That Writer Life
I have an ugly baby.
Not a literal baby, friends. Calm down. Sorry if I spooked you.
No, this ugly baby is not a living, breathing human.
It's a book.
Well, it's like the precursor to a book. It's a draft. An ugly, ugly, ugly draft.
Let me back up a little bit. If you are a "regular" reader of my blog, you might recall back in November I said I was participating in something called National Novel Writing Month {or NaNoWriMo for short}. The goal of that project is to write 50,000 words in 30 days - or the first draft of a novel, essentially.
I "won" NaNoWriMo, but I didn't finish the novel. I wrote all 50,000+ words, but the story just wasn't finished yet. So this April, I participated in Camp NaNoWriMo. Basically, that's just a shortened version, where you set your own word count goal for the month.
And so I pushed through the month of April, and I finished my draft. It is done, and the beautiful thing {the only beautiful thing about this particular one} about a first draft is that all it has to do is exist. How poetic is that? Without the first draft, nothing can come after it. It just has to exist, and it has served its purpose.
Did I mention this draft is ugly?
It's full of humongous plot holes. I changed characters' names halfway through. I didn't take the time to name characters, who exist in the draft as RESTAURANT OWNER or DOG. I began the novel with really great literary devices that I forgot about by the end.
How exactly does somebody do those things? I mean, if you're writing a novel, shouldn't you have all of that figured out before you start?
The short {and long} answer? No.
I mean, for me, at least. No. I fall somewhere in the middle between plotting and writing-by-the-seat-of-your-pants {those people are called pantsers, so I guess you would say I'm a plantser}. The main characters and main plot points are mapped out, yes, but things happen in the middle of the writing process. Your character needs a cup of coffee because they've been up all night doing The Important Thing, and so they go to a coffee shop. Well, that coffee shop needs a name. And rather than sit and stare at a blinking cursor, it is just easier to write COFFEE SHOP in all caps, and then come up with a name later. My draft is full of all-caps phrases and sentences. This one is a direct quote: YES, THEY HAVE CHICKENS AND I PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE WRITTEN ABOUT THEM SOONER. A reminder to Future Me to include chickens somewhere earlier in the story.
I have read a lot of really great writers' writing advice, and a few things have stuck out to me. The tip in the previous paragraph, for example, is straight from the revised edition of No Plot? No Problem! by Chris Baty. Another tip, which explains some of the ugliness in my draft, is that you shouldn't reread as you write. I mean, yes, read what you wrote the day before, but the book is never going to get written if you keep rereading what you've already written. Because rereading inevitably leads to editing, which is also why I don't edit.
I rewrite.
I know what you're thinking. They're the same thing, right? WRONG! Now that my 200-page, 85,000 word ugly baby has been born, I am in the process of rewriting. I've opened a brand new document and started retyping the entire thing. Why? Do I hate myself? Am I insane?
I'm not going to answer the last two questions, but the first answer is easy. Editing is not efficient in the long run of the novel. When you edit, you reread and change some words, move some commas around, fix your spelling, etc. But as I said, I have read a lot of really great writing advice, and this piece really stuck out to me. By forcing myself to retype every word, I can quickly figure out what the novel is missing or what is superfluous. When I get to that part where I didn't have the name for the coffee shop, I can take my time and come up with something that I really like. I can get used to the new name I gave the character, which makes the old name really stand out and ensures I don't miss it. I can fill in those plot holes as I go, because I've figured it out by the end of the draft.
Will this ugly baby ever see the light of day? Maybe. Maybe not. She certainly has potential, and with a lot of TLC, she might be ready for other people to see her. But not right now.
Not a literal baby, friends. Calm down. Sorry if I spooked you.
No, this ugly baby is not a living, breathing human.
It's a book.
Well, it's like the precursor to a book. It's a draft. An ugly, ugly, ugly draft.
I "won" NaNoWriMo, but I didn't finish the novel. I wrote all 50,000+ words, but the story just wasn't finished yet. So this April, I participated in Camp NaNoWriMo. Basically, that's just a shortened version, where you set your own word count goal for the month.
And so I pushed through the month of April, and I finished my draft. It is done, and the beautiful thing {the only beautiful thing about this particular one} about a first draft is that all it has to do is exist. How poetic is that? Without the first draft, nothing can come after it. It just has to exist, and it has served its purpose.
Did I mention this draft is ugly?
It's full of humongous plot holes. I changed characters' names halfway through. I didn't take the time to name characters, who exist in the draft as RESTAURANT OWNER or DOG. I began the novel with really great literary devices that I forgot about by the end.
How exactly does somebody do those things? I mean, if you're writing a novel, shouldn't you have all of that figured out before you start?
The short {and long} answer? No.
I mean, for me, at least. No. I fall somewhere in the middle between plotting and writing-by-the-seat-of-your-pants {those people are called pantsers, so I guess you would say I'm a plantser}. The main characters and main plot points are mapped out, yes, but things happen in the middle of the writing process. Your character needs a cup of coffee because they've been up all night doing The Important Thing, and so they go to a coffee shop. Well, that coffee shop needs a name. And rather than sit and stare at a blinking cursor, it is just easier to write COFFEE SHOP in all caps, and then come up with a name later. My draft is full of all-caps phrases and sentences. This one is a direct quote: YES, THEY HAVE CHICKENS AND I PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE WRITTEN ABOUT THEM SOONER. A reminder to Future Me to include chickens somewhere earlier in the story.
I have read a lot of really great writers' writing advice, and a few things have stuck out to me. The tip in the previous paragraph, for example, is straight from the revised edition of No Plot? No Problem! by Chris Baty. Another tip, which explains some of the ugliness in my draft, is that you shouldn't reread as you write. I mean, yes, read what you wrote the day before, but the book is never going to get written if you keep rereading what you've already written. Because rereading inevitably leads to editing, which is also why I don't edit.
I rewrite.
I know what you're thinking. They're the same thing, right? WRONG! Now that my 200-page, 85,000 word ugly baby has been born, I am in the process of rewriting. I've opened a brand new document and started retyping the entire thing. Why? Do I hate myself? Am I insane?
I'm not going to answer the last two questions, but the first answer is easy. Editing is not efficient in the long run of the novel. When you edit, you reread and change some words, move some commas around, fix your spelling, etc. But as I said, I have read a lot of really great writing advice, and this piece really stuck out to me. By forcing myself to retype every word, I can quickly figure out what the novel is missing or what is superfluous. When I get to that part where I didn't have the name for the coffee shop, I can take my time and come up with something that I really like. I can get used to the new name I gave the character, which makes the old name really stand out and ensures I don't miss it. I can fill in those plot holes as I go, because I've figured it out by the end of the draft.
Will this ugly baby ever see the light of day? Maybe. Maybe not. She certainly has potential, and with a lot of TLC, she might be ready for other people to see her. But not right now.
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