It’s NaNoEditMo—Five Ways to be Sure You’re Successful This Editcember

editingCongratulations to those of you who earned win badges from NaNoWriMo. Hitting the 50,000 word mark is an accomplishment for anyone; doing it in thirty days is a highlight few will ever be able to say they managed to hit. Now what? It’s easy to coast on a sugar cookie high (who wouldn’t want to do that?) and immerse yourself in holiday shopping and tree-trimming, but beware… before you know it January will have rolled around, new year resolutions will have begun (and possibly ended just as quickly), and the manuscript you toiled over before Thanksgiving will be a forgotten bunch of words—a sad little file taking up space on your laptop or flash drive.

Doesn’t your effort and time deserve better?

Doesn’t your story deserve a chance to be heard?

Unless you’re some kind of genius who managed to knock out such a brilliant rough draft in the first go round that it’s beyond the need for revision and polish, that NaNo treasure is just waiting for you to open it up and show it some love. If you were a pantser during November, you may have more work ahead of you than the plotters who went into the challenger with a roadmap, but with a little TLC and a lot of work, chances are you can shape your manuscript into a real gem.

1)      Reread the novel.
I know, it seems like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised at how many people try to start editing on page one without having taken a pass at the document. Your fingers were typing at the speed of, well, not light, but they were typing really fast. And you haven’t looked at your draft in over a month. It’s likely that you’ve forgotten some things that are in there, especially if you were a pantser or if you veered far from your outline. Give the manuscript a quick once-over, just to re-familiarize yourself with its contents.

2)      Consider goals and conflicts for your main characters
Each character in your story has to have motivation for every action. Do you know what those motivations are? If you have scenes where you noticed your characters doing something you consider odd, or your story veers off in a strange direction, or the pace just lags, it’s probably because the motivation wasn’t logical, or the character wasn’t acting toward his or her goal, or there wasn’t any conflict in the scene (and we all know the only scenes that are interesting are the ones that build conflict). Make notes for yourself in the manuscript to revisit these passages and correct the problems accordingly.

3)      Check your scenes for content and structure
Make sure you have each scene written as tightly as possible. Did you stay in the correct tense and point of view? Did you really establish the character’s voice, in both dialogue and internalization? Is the scene building conflict and is there good pace in the scene (rising and falling action)? Do you start with a hook and end with a cliffhanger of some sort to keep the reader turning the pages? If the answer to any of these questions is no, go back and see how you can correct the problem. It might be as simple as rewriting a few passages of dialogue or as difficult as redoing whole sections of text, but the end result will be worth it.

4)      Look at individual passages for weak writing
Now that the big issues are dealt with, look for places to spice things up. Add details to make the novel more rich and realistic. Are there places where the dialogue can be tweaked to sound more authentic? Can the setting be described better, or have you neglected to describe it at all? Are there places where you did too much telling, where you can add a scene to show the characters interacting and reveal more about them or their motives? Perhaps there are places where some foreshadowing can be subtly added, or conversely there may be times when you’ve done too much of these things and you need to know when to cut back.

5)      Polish the manuscript
The final step in revising your novel is to dot the I’s and cross the T’s. Almost literally. Proofread the document. Look for any repetitive words, fragments or run-on sentences. Spell-check and grammar check the document. Find and correct any typos or passages with poor writing technique. This is your last chance to shine. Take advantage of it.

So you did it. You completed NaNoWriMo. Do you have what it takes to edit your novel? If you can write an entire book in thirty days, squeeze in a national holiday, and still manage to function in society, I have every confidence in you. Plus, writers are awesome. We support each other. If you don’t already have a critique group, find one, in person or online, to offer advice or just a hug while you go through the process. And I’m always here for you.

You wrote your draft. That was the easy part. Now you need to make it shine. That’s the hard part. But you can do it. And there are millions of readers out here who want to read it. Get busy editing. We’re waiting.

