In this episode we cover: 

• Does skeleton drafting work for everyone?
• Skeleton draft mistakes to avoid
• An overview of the skeleton draft process
• What details go into a draft

This week’s question is: Tell me something fun you have planned for the summer.

Recommendation of the week is: The 12 Week Year by Brian P Moran

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***this show uses affiliate links

Find out more about Steff at:

Writing Your Skeleton Draft Course: Use code REBEL for $10 off

Rebel of the Week is: Katie Forrest

If you’d like to be a Rebel of the week please do send in your story, it can be any kind of rebellion. You can email your rebel story to rebelauthorpodcast@gmail.com

No new patrons this week but a big thank you to my existing patrons. If you’d like to support the show, and get early access to all the episodes as well as bonus content you can from as little as $2 a month by visiting: www.patreon.com/sachablack

This Show is Sponsored by ProWritingAid

Get 20% off using Sacha’s link.

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The post 145 How to Skeleton Draft with Steff Green appeared first on Sacha Black.

In this episode we cover: 

• Analogies to help you better understand editing vs drafting
• How to approach editing
• The pitfalls and mistakes writers fall into
• How to show the change a hero goes through
• The five big scenes you need to get right
• The stakes paradox

This week’s question is: tell me something you’ve achieved this year.

Recommendation of the week is: I Love You To My Heart by Matthew Dion Goodall

Apple

Kobo

Amazon UK

Amazon USA

***this show uses affiliate links

Links I mentioned are:

The 2021 NaNoWriMo Writing Tools Bundle

Activated Authors NaNoWriMo Preparation

Kindle Storyteller

Find out more about Alex on:

Twitter

Instagram

The Big-Picture Revision Checklist

Rebel of the Week is: Jasmine Arch

If you’d like to be a Rebel of the week please do send in your story, it can be any kind of rebellion. You can email your rebel story to rebelauthorpodcast@gmail.com or instagram me @sachablackauthor

No new patrons this week, but a big thank you to my existing patrons. If you’d like to support the show, and get early access to all the episodes as well as bonus content you can from as little as $2 a month by visiting: www.patreon.com/sachablack

This Show is Sponsored by ProWritingAid

Find out more about ProWritingAid here.

Twitter, Facebook, Instagram

The post 106 How to Edit a Second Draft with Alex Kourvo appeared first on Sacha Black.

I cried because it was the end of more than just a marathon of RSI, obscenely late nights and incessant tapping that drove my wife to distraction. It felt like I had achieved my first real step towards freedom and the life I really want because a) I’d completed something real and tangible, all 72108 words were staring back at me like tiny dancing stick men.

And b) because I knew, this time, unlike my first draft, it wasn’t a total pile of turd.

After my two lonely tears rapidly dried up, I glanced at the clock on my laptop. The time blinked back at me, it read 1:04am. I’d sat and written 4025 words in the last 3.5 hours without moving. I was gobsmacked, that was four days worth of writing. In. One. Go.

Something told me to check the date. So I did. August 20th. I frowned. That rang a bell. I checked the post I wrote after completing my first draft. To my utter bewilderment, I completed my first draft the previous year on August 20th at 1:04am. If you don’t believe me, check the post.

It’s a beautiful thing, synchronicity. Perhaps I should publish it at 1:04am on the 20th August next year!

Here’s 13 things I learnt writing this draft.

THING ONE – EVERYTHING TAKES LONGER THAN YOU THINK 

To say I was surprise I’d taken a year to finish another draft was an understatement. Fucking gutted is more like it.

I mean, if we’re going to get all motherboards and microchips technical about it, it took 5 months. I started the re-write in April, and I’ve written 48k since 1st July. But it took so long because I was doing an awful lot of other important stuff  faffing, starting other books, scratching my head, blogging, beasting myself in the gym, drinking wine, potty training and a bunch of other shit that wasn’t bum in chair smashing words out.

What did this teach me? It taught me that anything that isn’t progress towards your goal is a distraction. A year per draft is not satisfactory (for me), and I won’t let it happen again.

THING TWO – SUPPORT NETWORKS ARE EVERYTHING & NOTHING 

There are four penrat writer monkeys who without which I couldn’t have got through the book. They listen to me drone on worst than moaning myrtle. They put up with my bullshit yo-yo’ing self-doubt and trust me I’m worse than an alcoholic rollercoaster.

I need them. Daily. Not always because I am down or fed up, sometimes to share in my literary orgasms as I kill another darling or add another twist.

