Dear O'Abby: What do they mean by revise?

 Dear O'Abby,

I finished the novel I started during NaNo recently, and have been trying to figure out what to do next.  I've read through a bunch of stuff about NaNo and next steps on their website and here, on Operation Awesome, and from what I understand, the next step is to revise the novel I have just finished.  

But what does that mean?  Where I come from, you revise for exams - meaning you study, or go back over what you have learned during the year.  I'm pretty sure that isn't what the word means in this context, so could you please illuminate me?  What does revise mean in the context of a novel?

Kind regards,

Revisionist

Dear Revisionist,

Isn't the English language fun?  It's a miracle anyone ever learns to speak it properly to be honest!

You are correct that revision in terms of a novel is not the same as revision in preparation for an exam.  I guess the idea is similar, in that in both cases you will be going over work, but in the case of a novel, you aren't trying to learn it, but to make it better.  Editing, is probably a better word for what you need to do when you have finished a novel, but somehow that term always feels like it applies to books once they are much further down the track.

Basically, what you have to do now is make that book you've written better.

When you're drafting, particularly if you're drafting fast as you do during NaNo, the story is just spilling out and there are going to be things you don't notice while you're caught up in getting the story on the page.  My first suggestion is to leave your book alone for at least three or four weeks if you've just finished it.  Start something else if you have an idea in mind, or take a break and do something else for a wee while.  Getting some space from your story is critical to the revision process.

After you've had a break, go back and read through your manuscript slowly.  Make notes as you go about anything you feel isn't quite working.  There may be plot points that don't work because they haven't had enough set up, characters who appear and disappear (or change names and/or appearance) at random.  Characters may not act or react in a consistent manner.  The pacing may also feel off, with some places dragging, and others feeling rushed.  

Make notes on these things as you read, and anything else you feel is off.  If you can think of ways to address them, jot them down too, but don't try and fix them on the fly as you read through.  Making a change in one place always has repercussions later, and you need to have done a full read-through to be able to see the full picture and begin to make a revision plan.

Once you've read through and identified where the problem areas are, you can get to work on them.  Some fixes are likely to be easier than others, so if you're feeling anxious, start with these. But sometimes there aren't any easy fixes and the only way to tackle revision is to make a copy of your entire MS and dive in, starting from chapter one and working through to the end.

And the good news?  Once you've finished, you get to go back and start the whole process over again, from letting the book rest onward.  I usually find that three rounds of revising alone works for me, then I get some other eyes on it for a different perspective.  But the beta reading stage is probably best left for another post.

I hope that helps, and best of luck with the revision!  I hope you enjoy it.  I often find it's my favourite part of writing a book, when you take that messy pile of word vomit and start to shape it into something that actually resembles a novel. 

Have fun with it.

X O'Abby

OEW: December- NaNoWriMo

 

This week the Operation Awesome team are sharing their thoughts, opinions and experiences with NaNoWriMo.

I actually didn't do NaNo this year.  Having spent a lot of time revising my 2020 NaNo novel, it's finally at the point it's ready to go out to readers for critique, so rather than writing somethin new, I've been polishing up that MS so I can get it out on submission early in 2023.

But I have been supporting other writers who were doing NaNo.  Having done it several times now, and having both won and failed to meet the 50K words, I feel like I have something to offer those who are doing it.  So my contribution this year was tips and advice on how to get through.

I have to say, I did miss doing it.  There's something about the insanity of the schedule that really appeals to me.  In 2020 when I last did it, I really didn't have the time, so I ended up taking two days off work each week for the month and basically wrote the entire 50K words in those 7 or 8 days.  I did add a few more to finish the book over the Christmas break, but basically I wrote the whole book in less than 10 days.

Any wonder it needed so much revising I'm only just finishing now?

While it's super exciting to have "finished" a novel during NaNo, don't ever think it's actually finished.  I suggest trunking what you've just written for a least a month, more if you can bear to, and then come back to it with fresh eyes.  You'll be amazed how many flaws you will find once you have that distance from the story.

So that's the experience I'm going to leave you with.  Writing the novel is only the first step.  And you will not do yourself any favours if you skip or short-change the next steps.  You did all that work to get those words on the page.  Now spend some time making them glow.

Dear O'Abby: What next?

 Dear O'Abby,

I have just about finished the book I started writing for NaNo and was wondering what I do next.  This is the first time I've attempted NaNo and I was pretty surprised at myself for being able to do it.  Not only did I write the 50,000 words, but I've almost finished my book.  I think I'll be done by the end of next week.

I want to get it published now, so was wondering if you had any advice about what to do next.