Five Suggestions for the Non-NanNoWriMo Writer

writing

writingIt’s that time of year again. Writers everywhere are hoarding Halloween chocolate and stockpiling caffeinated drinks (Diet Pepsi and Gevalia coffee in this house) because November, despite having only thirty days and requiring a full week of preparation for Thanksgiving dinner, is NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month. Actually, it’s probably just Writing Month, as it’s also WNFIN, or Write Non Fiction In November month. I’ve even seen NaNoPoMo mentioned, or National November Posting Month, challenging bloggers to post every day. With the daily blogging, with fiction writers racing to write a 50,000 word novel in thirty days and with non-fiction writers also struggling to meet the same deadline, how could it not be Writing Month? And how could writers who aren’t participating fail to take notice, with daily word counts in everyone’s social media feeds?

I’m not participating this year. I decided I had too many other obligations to make a good faith attempt at a novel, or a daily blog. But that didn’t mean that I couldn’t learn from all the advice flying around. Many of the points are useful to any writer writing to meet any deadline or under no time constraints at all.

1)      Say it in a Sentence.
If you can condense your story concept down into one sentence (think of it as your elevator pitch), you are on your way to developing the essence of your story. If you begin planning your novel and you can’t even come up with the words that encapsulate the crux of the tale, you probably haven’t thought it through completely yet. Think of your story as a painting. The elevator pitch is where you are laying down the big bold strokes of color. It just lays the shape of the work, nothing more. The major milestones are the smaller strokes where the picture emerges. The scenes are the fine detail work where the picture takes shape and becomes a true work of art. In the planning stage, the broad brush strokes of a single sentence are all that is necessary. If you can’t do that, you don’t have a novel in the making.

2)      Research Research Research.
NaNoWriMo or not, much of your research can be done before you sit down to write or outline. It doesn’t matter what your idea is… unless you’re writing your autobiography as fiction, there is likely something you need to research. Even if you’re writing your autobiography as fiction, there’s probably something you need to research. Most likely you’re not writing something you know as well as yourself and your life. That will require more research, whether it be geography, history, and/or biography. The Internet has become an easy resource for us. Remember to try to use academic, government or specialist sites rather than general commercial sites, as they tend to be more thorough and reliable. But the Internet isn’t the only option for research. We tend to forget about books (how ironic), maps, charts, film, and other media, and most importantly, going directly to the source when possible. Visiting the geography we are interested in and interviewing the people we are writing about are excellent options. As this is research and can be done before the writing begins, the only constraints we have are the ones our lives and our bank accounts put on us. But if and when possible, we should consider doing something other than Internet research.

3)      Pantsers will struggle in November.
Are you a pantser or a plotter? Everyone writes differently, and, while I certainly have my favorite way to write, I’m not going to tell you which way is correct. There’s only one way that’s correct for you, and that’s the way you should stick with. That said, in November, if you go in without an outline or a plan, you’re probably going to fail, because you don’t have the luxury of finding your way through a plot in a mere month. If you are comfortable with a working plan or outline of some sort, it will help guide you through your novel. And if you find that comfortable in November, perhaps that structure will help you anytime you sit down to write a book.

4)      Editing is a Writer’s Worst Enemy
If you are participating in NaNoWriMo, you don’t have time to edit as you go. You’ll never get done in time. If you aren’t, should you edit as you go? Many authors say no. If you edit as you write, you’ll spend so much time editing that you’ll lose your flow and rhythm. Writers need to write. You can edit later. Some writers take the beginning of their writing day to edit the prior day’s work. That helps them get back in the story from the day before and lets them correct any issues that may have developed before they get out of hand. If you absolutely have to edit before draft one is complete, try just doing it once a day.

5)      Been There, Scene That
Scenes need to be thought of as vehicles. They take the reader from Point A to Point B in your story. If you are planning your story (or pantsing it) and find yourself with a scene, even a beautifully written scene with several darlings in it, but it simply stays in Point A, you have to cut it. Each scene should start with a hook (or at the very least something interesting enough to entice the reader to keep reading), continue with action that progresses the plot, and ends with something that leaves the reader desperate to read on. If you have a scene that doesn’t do those three things, it either needs to be rewritten or deleted.

These five points are popular points given to writers preparing for NaNoWriMo, but they are points that any writers can use when working on a novel. Like I said, I’m not doing NaNoWriMo this year, but I am going to put these suggestions to use as I work on my current and future projects. Hopefully you find them useful in your writing as well.

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