Writing Motivation: The Perfect Novel

Hey guys!

I wanted to talk about something that I’ve recently realised. That is; Obsession over creating the perfect novel.

I have one story, not the current story but definitely one that I will hopefully go back to, that has about a dozen half finished drafts. Why? Because I was adamant on creating the perfect novel. The perfectionist in me was sucking up as much knowledge as possible from every source available, trying to apply everything at once to the writing. And it was overwhelming. And it wasn’t working.

So today I’m going to tell you guys something. Remember that this is my opinion, and that you can’t take it as gospel, but it’s something I’m attempting to come to terms with.

You can’t write the perfect novel.

It won’t happen.

Let’s talk about some of the most famous stories today. Harry Potter, for one example. There are millions and millions of fans who absolutely adore the boy wizard. Why? Because it’s wonderful!

But. There are plotholes. Hermoine’s time turner, for example, has caused major problems. Even with all of J.K. Rowling’s planning, she still managed to make SOME mistakes.

Then we have Twilight. Millions of people adore it. About a million others, however, see the flaws in the relationship, the plot, the entire thing.

I have, to date, written about six novellas, and a couple of first drafted novels. But this is my first time revising a finished first draft. I have never revised before. I know a lot, but at the same time I know so little about it. And in the last few days I’ve caught myself trying to turn this thing into the ultimate perfection thing. Trying to find ways to make sure there won’t be any screw ups, nothing for people to point fingers at.

However. What I, and I think so many other writers, don’t realise, is that writing is an expression of creativity. Yes, there are things we can do to make it more appealing to a larger variety of people. But we can’t perfect everything.

Let’s compare writing a novel to being a ballerina. There are a million different ways to write a novel, and some people will like it and some people won’t. With being a ballerina, there is only ONE way to do a plie. Of course, it is still a fairly creative form of expression, but you have a set way of doing every little thing. Every toe turn, every point.

Imagine if we applied all those rules to writing.

That’s right. Every book would be the same. Wouldn’t that be boring as hell?

Another thing that I’ve been coming to terms with is that some people aren’t going to like my book. I’ve recently looked up reviews for one indie book that I wasn’t fussed on. I found that it has an incredible rating on goodreads, but there are people that agree with me. Someone ripped apart the entire book and picked out every little thing they hated about it.

 

Ask yourself. What am I trying to accomplish here? If you’re trying to write a book that everyone will love and pat you on the back for and praise you on, I’m afraid your motives aren’t the right ones.

But if you’re writing this story because you care about the characters, the story, because you love writing, then yes. Do it. And if you feel like you’d like to publish, you’d like to submit this to the rest of the world to read, do it. There will be people who don’t like it. But there might also be one person in the world who enjoys it.

Bottom line is write  because you love writing. Not to publish and get praise or become the next best seller. Write to tell a story, don’t try and make everything perfect. Try to make it as perfect as YOU can make it, sure, and tell your story in the best way, but don’t get so caught up and overwhelmed in the tweaking that you never finish. Writing a story is meant to be something you love, and an incredible experience. Not a burden, or something to loathe.

So you made it to the end of the post. Thanks a lot for reading, I’m sorry this wasn’t a hundred percent useful, but if you enjoyed it or got something out of it, please like it and drop a comment. If you would like to see more of this content, hit the follow button, it’s free. Follow me on the social medias. Admittedly I’m still trying to fix up the site to have more social media buttons, so there’s only the twitter one there right now, but I have links to my other social medias in the About page.

I hope you have a great day, get lots of writing done, and I will see you next time. Goodbyyeeee!

Writing Life Update: Revision is HARD!!!

I’m sure once I finish up my second draft I’ll be able to give you guys a coherent blog post on how I went about it. But right now I’ve just finished up revising the first four chapters.

One thing I’ve learned about revision is that it isn’t editing. I already knew that (kind of) but I’ve also learned that there’s a certain amount of work involved with creating a half decent book, and you’re going to have to put in that work sooner or later. So now I understand why some people do massive outlines and worldbuilding and all that before they even start the novel.

That said, revising is kind of fun at the same time. With the first draft I was just trying to get it up to 50,000 words and  have a much broader idea of how the story would go, not just in outlining but also in writing. I even pantsed some scenes that I am definitely holding onto. But of course, the first draft isn’t perfect, but it’s there. It’s like clay. That you had to make yourself. And the outline is like the instructions to making the pot. The first draft is the clay.