Thanks,

First-timer

Dear First-Timer,

Let me congratulate you on both finishing NaNo and completing your book.  Both are fantastic achievements and you should be very proud of yourself.  I'm proud of you too!

But talking about publishing right now is jumping the gun a little bit...  There are a lot of steps that need to be taken before you even start thinking about that.

What you've written this month is a first draft, not a finished novel.  In fact, I don't even call my NaNo drafts a first draft; I call them zero-drafts or vomit drafts.  They're a basic idea of a novel which may have moments of beauty and insight, but are definitely not ready for anyone, even my closest critique partners, to read.

The first thing you should do is leave the book alone for a few weeks.  Write something else, or take a nice holiday break from your story.  In three or four weeks you can go back to it with fresh eyes and a level of perspective you won't have right now.

Then the hard work of revising begins.  You will probably find there are parts of the story you need to fill in, character details you figured out as you wrote that need to be woven into the characters earlier in the story, plot points that might not make a lot of sense where they happen in the story and myriad other things.  You will probably find you spend far longer revising and re-writing than you did writing your initial draft.  I usually find it takes me around 6-9 months to get a NaNo draft polished up enough to send out to readers.

Which is the next step.  You need to find people to read for you, people who can give you constructive feedback that you can use.  You might want to join a critique group online (or in person if we're ever allowed to do that again) or you might know some other writers in your area who might be willing to read for you.

You need to be prepared for critique at this stage.  Sometimes feedback from readers is harsh and not at all what you were expecting.  Readers might hate your favorite character or think the plot point you believed was cleverly crafted falls flat.  They might have issues with your character arcs, with the pacing.

Take some time to digest the feedback you get.  Some may resonate while some may not.  But it's important to consider it all and implement what you feel will help make your story stronger.

Then rinse and repeat...  Maybe then you can start thinking about publishing and the steps you can take toward it.

Hope this helps and doesn't discourage you too much. It's a lot of work, but it really is worthwhile and your book will be so much better for it.

X O'Abby

Editor Interview: Rhonda Parrish

Good morning, everyone! This is Samantha, and I'm so excited that today I get to share my interview with editor and writer extraordinaire Rhonda Parrish:

I first became acquainted with Rhonda's work when I read the anthology Fae, which she edited as the first book in her Magical Menageries series for World Weaver Press. (Just as an aside, "edited" crams tons of blood, sweat, and tears, into a demure, little word. You can read more about what an anthology editor does on her post here.) I loved Fae so much I found myself hugging my phone whilst reading. (I read on the Kindle app, so that makes more sense, right?) Then--THEN--she followed it up with two more awesome anthologies, Corvidae and Scarecrow. And now? NOW! She's accepting submissions for a fourth, Sirens. More details below.

Hi, Rhonda! Thanks for joining us today. You were the editor of Niteblade Magazine for eight years, and you’ve edited six anthologies. Obviously you love short stories! Why is that?

I love stories in any format--poems, short stories, novels, RPGs, video games, movies, television--but one of the best things about short stories is that they are short. That means I can read more of them in the same amount of time it takes me to get through a book.

I totally agree, and for even more reasons why our readers should be writing short fiction, check out Terra Luft's guest post from last week.

You’re currently accepting submissions for the upcoming Sirens anthology (which everybody should write something for, so says Samantha). What else can you say about what you’re looking for that you haven’t already?

Nothing really. I haven’t read a high enough proportion of the submissions I’ve received so far to really see what shape this anthology is taking (and thus what kind of stories I’m seeing too much or too little of). I’m hoping to be able to do an update around the beginning of October though.

We’re about halfway to the deadline of November 15. You’ve said you want an equal balance of sea and sky sirens, so are you getting that? How many submissions have you received so far? Have you started reading? Any tidbits you want to share about the slush?

So far I’ve received about 65 story submissions, and yes, I have begun reading them.

I’m excited. The overall quality of submissions seems to be quite high, which is not always the case right at the beginning where every author with a shelved story they think might possibly, almost, may be a fit for the anthology sends it your way. I’m not seeing that with this anthology, which is pretty exciting. I am seeing about twice as many sea-based sirens as sky-based sirens, but I expected that.

How do you feel about adherence to word count limits? What if I send you a story that’s exactly 7,500 words? What if I send you one that’s 7,549, but I call it 7,500? What if I send you one that’s 20,000 (but every single one is important, I swear)?

I don’t usually read cover letters before I read submissions (because I want the story to speak for itself), and the way most manuscripts are formatted the word count is way up in the right-hand corner, so I’m unlikely to notice the word count before I start reading. If I notice it while I’m reading, it’s because I’ve thought, “This story feels long… how long is it?” which is usually a symptom of a problem with pacing/tension/conflict/something within the story rather than “ZOMG, there are 49 extra words in here! Where’s my big red REJECTION stamp?!”