BUT… That is where the support stops.

While we can prance around the virtual May Pole, braid each others hair and put wordy face masks on… they cannot write my book. They cannot put my pudgy fingerprints, on my superhero keys and make the sentences flow and they cannot force my butt in the chair.

If at the end of the year I haven’t finished my book, they are not to blame. I am.

Support is everything. It’s oxygen. Caffeine. Wine.

And it is nothing.

You are responsible for shaving fifteen minutes off housework, for asking hubby or wife to help so you can write. It is your choice to watch TV or socialise on lunch breaks, or go to the pub instead of work late into the night.

We all have 24 hours each day.

THING THREE – PUNCH RESISTANCE IN THE TIT AND WALK OFF

Which leads me to resistance. Everything that isn’t you making progress towards your goal is a distraction. It’s waste and according to Steven Pressfield, it’s resistance. If you haven’t read the War on Art, you should. It’s insightful and thought provoking. I read it in an hour or two the day after I finished the draft and it was enlightening to say the least.

Resistance is in essence, anything (including self doubt, procrastination, etc etc) that stops you working towards your goal.

His book is truth. It’s scary. And it’s frighteningly accurate.

“The danger is greatest when the finish line is in sight. At this point, Resistance knows we’re about to beat it. It hits the panic button. It marshals one last assault and slams us with everything it’s got.” Steven Pressfield, War on Art p.18

Never a truer word spoke – the two weeks leading up to finishing this draft, I suffered extreme self-doubt. I was excruciatingly tired, I had back aches, neck aches and agonising pain in my knuckles from the typing. The day I finished, (with the exception of the tiredness), it all went away.

Resistance taught me who I am. I am grateful to Resistance because without it, I wouldn’t have realised that I am a fucking force. I am real. I am a writer. I will not be defeated. Resistance can do what it wants to me. It can hold a blood smeared knife to my throat, or poison my Sunday roast. I will never give up. I will kick Resistance in the testicles while I write one handed and throw up over the bog if necessary.

“The working artist will not tolerate trouble in her life because she’s knows trouble prevents her from doing her work. The working artist banishes from her world all sources of trouble. She harness the urge for trouble and transforms it in her work.” Steven Pressfield, War on Art p.24

THING FOUR – TARGETS, ACCOUNTABILITY & TRACKING 

My accountability partner is my hero.  I’ve written about her and how having someone hold you to account, as well as setting targets is essential. You can read that here.

I set a date. Two in fact. One to finish this draft, one to finish the edits. Once I did that I worked backwards, setting daily and weekly targets. I know this doesn’t work for everyone. But for me, it is as essential as coffee, and coffee is life.

I track my word count and since having an accountability partner my daily word count has doubled.

The result? I finished my draft 5 days early.

THING FIVE – FUTURE ME IS AWESOME

We don’t all want to be held to account by someone else. Sometimes, all you need is a prod from yourself.

Futureme is an email system that you can use to email yourself at a specific time and date (of your choosing) in the future.

I set one up to email me during this draft and then forgot all about it. When it arrived, I had to smile. I’d said exactly what I needed to say to encourage me on.

SIX – DON’T SKIP PAST THE MAJOR EDITS 

One of the major fuckups I made in the first draft was not to stop and go back and correct something when I realised I needed to make a SIGNIFICANT change.

ERROR, of the jumping out a plane and forgetting the parachute level of catastrophe.

Don’t be me. Don’t do that. Skipping past the chapters you need to rewrite because you change the male lead, or removed three characters entirely from the book is a fucking monstrous mistake.

I know when your all up in your computer screen and in the middle of an epic word-gush it’s more painful to stop than a syphilis ladened chilli in the eye. But seriously. You need to stop. It hurt me bad when I came back to edit. I won’t make that mistake again.

THING SEVEN – DON’T SWEAT THE SMALL WORDS – COMPLETING IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN PERFECTION 

Buuuuuut you also don’t want to sweat the small shit. Can’t think of a word? Highlight it and move the fuck on. It will come to you. My novel is littered with highlights. Things where I know I have repeated a descriptive word because I couldn’t think of something else at the time.

Doesn’t matter. Just move on. You can fix it in the next edit. Completing a draft end to end is far more important than trying to get perfection in one draft. You can always read it again, or go through another round of edits.