Alright I’m not good at explanations or examples but YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN.

The revision work that I’ve done is revising the outline, fixing up the sub plots. All that. The outline is now not completely perfect still, but I was happy enough with it to do a second draft. I find that if I don’t leave wiggle room to still improve the book/outline then it kills a lot of the excitement and creativity for me.

I’m also taking a lot of notes as I go like . . . ‘such and such doesn’t make sense’ or ‘worldbuild this’ and all that.

Yeah, I’m not going to make much sense until I’ve finished the draft and can do a real video, but that’s sort of the point of some of  my more random blog posts. To show you guys that writing  isn’t always cut and dried. Sometimes things get blown completely out of the water, and sometimes you can’t plan everything.

Three things that I KNOW will be big picture revisions so far are Plot, Characters, and World. Right now I’m focusing more on plot, then I’ll move on to characters to try and figure out how they react to certain plot points, both emotionally and outwardly (like if they themselves change the story to go in another direction or if the plot just propels them). What I’m also finding kind of intriging is the fact that I’ve got four different main characters. Four. Together they are a protagonist. This might change after revisions, I might decide to make one of them the protagonist and the others supportive, but I’ve got four different points of view to write from and that is pretty fun.

So far I’m MEANT to be revising two chapters a day but it looks like I’m only doing a chapter a day, which means that at this rate I probably won’t get it done as quickly as possible, and revisions will probably take a month, but I’ll just see what happens.

So, yeah, that is my writing life update. Please like, comment, and share. Hit the subscribe button for more posts, and let me know if the writing life update posts are useful or if you would prefer more structured writing advice.

Until next time.

Character Development: Five Random Facts/Scenerios

 

One of the things I love doing with my characters is imagining them in random scenarios. Because, let’s face it, we can fill out their bios all we want. It’s not until we actually write for them that we start to get to know them a whole lot better.

I’m not sure if this will become kind of a series, with me throwing five random scenarios/facts to find out about your character every now and then, so let me know if this post is helpful guys!

Putting your character into some situations can be fun and also interesting to ponder and work out what your character might do. Please note that this is just something I do and that I haven’t heard anywhere at all that this is required for writing a novel, I’m sure it’s not. These situations could inspire your novel, or you could ever put them in your novel. I just find it fun and kind of useful to do.

Number One? Homeless.

Your character is sitting on the mouth of an alleyway, late afternoon, people are walking home from work. As they walk past he asks them for change.

Already, we’ve got some questions to ask. Like, is he asking them for change? Is he even here? Is your character way too prideful, and would he rather starve than be caught asking for money? How is he asking for money? Is he so selfish that he’s shoving the can in people’s faces or is he so quiet they can barely hear him?

People’s actions speak louder than their words (also you’ll find that I say that one A LOT, not only with writing but also in real life situations. But that’s for another post . . .)

Back to our little scene, Let’s say a higher middle class business woman strides down the street, and turns up her nose at our homeless character. The homeless character notices her disdain, and says; “Got any change, ma’am?”

Just quickly I’ll mention that this kind of dialogue could be a lot different, depending on the character.

“No. Not for your filthy lot anyway.” she spits. “It’s lazy people like you who deserve to be on the street.”

Now. How does your character react as she strides off in her pointy shoes? Does he burst into tears or get up to lob her over the head? I’ve decided to include a little piece that I thought up. The scene is completed with a character from my current story, Blue Skittles (the code name of the story. I’m going to keep mentioning this is the code name because I don’t want to confuse new readers). I’m not even going to mention the character’s name, let’s just see what happens.

Late afternoon. I glanced up at the passerbys, wearing their pressed suits and ties. A middle aged woman with her nose in the air and a bun as tight as her outward persona clicked her kitten heels down the street. When she came to me, she slowed, and looked down her nose at me,  coming to a stop.

Worth a shot, I decided. “Any change?”

“No.” her nose wrinkled, as though just talking to me filled her senses with disgust. “Not for your filthy lot anyway. It’s lazy people like you who deserve to be on the street.”

And then she strode off.

“How about you take that money and buy yourself some MANNERS!” I called after her, rolling my eyes and shaking my head. “Nasty.”