That being said, if you’re going to send something significantly over my word limit, email me first. I’m not an ogre, I’ll probably agree to take a look at it, but it’s about respect. If I say nothing over 7,500 words and you send me 20,000 words, I’ll be miffed because either a) you didn’t bother to read my guidelines, or b) you read them but decided that obviously they don’t apply to you. [Samantha's note: Why do writers do this? Don't let this be you.] Either one of those things, depending on my mood before I start reading, might have me reaching for my big red stamp…

Do you have any pet peeves about stories or submissions?

As you may have guessed from my answer above, people not following the submission guidelines drives me up the wall.

Niteblade used to have a ‘No Indents’ rule. It began as a practical thing to speed up formatting, but it very quickly became our BrownM&Ms Rule… sort of. In our case it wasn’t about safety, it was about who reads and follows directions because I don’t want to work with someone who doesn’t.

We turned away a lot of great stories because they were indented.

And I really wasn’t an ogre about it. It’s not like I wrote ‘no indents’ in tiny text at the bottom of the guidelines in the same colour as the background so you had to highlight it to see it. Nope. The very top of the page said, ‘NOT indented,’ and then a little further down it said, “When submitting prose, please single space your work, insert a blank line between paragraphs, and do not indent them.” AND there was a .jpgexample of what we meant. And yet…

To be clear, Sirens stories don’t have to be formatted in any special way. My point is just read and follow the guidelines. LOL.

Yep. Do it. It's hard work being a writer. Give yourself as many advantages as possible--and that one is easy.

As writers, we always want to know about the magic an editor brews to pull stories out of the slush. Once submissions close and you’ve made a first pass, about how many stories do you usually have on your shortlist before you start paring down?

I don’t think there is a ‘usual’ number. The shortlist has fewer stories than the total number of submissions and more than the final table of contents. That sounds like I’m being sarcastic, but I’m really not.

Fae had 191 submissions in total; 39 of them made it on the short list and 17 onto the table of contents. I recently edited an anthology using my pen name, and every story on the shortlist made it onto the table of contents. You just never know.

Can you tell us more about the step between shortlisting and deciding on your table of contents? Besides lots of coffee, wine, and/or painkillers, how do you decide what goes in and what goes out?

None of the stories on my shortlist are bad, which makes this stage the most difficult stage in regard to decision-making. It’s easy to pick between a strong story and a less-strong story. It’s a different thing entirely to pick between two strong pieces. Unfortunately I have to.

Once I re-read my shortlist, there are usually a handful of stories that I love so much they are guaranteed a spot. After I’ve established those, it becomes a matter of figuring out what else to keep. What goes with them? How do I get the most diversity, the most variety?

If I have two stories about a polka-dotted panda bear saving the world from evil using the power of dance, I can only keep one. In that case the stories go head-to-head, but usually by this point I’m trying to figure out which stories work best together.

For WWP anthologies once I have my short-short list done, I pass it up to my publisher, Eileen Wiedbrauk. She reads the stories and sends me her notes. They are short things (“It’s good but that ending…” or “I LOVE this one.”) but definitely help me with the final decisions.

Agents and publishers talk about an author’s behavior on social media as a decision-making factor in working with them. Do you consider that for anthologies?

I haven’t yet, though anything is possible.

I mean, I’ve accepted work by people I don’t like or wouldn’t want to hang out with, because the work was good*. BUT it’s different when you’re putting together an anthology because that person is just one of 17 or one of 26 or whatever rather than being THE ONE as in the case of a novel.

And… after giving this question a lot of thought… once you get down to the short-shortlist, if I’m deciding between two stories and the author of one is an ass on social media… well, that might be enough to tip the balance in the other direction.

You just never know, really, so we should all follow Wheaton’s Law. I mean, just in general, not only because you don’t want to alienate editors, agents, or publishers.

*For the next week my inbox is going to be full of “Do you mean me?” emails, so let me just say, if you have my email address the answer is probably no. :-p

Once you’ve decided on your table of contents and the author has been signed onto the project, you send back a list of substantive edits. How much say does the author have in which updates to accept and reject? Have you ever worked on a story where you and the author had to walk away because you couldn’t agree?

Authors always get the final say in which updates to accept and reject. Always. I do ask everyone I work with to look at my suggestions with an open mind, and often there’s a bit of back and forth which goes on between drafts, but it’s not adversarial or dictatorial, it’s a conversation.

I’ve been doing this for a while now, and I can only remember two times when the author and I couldn’t find a middle ground. One of those times was because the author really, really didn’t want to change a single word, and the other time was because the author and I had totally different visions for the story. Thankfully in both cases, the break was amicable, and I would happily work with either of those authors again.