“Books aren’t written, they’re rewritten. Including your own. It’s one of the hardest things to accept, especially after the seventh rewrite hasn’t quite done it…” Michael Crichton

THING EIGHT – TRUST EMERGENCE

And because I didn’t sweat the small stuff, I learnt to trust emergence. Sometimes, no matter what I did, I couldn’t figure out a twist, or the next scene. Instead of stressing, I just moved on to the following scene, or something else and worked on what I did know.

When I was changing a dirty nappy, shovelling crumb covered plates in the dishwasher or yawning at work, the answer would emerge from some crusty corner of my mind like the lost fiver you randomly find in an old pair of jeans.

You always find the answer, just not when you want it. Be patient.

THING NINE – NEVER TOO EARLY TO MARKET 

It’s never too early to market. It’s never too early to read marketing books, to make plans, build an audience, establish connections, create a media kit or create an email list. I’ve written a lot about marketing recently. If you’re an indie a writer, you will have to get comfy with marketing. If you put a book out there and ‘hope’ for the best, you ain’t guna sell shit. #truth.

Study marketing. Study hard. Try stuff. If it doesn’t work, analyse, tweak and try again. But don’t give up. 

THING TEN – I CAN WRITE FASTER & STILL RETAIN QUALITY. 

I was averaging 500 words a day, but after initiating my tracking sheet and being able to see my word count or lack of it, it pushed me to write faster and I started averaging a count  of 1000 words a day. Some weeks I’d average 1500 or more a day and then I had a few random occasions, like the night I finished the book where I either had some kind of divine karmic intervention, or I’d taken writerly crack and wrote 4025 words in 3.5 hours. Not once did I lose quality.

Lesson? I need to make this a permanent change.

THING ELEVEN – NEVER STOP BEING A STUDENT

I made an arrogant mistake on my first draft. I thought I shouldn’t read in my genre while I was writing because I might sound like them. I know. I know, I know, lower your bloody eyebrow, I was a newbie. I knew shit.

This time I’ve continued to read in my genre and my writing is better for it. I made a conscious effort to deconstruct books in my genre to study what made them brilliant. Then I tried to apply those lessons to my own work. Surprise, surprise, I got better.

This post is longer than the one I wrote after completing my first draft, because I know more. No doubt that the post I write after the next draft will be longer still.

Actively study. Seek out knowledge like an addict searches for their smack. Make the time to study. Always. And you will always grow and develop.

THING TWELVE – NOTES NOTES NOTES

Thankfully, I have an obsession with notebooks. I collect them like a hoarder stores junk. Can’t help myself, whenever I see a nice one I HAVE to buy it!

That’s handy for me. One of the best things I did this time was write further editing notes as I went. Marking down (in chapter) any changes that need to be made, or continuity checks I need to do. This is vital, I still haven’t worked out a good method for tracking things like when key information is told or the times of day, but I will. I even wrote down words or metaphors I wanted to change it will help immeasurably as I start the next round of edits.

THING THIRTEEN – WIVES NEED ATTENTION

I said it last time, I’ll say it again. My wife needs love. I’m a bad spouse. I’ll do better next time!

What’s the best lesson you have learnt while working on drafts? Let me know in the comments.

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The post 13 Things I Learnt From Completing Draft Two of My Novel appeared first on Sacha Black.

I don’t think I am alone in obsessing over reading blogs about writing, but all it does it confuse me. I mean, how much attention do we really pay to understanding our own writing process?

Until recently, when I had an epiphany, I’d spent a long time thinking there was a right way… a right writing process I should be following. There isn’t. I decided to sit down and really give my process some thought, because if I can understand my own process, then I can shape it and tweak it to maximize my effectiveness. I hope this post helps you do the same.

Everyone’s process will of course be different, but if you are in any doubt about your own method, if you’re blocked or just feel something isn’t right, then I strongly recommend you do your own version of this to understand your process. Because I love visual things, I have depicted it in a pyramid:

 ***

Usually I prepare and organise till I’m blue in the face, lists run in my blood. But it wasn’t working for my writing, so I let go of doing most ‘preparation’ to write this novel. One thing I couldn’t let go of was an outline. I need it, for my sanity! For me, it doesn’t have to be massive, but because getting the timeline/action down is the most important thing in my first draft, I need a paragraph outlining each chapter. I never follow the outline to the letter, things get moved, cut completely and then changed again, but it’s a guide.

Step 1: Decide what you need before you start – an outline, a synopsis, masses of research or just an idea.

***

PLOT

This is where you figure out what is most important to you to get down on the page first. This will also be dependent on how you work out and develop your characters.