So, yes, as I was saying, this is a pretty cool way of getting straight to your character’s core. They’re scum to society, they get treated like scum from society, and then we get to see their reaction.

This was one of the more in depth ones that I wanted to look at (also don’t mind my unedited unrevised completely pantsed piece of writing, I just thought you guys would like an example). Here are the next four.

Number Two. Getting up in the morning.

Okay, I got this idea from the Pentatonix music video Starships. Someone commented what they each did in the morning at the beginning of the video. One took out her retainer, another fixed his hair, another was dancing. Etc.

When your character wakes up in the morning, what’s the one thing they usually do without even thinking about it? Something that they always do, it’s pretty much second nature?

This can say as much or as little about your character as you want, but I do find this to be one of the fun ones.

Number Three. A friend dares them to do karaoke.

Your character and his friend are at a club. Open mic karaoke night. The friend dares your character to jump up and give it a shot. Does your character jump up, eager to show the world what a star they are? Do they ponder it and then think, yeah, that could be fun. Or do they barter with the friend until the friend gives up, and your character stays far away from the stage or any kind of attention.

You can also ask why they react the way they do. Do they love attention because they were in childhood beauty pageants by their pretentious mother, or do they shy away because of one particularly bad incident at public speaking class? (I don’t even know that’s what it’s called, you know what I mean. Don’t judge me.)

Number Four. Late. Three things they would do before running out the door.

This one is so random and it varies so much that I can’t even be that specific.

I have one character who would grab his keys. Another who would draw on eyeliner as quickly as possible. So, yes, I can’t be specific about this one, because it’s a very . . . changeable subject.

AND FINALLY Number Five. The Sorting Hat.

I’m sorry for those who hate Harry Potter. But this. This is an awesome idea.

And kind of a cop out because I couldn’t really think of another idea, but oh well, we’re not going to look at it that way.

Go to Pottermore or Buzzfeed or wherever to find the sorting hat quiz. Fill out the quiz AS YOUR CHARACTER. To make it extra fun, write down which house you think they’ll get beforehand and see if you were right or not.

Who wants to hear some hilarious irony? I just realised that I can hear Harry Potter on the tv in the other room (internal laughing).

 

Anyway, go and enjoy these fun random things to do with your characters (because really, writing gets too serious sometimes) And I will hopefully post again soon. Revisions are killing me right now though (this is a welcome distraction) and if anyone has any tips, then please comment below and let me know!!!

Happy writing and revising and editing and . . . this is not a good way to end a blog post.

Bye.

Pop Culture References in Fiction

The longer title would be; Should I use pop culture references in fiction?

My quick-and-easy-you-just-came-here-for-the-title answer is; No.

Now for the longer answer. Which is; Maybe.

(See what I did there with letters? What’s that? I’m a weirdo? . . . your face is a weirdo.)

I need to quickly mention that this is just my opinion. There aren’t any rules for writing, but if you’re trying to decide whether or not to use pop culture references in your writing, it’s good to try and get a lot of opinions and then make an informed decision.

So, Jess. Should I put pop culture references in my novel?

Depends. First of all, on the time. When is your novel set? If you’re writing a story on an Egyptian princess and she starts dancing around her castle to Ariana Grande via Beats By Dr.Dre, you, my friend, have made a bad decision. Unless this is a comedy. But a lot of things can be overlooked for a comedy.

Is your novel set in the future, where there are evil societys rising up and making teenagers beat each other to death? In this case, I don’t recommend making pop culture references.

Making a pop culture reference pulls the reader into THIS CURRENT WORLD. I once read a (coughripoffofthehungergamescough) dystopian where they mentioned a couple of books from present day. The Hunger Games was one of them.

Oh. I don’t think I’ve ever eye rolled so severely.

Because you, as the writer, are transporting the reader to a FICTIONAL world. And if you remind them of the real world, they instantly get transported straight out of that world you’ve created.

Now. When are pop culture references okay to make? In contemporaries? Maybe. But you need to carefully consider the reference you are making, why you are making it, and whether or not it will date the book. John Green, Meg Cabot, Cat Patrick, I’ve read some their books that are (mostly) contemporary, and set in present day, so of course there were a few pop culture references. They seemed well-placed, in my opinion, but have you ever read a book when a reference goes over your head?