You’ve said that you have to pitch each individual idea for Magical Menageries and I wouldn’t want to spoiler any announcements, but I’m terribly curious: Are you able to share any future anthology ideas? Are there any for this series that you pitched and had rejected?

I’ve been very lucky with the Magical Menageries in that so far each idea I’ve pitched has been accepted, but I’ve gathered plenty of rejection letters for other anthologies (with several publishers). It happens.

As for what’s coming next… I have some ideas, but nothing I’m ready to share yet. I will say I’m at the short shortlist stage, but I haven’t pitched anything to follow Sirens yet, and, really, I don’t want to jinx myself. LOL.

That's all right... if a bit mysterious. *eyebrow wiggle* How many more Magical Menageries anthologies will there be? Are you working on anything outside that series right now?

Yes. So many things.

I assume you mean specifically in regard to editing and anthologies? I’m in the midst of line edits on the third of my AlphabetAnthologies (C is for Chimera). I’ve also got a couple collaborative anthology projects looking for a home. I can’t talk about them much just yet, but they are pretty exciting.

I’ve also got an idea for a trilogy of anthologies I’d like to develop and find a home for--and I will, just as soon as I find where I left my time turner. ;)

As for how many more Magical Menageries anthologies there will be… that’s tough to say. I have lots of ideas (as I mentioned), and I enjoy working with World Weaver Press, but right now we don’t have anything planned beyond Sirens.

What are your long-term plans now that Niteblade is closing?

I intend to continue editing anthologies and such, but mostly I’m looking forward to having more time to write. LOL. Isn’t that what we all say?

Yep. "What would you if you had a million dol--" "WRITE." "OK, then..."

That’s all the questions we have for you. Thank you very much for your time!

Thank you very much for inviting me and for this interview. I appreciate it. J

Rhonda Parrish is driven by a desire to do All The Things. She was the publisher and editor-in-chief of Niteblade Magazine for eight years (which is like forever in internet time) and is the editor of several anthologies including, most recently, Scarecrow and B is for Broken.

In addition, Rhonda is a writer whose work has been in publications such as Tesseracts 17: Speculating Canada from Coast to Coast, Imaginarium: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing (2012 & 2015), and Mythic Delirium.

Her website, updated weekly, is at http://www.rhondaparrish.com, and you can find her on: 

• Twitter
• Facebook
• Goodreads

Check out all the details about submitting to her Sirens anthology here:

That's it! Don't forget next Friday is Operation Awesome's second flash fiction contest. I've been considering the feedback after the last one, and I'll have some details about minor changes in quick post on Sunday. Stay tuned for that!

What's Your Easter Egg?

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter! I spent mine trying to get some relaxation time in, while fixing some plot and character problems in one of my manuscripts. There was a place, a little more than 30% in, where it felt flat, and had no direction. Kind of like this:

Now what?

Ultimately, it meant I hadn't yet gotten to what that story really was--it was floundering, with nothing holding it together. I'd added too many directions, and made the story wider instead of deeper.

But it needed to go deeper. That was the creamy filling that the book's egg was missing.

Which meant my character needed a clear focus, a motivation, even after she'd experienced a pretty significant trauma. And it had to directly relate to the mid-point reversal.

And then, when I saw the the end of an episode of Better Call Saul, called Pimento, I finally found my missing Easter egg.

I won't ruin Better Call Saul for those who want to see it, but suffice to say that Saul (Jimmy) finds out that he's been strung along for quite awhile by someone he thought he trusted (which is exactly what happens to my protagonist). Watch if you dare:




My protagonist's motivation was not only to try to fill the holes in her life, but acknowledge that they were there in the first place. And because the antagonist would never allow her to do that, that's where they could bat heads at the mid-point reversal.

Armed with my Easter egg (and its creamy filling) I'll go back to revising that section with a completely new purpose--both with what the antagonist intends and how my protagonist has to get around it.

To to sum up, if you have a section of your book that's falling flat, revisit the following questions:

• What does my protagonist really want here (their Easter egg)? Why do they want it? How will it help him/her?
• What does my antagonist really want here (their Easter egg)? How will he/she thwart my protagonist's efforts to get what he/she wants?
• How will this section relate to the mid-point reversal (or other places where protagonist and antagonist go head-to-head)?

Hopefully, by the time you've worked through this, you'll find Easter eggs that you might not otherwise have discovered.

Your turn. What's your protagonists's Easter egg? Antagonist's Easter egg? How will they help your plot and character development?

Method Writing

Are you familiar with method acting? Ever applied this vein of thought to your character development while writing?