Step 2: Decide what’s most important to you in draft one.

Here are my questions to help you work out your own process for draft 1:

• What do you like doing first?
• How do you develop your characters? Do you know them before you start writing or do you see how they develop on the page?
• How well do you know your setting before you start?
• Do you need to do lots of research?

I tried to use character sheets and interview each one before I started, but it didn’t work for me and trying only made me tie myself in knots worrying I was a shit writer because I couldn’t answer the questions.

So I sacked the preparation off and let the characters develop on the page. For me draft one is all about timeline and action. I need to get the basic plot down on the page. There’s only a little bit of creativity and imagery woven in to the story at this stage. I can’t get everything perfect in the first draft, so I don’t even try. I don’t worry about the chapter, three chapters ago, that Ive decided needs a rewrite, I just keep going. But how do I combat this incessant need to edit?

Step 3: Create an editing map.

I create one place, with a designated section for each chapter. Dump decisions or notes about chapters or characters or whatever you like under the appropriate chapter section. That way you keep your thoughts and decisions ready and organised for when you want to edit.

The benefit of an editing map is it will allow you to pattern spot your thinking. If you find you constantly put notes about characters then you know that’s what needs to go in the next draft. If you comment about setting then work on that next and so on.

***

CHARACTERS

Have a break before starting draft two, the longer the text the longer the break should be, but its up to you to decide how long is right for you. I imagine I will put my manuscript down for a month or two – or as long as I physically can.

Here’s where I hack the manuscript or story to pieces, I focus on finalising the timeline. Moving chapters or scenes till they are right, but I get it right here. Once this draft is over I don’t want to have to move the timeline much more. Whilst I do this, I study the characters. Picking up on their salient traits, emphasising or minimising them, checking consistencies and making very rough notes about each one, so that I get consistency across the whole story – bit like an editing map but for the characters – let’s call it a character map.

Step 4: Check your editing map for patterns of your thinking before you start editing- whatever is most salient is what you should work on next.

Step 5: Create a character map – it can look like whatever you want, and be as big or small as you want but should have relevant or key bits of information about your character to ensure consistency when editing.

Step 6: Once the timeline is finalised plot a loose map of chapters / scenes so you can easily find bits you need when editing.    

The character map ensures I check their back story and history and start weaving in detail.

Finally I start thinking about the world and environment. I know a lot of detail about my stories world before I start writing, so I don’t need to do much work to create it, more weave the detail in, in draft 3.

***

WORLD-BUILDING

Have another break before starting draft 3.

This is world-building time. I know for some people this will be the first draft stuff. But not for me, world-building comes in as a finishing touch – madness given the genre I write (fantasy/dystopian), but my world building is really done before I outline. The world in my current novel is what came to me first, so even though I only start to weave the detail in now, I already know what needs doing. My other focus in this draft is to finalise characters, detail, backstory and ensuring all the foreshadowing is in the right place.

Step 7: Check your editing map again

Ask yourself:

• What’s left to perfect?
• Have you checked details?
• Is your world complete?
• Are your characters perfected?
• Do you need to foreshadow?
• Does your timeline work?

***

PERFECTING THE MANUSCRIPT

I’m rubbish at proof reading. But I have to at least attempt it before giving it to beta readers and editors. So I proof read, check everything, over and over till I feel like I have done as much as I can do. I check:

• Characters
• Timelines
• Consistencies of: characters, world, locations, storyline, descriptions etc
• Grammar/spelling/word order/sentence structure etc
• General errors
• Story arcs / character growth

***

BETA FEEDBACK

This is the bit where you crap your pants a little – your hand shakes as you tentatively give your manuscript over to be critiqued by beta readers.

Once you stop crying! You edit in your feedback and hey presto you’re ready to pay a developmental or copy editor or seek an agent or whatever you feel your next steps should be.

 ***

RESEARCH

Step8: Research along the way, don’t get stuck making all the decisions before you start

There’s one section I haven’t mentioned. Research, and that’s because I research constantly. From before I pick up the pen, right through to the end of draft 3. I don’t worry about having all the tiny details before I start, or I would never start, plus I change my mind too often to decide everything before I begin; so I research details along the way.

***

This post is not meant to be a guide to the only writing process– the complete opposite in fact. This post is just my personal method of writing, my process. It will only be right for me. But what I hope it does do, is help you get some insight into discovering your own process. 

What does your pyramid look like?

The post 8 Steps to Discover Your Perfect Writing Process appeared first on Sacha Black.