This is what dating the book does. And unless this is the desired effect, you probably don’t want to do this. I once read a book where the girl was gushing over how her crush looked ‘almost exactly like Prince William’.

Think about that for a minute.

That book must have been released a while back. Because now, I don’t think about how attractive Prince William is when I hear his name. I think about the wonderful FAMILY he has, and his receding hairline. Probably not something that the author considered when she wrote that line.

So, should you make pop culture references? It’s up to you. I’ve just pointed out some things you should definitely consider when going about making pop culture references.

As a side note, there is also the problem of whether or not you’re obliged to make pop culture references in a contemporary. Honestly, I know there were probably pop culture references in Looking for Alaska and Paper Towns, but I don’t remember them. My current contemporary, Blue Skittles (the code name for my current work in progress, for those who missed the last post) is currently void of any pop culture references, and I doubt I’m going to put them in at all.

So there you have it. Pop Culture references can either enchance or ruin your story, so it’s an important thing to consider.

Now. Let’s play the HOW MANY TIMES DID JESS WRITE THE WORDS POP CULTURE IN THIS POST GAME!

The answer? Fourteen.

Let’s round it off and make it fifteen. POP CULTURE!

It doesn’t even feel like a real word to me anymore. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this post. Leave it a like and a comment. I will see you guys the next time I post, and . . . yes. I hope you all have a great day and please someone tell me how to end blog posts.

(It’s starting to sound like a running gag now, but I really can’t end blog posts.)

A Finished First Draft and Tips for Underwriters

Jessie Grace The Underwriter and the Finished First Draft

Also known as Jessie Grace and the nightmare of WHAT THE HELL DO I DO NOW HOW DO I REVISE.

But for now I’m just going to eat celebratory chocolate and blog.

It has taken me three and a half weeks to complete said novel and I have finally reached 50,000 words on it. And yes, it is finished. The first draft is, anyway.

I’m an underwriter, and I consider this a fairly impressive achievement. Most of the time I have struggled with word count goals but finally (FINALLY) I have a coherent (enough. coherent enough) novel and I can finally revise it.

Whilst I have written maybe six novels, each one is some kind of version of awful, because of my lack of outlining. This is the first one completed that used an outline I am actually proud of. And I don’t even have a title for it so we’re going to give it a code name to refer to on this blog which is . . . BLUE SKITTLES.

Yes. I am now going to refer to my novel as Blue Skittles until I have an actual  name for it. Now I think I should tell you guys a little bit about Blue Skittles, because while I am very protective of my stories and telling people about them, I think that you guys deserve to know at least a little bit about it.Blue Skittles is a contemporary.

There. That’s literally all I’m telling you. You’re welcome.

So, back to how an underwriter completed a 50,000 word novel. Also yes I am aware that there are very little novels that are just 50,000 words, and yes I will be expanding on it in revisions, but for now this is still an incredible achievement.

Okay. So, you’re an underwriter.You try writing novels but they always turn into short stories. You just want to be taken seriously. So here are my tips for how to up that word count.

One; Outline

I think every single on of my blog posts has included a promise to write on my outlining process, but I swear. I will be putting one up soon. Really.

Outlining can be great for making your word count grow. Please note, outlining isn’t for everyone, but if you’re struggling, you’ve got nothing to lose trying it out. You can divide the novel up into outlined chapters and then divide the number of chapters by the word count goal for the novel. Math. Science. Wait, not science. Math. So for example, if your novel has thirty chapters and you want to reach 50,000 words, you only need to write 1,667 words per chapter.

Two; Sub Plots

Sub plots add depth to your novel and are a good way to give the reader a break from the events of the main plot. Just make sure that the sub plots aren’t meaningless, and that they somehow tie up at the climax of your story. Admittedly I’m not a pro at sub plots (ha, I’m not a pro at anything) So I don’t think I’m well versed enough to lecture you on sub plots, therefore I am going to encourage you to use the power of google.

Three; Describe. Everything.

One thing that I’ve found is that I am fairly good at short and sweet descriptions. But as an experiment I ‘overwrote’ a scene and it turned out to be a lot better than  the underwritten kind. Even if half the description gets scrapped, it’s still useful stuff.

What if you’ve tried all of these and nothing helped?