It's the use of sensory techniques to get into character. Things like drawing on personal emotions and memories, and what's called affective memory. Emotional recall and sense memory use the act of recalling physical sensations surrounding events to apply it to your character's reaction and make your scene real and character believable.

I don't know about you, but since I began actively learning craft, I also began taking mental note of body reactions and facial expressions during certain high intensity moments so that I can use them later while writing. As for the sense memory, friends and family have probably wondered why I stare at them as though I'm studying their every move while in the middle of an emotional conversation. I want to remember how someone looked, sounded, felt, etc. when tension is high.

All for the writer's toolbox.

There's another method I use to stay in character while writing, and this I use mainly when writing first person. I have to be that character while narrating. Think like them, act like them, breathe like them. It's no secret around my house that my lingo changes depending on the story I'm telling. So does what I listen to, what I watch, etc.

Much like method acting, I import the character into my very being so that I can stay in that character's frame of mind while telling the story. If I don't believe I'm the character while writing, then why would my readers believe the narrator is the character and not the author?

Think about it.

How about you? Do you believe in method writing? Do you have any tricks of the trade to stay in character or help develop them in order to tell their story? How do you think writing in third person is different?  

I'll Make it Fit: Why Cramming Things Together is a Bad Idea

Having finished the second draft of my WIP, I've thought about my editing process, and what I learned from this past go-round. A lot of things came to mind, but the most important was the consequences of molding the story into something it wasn't (and having to back-track when that didn't work).

We've all been there, I'm sure. When revising the heck out of Plot A, Plot B comes along and says, "I'm the real story here. Plot A can suck it." So I cut too much to accommodate Plot B, and ended up having to re-add it back in (thank goodness for previous saved drafts).

The trick is to marry Plot A and Plot B in a way that doesn't feel forced:

"I'll make it fit!"

When we try to force story, it gets stifled, and turns into something it isn't meant to be. If you're encountering this, take a step back and see what your characters are doing.

That's right--I said characters. Not plot. Because the "making it fit" phenomenon happens when I'm trying to tell my characters what they're supposed to be doing. Making them speak, instead of letting them speak.

If you find that your novel is feeling forced, ask yourself the following:

1. Am I letting my characters discover their true selves, or am I adding unnecessary frills and forcing the story?

2. Does Plot B contradict the characters' actions that led up to the current scene? Or is there a way to tie it together to what will inevitably happen?

3.  Am I going wider? Or deeper? (Hint: Go deeper so the puzzle pieces fit, but don't feel forced.)

Once I found my villain's true motivation--simple, with no frills attached--Plot B finally said, "Oh! That's what you're doing. Okay, I can fit in this way..."

And because my villain's no-frills motivation was directly connected with my protagonist's inciting event, it let me see what was supposed to stay (and what needed to be cut). And at last, I saw my way to the end.

So what about you? What do you do when things don't fit?

Plot running astray?

The second draft of my novel has gone in so many unexpected directions, it feels more like a first draft, and I wish I could do NaNo WriMo with the rest of you wonderful people.

In my revisions, I built an ever-increasing word count that bordered on gluttonous, and it eventually ran my story into the ground. Kind of like this:

For days, I hemmed over how to jump start everything into gear. The answer came when I helped a student hone in on her research paper thesis. I told her a mantra from my own papers: "Stick to your thesis like glue."

I realized my novel's thesis was my synopsis and query, and I hadn't stuck to them at all. Notes and changes were spread across multiple documents, and there was a story thread that didn't need to be there. That's what was blocking my path.

Here's how I got myself untangled:

Step 1: Revised query and synopsis to reflect new story directions, and stuck to it like glue

Step 2: Condensed proposed story changes into a manageable to-do list

Step 3: Sliced out extra story threads that didn't belong

So far, I've been able to subtract 4,000 words, and I now have a clear path to the end:

I hope, whether you're doing NaNo WriMo, or if you're buried in revisions like I am, that you can stick to your query and synopsis (or outline, if that's your preference). Especially if you find your plot tangled or your story stalled. Letting go of what you don't need makes everything a ton easier.

Your turn: What are some ways you've tamed your unruly plots?

What's in Your Toolbox?

With November quickly approaching, I've seen lots of posts on how to prep for NaNo this year.

I won't be participating, since I'm still editing my current WIP (I'm almost 260 pages in), but all the NaNo stuff got me thinking about being prepared for novel writing and editing, and what I keep in my writer's toolbox year-round. So here it is:

And it's just about this messy.

Writing: The Drafting Stage/Craft Honing

NaNoWriMo really put me in touch with my drafting process back in 2011. With a spreadsheet to keep track of word count, and a separate spreadsheet with character sketches and chapter synopses, I always felt confident at this stage.

