#the second draft

if our bodies are roadmaps

red and blue curls

that tangle as we grow

consider me an explorer

tracing the side streets

until i can find my way to the center of you

that knot where all roads converge

where all the unsaid things go

there i would plant you a garden

something for you that grows

Many people in my online community have asked for tips on self-editing. I don’t recommend it, as most people don’t have the tenacity to do a proper job of it. However, it can be done, so we’re revisiting a post from April of 2024 on effective self-editing. I hope this answers some questions! As an editor, I saw every kind of mistake you can imagine, and before that, as a writer, I made them all.…

We are still working on the second draft of our manuscript. We have searched for our code words and examined our character arcs for agency and consequences. The Second Draft: Decoding My Mental Shorthand #writing The Second Draft: agency and consequences #writing Today, we’re looking at the arc of the plot.  This is a good opportunity to open a new document and answer a few questions about your…

As an editor, I saw every kind of mistake you can imagine, and before that, as a writer, I made them all. This is why I rely on an editor for my work. Irene sees the flaws that my eye skips over. When prepping a novel to send to Irene, I use a three-part method. This requires specific tools that come with Microsoft Word, my word-processing program. I believe these tools are available for Google…

Sculpting the second draft #amwriting

The end of NaNoWriMo approaches. Many novels have been written, and many are still incomplete. And when we do finally write the last words, we will get that happy-dance feeling, that moment where the world is singing.

Following that burst of joy, we have the urge to immediately share it. I know it’s tempting, but don’t do it.

We need to gain some distance from our work to see it more clearly, so…

How can you have a second draft without finishing the first?  No idea, but it's easy enough to work on so I'm not questioning it too much.

Things have been progressing slowly, but smoothly.  The story's condensing, and I like the faster pace it's taking now.  I'm clearing a lot of deer from the forest with this second draft and it's nice to start paving the path I set with the partial first draft.  Probably my favorite part about this process is the Copy & Paste function.  Yes, I'm clearing a lot and rewriting a lot, but it's amazing how much I still end up using copy & paste for the core scenes I'm keeping.  Don't get me wrong, I'm still editing and rewriting those scenes to make sure they blend well with the rest of the draft, but there's not as much to change as with other scenes.

I've always heard from authors and writers that the second draft is the part where you essentially delete 99% of your first draft.  Or maybe that happens in between the first and the final draft (so probably the latter).  Anyway, I was expecting a lot of deleting with this draft--and don't get me wrong, there has been a LOT of deleting--but it's surprising how much I've kept and plan to keep.  I mean, the main characters are staying the same.  Their appearances haven't changed, so I'm C&P'ing that info from the first to the second and making some alterations.  And then there are the core scenes, which I'm editing, but if they take place in the same location and have all the same characters there's little to change if the second draft's characters somehow arrive at the same circumstance as their first draft characters did.

You know what I mean?

Anyhow, that's the status of the second draft so far.  I'm at 25 pages and likely to hit 30 before I finish the second chapter (which is almost done thanks to a C&P of a core scene).  My writing pace is slow, but the actual story is moving faster, which is wonderful.  I'll likely catch up to the first draft (last left around 150 pages) at the 100 page mark, which means I'll be able to bring other core characters in a lot sooner.  Thank goodness.

As for the second draft, I'm predicting finishing that and starting on the third chapter today.