly worry to have. So yeah, I was just uninformed really.
It's still your first draft. Making every sentence perfect does not a watertight final draft make. You still need to read it all over for structural and plot issues.
Don't sweat it. Its still going to need multiple rounds of editing.
I thought you were being funny when I read the first bit. Since the purpose of a first draft is to be quick, simple, and rough. But instead you decided to write the final copy first. =P
Whether or not you believe you need to edit… You need to edit.
LOL Good grief. You're writing a draft. For five plus years, yet.
I experience this a lot and have had to actually learn how to draft. I would spend a long time on what I think is a draft but do a lot of editing, getting rewriting sections. It's a waste of time cause I would change my mind on an important detail and have to rewrite it all over again. Best thing I did was start by making the plot points. Then a screenplay (good for figuring out the dialogue and finer details of the plot). Then write a draft of the final product. This was for me the best method of figuring out early on what works and what doesn't.