For those of you pantsers out there (I'm sure there are many of us), I highly recommend Rock Your Plot by Cathy Yeardley--I often build my outline around the elements she includes, such as inciting event, plot points, pinch points, etc.

I'm also increasing my focus on character development--since I feel weakest there. Mostly, it's getting to what your protagonist wants (goal) and why they want it (motivation). Explore who your characters are, and how they've been shaped by their experiences. Sometimes characters won't tell you these things until halfway through the novel (or even after the novel is written). This happened to me in my current WIP, when I finally realized her main goal was to fill the holes within herself.

At all writing stages, published or not, growing in craft is something we can all do. For this reason, craft stuff probably constitutes the biggest part of my toolbox.

Books:

Rock Your Plot by Cathy Yeardley
Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
Characters & Viewpoint by Orson Scott Card
The Art of Character by David Corbitt

Blogs:

Fiction University
Writer Unboxed

Editing: The Revising Stage/Perfectionism and Fear Mongering

I'd admit, this is still an uphill battle for me. I just printed out pages of a revised chapter that I plan to look at tomorrow with fresh eyes, but even before I do, I know it will need a lot of work.

A lesson I learned the hard way was not to worry about line edits too early. Sometimes the perfectionist in me refuses, but when I ask her if she's being helpful, and she says no, I tell her to take a hike. And then I allow myself to be satisfied with my product, even though it might be messy and unfinished.

Another big and hard lesson in this process was learning that the best editor = space from my novel. Which means trunking my first draft for months, maybe a year. When I finally do revisit content, here are some things I try to consider:

First stage: Are the characters compelling people that readers want to hang out with for hundreds of pages? Is the plot engaging? Is there a strong hook to reel readers in? Writing 21st Century Fiction by Donald Maass is helpful in this stage, because it includes all kinds of useful exercises to ramp up narrative.

Second stage: Is everything consistent? Are there story flaws?

*Insert many stages of editing and trunking, including drafts to beta readers*

Last stage: Is everything consistent? Do the sentences read awkwardly?

I'm still honing this part of my toolbox, so if anyone wants to include something in the comments section, I'm all ears.

Books:

Writing 21st Century Fiction by Donald Maass
GMC: Goal, Motivation, Conflict by Debra Dixon
Self-editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne and David King

Blogs:

Fiction University (Mentioned above, but covers all writing stages)
A Novel Edit

Publishing: The Final Stage/Sending Your Stuff into the Great Beyond 

I've had a tendency to focus too much on this stage, so I'm only designating a small part of my toolbox to it. Still, it's good to know some basics, such as who your audience is, what genre your book fits in (including what genres are actually out there) and what age group your book will fall under (such as the nuanced differences between Young Adult and Middle Grade, standard word counts, etc.). You can keep an ear to what's trending, but don't marry yourself to it. And don't just write to the market, because it's constantly changing.

Books:

Writer's Market by Robert Lee Brewer (a new one of these comes out every year)

Blogs/Websites:

Absolute Write Water Cooler
Janet Reid, Literary Agent
Fiction University (Mentioned above, but covers all stages of the process)


Okay, your turn! What's in your toolbox?

Edited prose falling flat? Check your inner critic

Ernest Hemingway said, "Write drunk, edit sober." The problem with editing sober, though, is if it goes too far unchecked, it can turn into "church lady" sober. The inner critic taunts your loopy, messy prose, making you feel stupid for writing it in the first place. Sort of like this:



The unfortunate result of this, at least for me, is prose with all the life sucked out of it, leading to flat characters and a weak plot. Yeah, the sentences go together, but if there's no life in them, they're not worth reading.
I ran into this with a recent short story I wrote for my MFA class. It explored what might happen if our bad ideas didn't come from us, but from external, invisible beings who planted them to ensure we learned from our mistakes. (Much like an inner critic, no?) My protagonist is one of these invisible beings, and the seed she plants backfires. Forced to confront her lizard boss Roebuck, she finds out the whole system is rigged. 
Here's the scene as I turned it in for class:

I can’t move. Can’t think. I stare, feeling like I’m seeing Roebuck for the first time. “Why control us this way? Make us do this if it doesn’t help the humans?”   

He flicks his tongue. Irritated. “Ignorance keeps the system healthy. Don’t question it.”

This isn’t right. My entire being buzzes with a new clarity. One that allows me, for the first time, to see into his brain. His memories.

There’s a silver medical table, with his former lizard self, much smaller, and squealing in pain. A human in a white lab coat injects him with a red fluid.

My mouth gapes, and I can’t speak. Zorg was right about pawns. I wonder how much he knows. How much he wanted to tell me, but was afraid of what Roebuck would do if he did.

