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Approaches in Writing

Hello all, hope you've had a productive week. Mine was interesting. Recently I visited a blog where the author reported it took a year to complete their novel.  I scratched my head, wondering how the heck they did it.  I could see a first draft in this time frame, but to finish the work in its entirety, seemed impossible.

Curious to see if this was the exception or the norm, I googled popular authors like Stephen King and Stephanie Meyer.  Needless to say, it's the norm.  King usually writes a draft in six months.  He puts it away for a year then re-writes it. Meyer took six months to write her first novel, Twilight.  Their efficiency and expediency motivated me to try a new approach to writing.

Normally, it takes about a month to complete two chapters (if I'm lucky).  I write and edit,then write again, then edit again, until I feel the piece is pristine. Seriously, I cannot move forward until the draft is good as I can get it.  The problem is, when I look at it a few weeks later, with a fresh set of eyes, I still find ways to improve the piece.  It's a never ending cycle.

This week  I decided to try something different.  I wrote the chapter and moved onto the next without editing it first.  Admittedly, it was tough. Whenever I hit the hay, my mind continually ran through the revisions my chapter needed.  The following day, I forced myself to move on..   By Saturday, I had churned out two chapters.

Currently,  I'm on chapter thirty-four and have completed 72,000 words of my third draft. If I just write my ideas and move forward, I should have ten chapters done in a month or two.  Using my previous approach, I'd be looking at a year, not including final edits, etc. Since I'm ready to be done with this novel and move onto the next, I'll be taking the most expedient approach.  Do any of you share the same struggles? If so, I'd be interested to know how you kept from devoting most of your time to editing.  Until next week, happy writing.        



         

Comments

  1. Hi, Andrea,
    I guess it takes time to find the things that work for us, as writers. Six months writing the story works for me too, but editing can take me anywhere from 1 - 5 years.

    I tend to edit before I move to the next chapter, but after a couple of passes, I'm satisfied enough to get writing. I also realize that I'll have to go back and edit anyway.

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    1. Hi J.I. Welcome. Slowly but surely I'm getting to where you are. It's taken awhile to realize there's no such thing as perfect in this life.(:

      BTW, thanks for the following.

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  2. I don't edit as I go because even though I follow a timeline with a loose plot outline, things change by the time I get to the end. And that means I have to change things at the front. On first draft I just get the story down. I don't worry about anything but laying out the plot and basic characterization.

    Second draft I work on moving anything that needs to be moved around. When things are in place I work more on characterization, add in sensory and emotional elements.

    Second draft is the draft I send to my CP's. I don't especially think about cleaning up words and phrasing at this point. When I get their comments and make changes, I get down to serious editing.

    Good luck!

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    1. Your method sounds doable, Carol. The only question I have is how do you keep track of all the changes that need to be made along the way? For example, I have written chapters before, edited them, and moved on. A few days later, while in the shower, or driving,etc., it occurred to me that I overlooked an important element. I immediately went back and added it. Otherwise, I'd forget. Keeping track of plot twists and what not, is difficult enough. I can't imagine juggling impending changes as well. How do you do it?

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  3. I used to have a lot of trouble with editing instead of continuing the story, but I've managed to silence my inner editor for most first drafts. It's still hard to resist, though!

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    1. I'm on the third draft and still doing it. I feel like it's never going to be complete. Guess I'll just write it and then go back and edit. It's good to know that I'm not the only person who struggles to keep their inner editor at bay. Thanks for stopping by Golden Eagle.

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  4. While I was on a roll with my only completed novel, I bashed out the first draft in 6 months. That is not a difficult pace (only 500 words a day) providing the words keep flowing. It's taken a further three years of serious revising since then, though :)

    I know what you mean about editing. I am part-way between plotter and pantser, and I can't do what everyone says to do - just keep writing. I have to edit as I go. It's in my blood.

    My approach was to re-read sections (and correct anything that felt off along the way) as a way of easing myself back into the story. But I made sure not to get bogged down. If I found I was thrashing around editing more than writing, then I would hit "pause" on that scene and move on to a different one. Here is where the plotter became an advantage, I could leap ahead to chapters that caught my interest later on and let the words flow again, knowing how they fitted into the overall story. Then when I came back to earlier sections, usually the mental block would have worked loose.

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    1. For a moment, Botanist, I thought we lived in parallel writing universes. Seriously, I related with everything you said, until the part where you skipped around. I am such a linear thinker that it is difficult to jump ahead. What I have been able to do is switch between centuries with ease. If I get bogged down in the 21 century plot, then I move to the 16th century. The differences in dialogue and language give me a fresh perspective. Regardless of the century, I still have to write linearly. Guess I have a one-track mind.(:

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  5. My first novel, Uncut Diamonds, took me TEN years to write. Needless to say, I had never written a novel before and it took a whole lot of work before I had a clue and even more work before I got anything ready to submit, let alone publish. Since then I've sped things up, and my second novel was done in 2 years, my last was one year start to finish.

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    1. KarenG, so glad you visited. It's been a while. You made a good point, I had not considered the learning curve in all this. My background is mainly in technical writing, which is nothing like the creative side. As a person who loves the craft, I wrote and published a couple of short stories. This background boosted my ego enough to think I had what it took to write a novel. Well, I soon figured out how wrong I was.

      I wrote the first draft of my novel in a year, but for lack of a better word, it sucked!!!! My characters were one-dimensional, my plot had more holes than you'd find in a warehouse filled with Swiss cheese, and my POV was all over the place.

      After my draft was shredded by several members on Litopia, I purchased several "how to" books and read them from front to back. I practiced, and took a few workshops. Once I grasped the fundamentals of writing fiction, I moved onto the second draft. The feedback I received was positive, certainly light years ahead of the first reviews.

      The third draft (in my third year) is the best yet, but I am so anal that it's hard to move forward without editing each chapter to death. I'm moving past this compulsion, but it's difficult. Hopefully, one day I'll be able to write a novel in a year. You're story is inspiring. It shows me that practice does make perfect.(:

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    2. Andrea, I completely rewrote it at least twice, and then when I had something that seemed to work, I went in and changed the POV from 1st person to 3rd, and that seemed to do the trick. Novel-writing is like anything, you've got to learn how to master the craft. It's not easy to make it look easy!

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    3. Yeah, I gather that, KarenG. It takes time, lots and lots of time. Slowly but surely I'm getting there. Your experience gives me hope.

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  6. Never publish my book yet but my book took me roughly a year .i kept rewriting and changing.writing is never a day job.Kudos to Authors.

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  7. I guess I'm near average then. I write the first draft in six months, put it away for a month, then spend a couple of months revising and editing. I'm an outliner, so there's not a whole lot done as far as revisions go, except what my CP's give me. Using CP's slows the process down, but they are a necessary step! :)

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    1. Yup, DL, your comment, along with the others, reinforces my suspicions. My writing speed is below average.

      I am also a plotter, but sometimes I deviate from it. It's hard to predict whether an idea works until I it in writing. Perhaps that's the problem. I'm allowing myself to be distracted from the end goal, finishing my book.

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