I narrow my black eyes. “You don’t do this to help the humans. You do it because you want revenge on them.”

He growls, and pulls me toward another wall. An invisible door, one I didn’t know was there, opens. “They need to know the harm they cause others. Be accountable for it.”

The room seems to elongate. I stare at the empty elevator pod at the other side of the room, starting its countdown to leave.

I can’t let it. 

Here's the same scene with some deleted lines added back in, more showing instead of telling, and some sentences combined:

My joints stiffen. I can’t move. Can’t think. “Why control us? Make us do this if it doesn’t help the humans?”   

He flicks his tongue, irritated. “Because it works. Ignorance keeps the system healthy.”

I stare at his hooked face with its sinister scales and needle-sharp teeth. And for the first time, I don’t trust it. Fueled by anger, my mind buzzes, allowing me access into the deepest part of his brain, where his memories live.

On a silver medical table, his former lizard self, much smaller, squeals in pain. A human in a white lab coat injects him with a red fluid.

So that’s why. He doesn’t want to help the humans. He wants revenge on them.

Zorg was right about pawns. I wonder how much he wanted to tell me, but couldn’t, afraid of what Roebuck might do.

I narrow my black eyes, scathing. “You’re using us. All of us. To hurt them.”

"I don't have time for this." He growls, and pulls me toward another wall. An invisible door, one I didn’t know was there, opens. “They need to know the harm they cause others, and be accountable for it. Someday, you'll understand.”

The room elongates, and I stare at the empty elevator pod at the other side, starting its countdown to make someone else’s life unnecessarily miserable.

I can’t let it. 

  The scene still needs work, but at least I've gotten hold of the emotional heft needed to carry it forward. I took a overly telling sentence that involved "seeing Roebuck for the first time" and showed how she perceives him differently instead. I also inserted more of Roebuck's reactions to her. But most importantly, I allowed my sentences to be a bit messier, inserting more cadence and variety within the prose by default.
So what about you? What kills your prose, and what have you done to spruce it back up again?

Plot holes and a simple suggestion

These are my sweat pants. They're falling apart. (I folded one leg over so you could see the back, too.)

I didn't realize how full of holes my pants were until I was getting ready to fold them recently, and saw them lying on the bed. 

Whoa, I thought. Those are practically goners. 

It made me sad.

It also reminded me of my current WIP. With OTH releasing on Monday, I've been working on Flora stuff for months now. With the Flora things being officially out of my hands for a while (whew), I've been able to go back to Cozenage 2. 

It's like seeing the storyline for the very first time. Tons of issues are jumping out at me, demanding my attention. I love it.

A lot of times, we writers spend so much time getting comfortable with our works-in-progress, it's easy to get to a point where plot/character holes are completely missed. The stories or specific aspects of them might be falling apart at the seams, but because we've been buried so deep in everything and know how the WIP is *supposed* to be, we don't even see this.

There are varying pieces of advice on how to fix this (CPs, betas, et cetera), but I've personally come to learn that taking a few months (yes, months--not weeks) away from a project that might *feel* like it's done is really the best. I know that seems like a long time when you're chomping at the bit to get it finished and move on to another project, but believe me, it's worth it. You'll be looking at your work with a pair of fresh eyes and only will plot holes stand out, but it'll also be easier to come up with solutions when you're not burnt out on the storyline.

I like what Neil Gaiman says:

The best advice I can give on this is, once it's done, to put it away until you can read it with new eyes. Finish the short story, print it out, then put it in a drawer and write other things. When you're ready, pick it up and read it, as if you've never read it before. If there are things you aren't satisfied with as a reader, go in and fix them as a writer: that's revision.

How about you? Do you agree with this? If so, how long do you step away from WIP (or finished draft) before diving back in again? 

How All Work and No Play Kills a Manuscript

I'll admit, I've struggled with what to blog about this week. I was going to one about editing, but realized I'd already done that. I was going to post about creative inspiration from my Hawaii trip, but Aimee already did such a good job of that with Alaska that mine seemed redundant in comparison.

But perhaps I can do both--with what I learned in Hawaii during the limited hours I dared to hand-edit the last chapter I'd hacked to bits. It fell completely flat, and made my character a distant carbon copy of herself.

I'd been working on it too hard to notice. Unwilling to take breaks for fear I'd never get the revisions done.

It took getting me out of my routine, and putting me in a setting with lots of ocean, rainbows, and a touch of yoga to knock some sense back into me. Give me the perspective I needed.

And I realized the reason my scene fell flat is because my character literally had a gun in her pocket--and wasn't using it. In this scene, she needed to do a lot more than just sit there.

So when I got back home, I re-wrote the scene, splicing it together in the sequence it was meant to go, and had her hold that gun to someone's head, for goodness sake. I don't know if I'll keep it as is, but for now, it's enough to move forward with the rest of my revisions.

Another thing the time and space in Hawaii gave me was the realization that fun is not only a necessary part of writing (and living) but it has to be a priority. Even if I have to manually write it out on my to-do list. Staring at the Pacific Ocean, with its waves rolling in, reminded me that there is a whole lot more to life than being hyperfocused on work. And that being too driven actually hurts more than it helps.

So, instead of feeling guilty for the week I spent barely writing or revising, I feel blessed that it allowed me the space I needed. And if that doesn't help me remember not to work myself to death, perhaps these pictures will:

So what is your limit? What are some signs that tell you you've been working too hard?

Before the Query Stage, and What I've Learned Editing a Second Draft

We hear it all the time. Finish what you start. Complete that novel. And we do. We write "THE END" and jump in the air. (Cue marching band.)

Until we realize, we just completed a first draft. Which is fantastic. But it's still only one piece of the journey. (Send marching band back to the rehearsal room.)

I've done NaNo WriMo before, and even adapted an excel spreadsheet from it when I'm drafting. But for me, drafting isn't the issue. I'm usually good about meeting my word counts and getting words on the page in an efficient manner.

This often feels like this:

But after NaNo ends...then what? We don't hear a lot about what to do after first draft is on the page (or perhaps after the second or third draft is done either). Perhaps it's because drafting is sexier than editing. Editing is work. Drafting is fun! But one of my previous NaNo novels was so messy that I wasn't able to get it off the ground at all, and it's currently sitting in a drawer waiting for me to sell it for parts.

And maybe someday I will. But right now, I'm almost 200 pages revised into the second draft of a manuscript I drafted last year. The story is shaping up much differently than when I first wrote it, which means, after I finish this pass through, I'll need to trunk the novel again, bring it out of moth balls, and edit it at least once or twice more before showing it to beta readers.

This process is more like this:

I was lucky enough to land on this blog post called "Braving Your Second Draft." It said: "Each draft is an essential step on the road to the completed manuscript you’re trying to write." The good news? No words are wasted, despite what I claimed in this previous post. Those anchors aren't always bad, and sometimes, they can be stabilizing, offering further proof that the true joy comes from the writing itself.

So with that in mind, here's what I've learned in my second draft edits this go-round:

1. Instead of word count, do a minimum page count.

I'm forgetting where I heard this advice, so I'm unable to cite anybody on it. But I discovered that if I grapple with at least five pages a day, and get them done, I still accomplish something. And if I do more, great. This breaks the perfectionist part of me that wants to dwell on a word and paragraph level, which is not what I should be doing at this stage, and prevents twelve hour editing binges (you think I'm joking, but this actually happened).

2. Covering a plot hole might make more, so be careful when this turns into a domino effect.

 About mid-way through the draft, I finally figured out my villain's true motivation. It went against some of what I'd written previously, and when I fixed it, more plot holes opened, and soon I was in a gopher field, with my novel progress halted. So I took a step back and only made the changes that were absolutely necessary to remain consistent with what the villain wanted. If there's more to it, I can always address it in a subsequent draft.

3. Don't be afraid of the delete key...

Once the words are down, it's hard to get rid of them, and I carry this anxiety of not getting back what I delete if I need it later. So I created a document where I could put excess stuff (including plot points that went nowhere). And I'm discovering that I'm only drawing from it rarely--it's grown to over 100 pages and 24,000 words. A novella of scraps, in other words. What this has taught me is it's okay to delete words and write new ones that are better--and the more I'm willing to part with, the better the novel will be.

4. ...but also don't be afraid to flesh out those skeletons.

All the novels I've written with the NaNo spreadsheet, even if they took a few months, ended up pretty skeletal, and those drafts always needed more fleshing out. So look for areas of expansion, and remember to go deeper instead of wider.

5. Editing can really be fun. Really.

I'm still having scads of fun with this novel and its growth spurts, so at least for now, the editing doesn't feel like work yet. I'm in the third act, when a lot of previous plot clues are answered--but also found the big reveal wasn't well established or consistent. So I wrote outside conversations between my characters to establish some clarity, which were tons of fun. And lo and behold, a plot point I didn't know was staring me in the face revealed itself, and today I combed the novel to make this detail more apparent throughout. I'm sure there are some places I missed--but I can always catch them on the next go-round.

Of course, none of this is on official deadline--so I'm curious to hear from those of you needing to make these kinds of editing decisions quickly. How do you negotiate the changes you're asked to make?