You. My friend. Need to overwrite.

Overwrite everything. Overwrite dialogue. Descriptions. Everything. You can always cut a lot of the words that are irrelevant, but it can still be useful to have too much than too little (in my opinion). Also try to flesh out a lot of the scenes.

Okay, those are my ratchet tips for how underwriters can write novels. Just stick with it.

If anyone has links to any good revision resources, I would like to see them. And yes I am still going to document my continued struggle with writing and finishing a novel. No matter how bumpy and awful it may be, I want you guys to see the ups and downs, and I hope this will help some aspiring writer out there.

Also, I just quickly wanted to say that I have got five followers on my blog, six on my twitter, and I think four on my Facebook page. There are links to my social medias in the About page. I know these numbers aren’t a lot, but as someone who was at zero everything five months ago, they really mean a lot to me. Trying to market myself as a writer has been pretty scary, and I’m really grateful for you guys. Also if you are new, please follow, we have lots of fun here.

Hopefully I will have another blog up soon. Until then, goodbyyeeee.

(no, seriously, how the hell do you end a blog post?)

DIY The Fault In Our Stars Wall Decor

Also known as I did a thing and thought it might be fun to blog about it.

I really like TFIOS and I am finally getting into things like posters and wall decorations, so I decided to channel my craftiness by creating the two OKAY? OKAY. clouds to hang on my wall.

AND YOU CAN DO IT TOO.

Things you’ll need are;

1. Black paper
2. White paper
3. Pencil
4. Black paint
5. White paint
6. A paintbrush
7. Scissors
8. An eraser (because we all make mistakes)
9. Skittles (optional)
10. Google images for reference (optional)

Step One; Draw an light outline of a cloud on both pieces of paper using the pencil.Like I said, you can use google images as a reference or even print out stencils if you so desire.

Step Two; Write OKAY? OKAY. On appropriately coloured clouds.

Yes, I’m only showing the white one, because you can’t see the pencil lines on the black one with the camera.

Step Three; Stab paintbrush with appropriately coloured paint over letters.

The stabbing creates an uneven sort of look and texture, which sort of replicates the chalky look of the original. Of course, you can make it cleaner if you want, or you can actually use chalk, but I found this method to be suitable.

Step Four; Cut out clouds.

Step Five; Eat skittles whilest smiling at your beautiful DIY hanging on your wall. Then eat chocolate because chocolate cures the tears you cry every time you read The Fault In Our Stars.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this little DIY thingy. I know yesterday I said that you wouldn’t see me until next week, but I just wanted to share this.

ALSO these last couple of days I have actually gained a few more followers on my blog! Hi, welcome to madness, I hope you enjoy your stay. Remember you can find me on social medias, which you can find the links to in the About page. And now I’m going to disappear.

I really need to find an appropriate way to end a blog post.

Write or Die, 8,000 Words, and Nanowrimo

That’s a big title.

Hello all. This isn’t going to be a hundred percent useful blog, just an update really. (Oh yes because people really care. Nah, this update might have some useful stuff for other writers which is pretty much the only reason I’m doing it) As you can tell I’m now aiming for once a week posts but I have no focus. So this one is like a day late.

Anyway. Yesterday was Sunday and I had a huge day of writing. It was about early afternoon that I was on youtube. Then a revelation occurred! Instead of spending the next eight hours using up internet data, I could write a thousand words an hour and have eight thousand words done in a day. Bonus; It would also get my novel at 40k.

It usually takes me around fifteen to twenty minutes to spit out a thousand words, so I decided this was a fairly simple task, and definitely one that I could take on. Then I turned to my good ole friend Write or Die to help me out.

Write or Die is this great app that you can buy. You set word count goal and a time limit to acheive that, and then  you write. And you can’t stop. Because if you stop, the screen goes red and starts screaming at you, and I’ve heard it even deletes words. Just the red and screaming is good enough for me though.

So this is how I wrote eight thousand words in eight hours. Even though I really only needed to write 1,666 because, segway alert, I’m doing Nanowrimo!

Sort of.

For those who don’t know, Nanowrimo is National Novel Writing Month. All around the world people attempt to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days, in November. Google it, it’s awesome.

Now if you check the date that this goes up, you might realise that it isn’t November. No. It’s May. Better yet, I didn’t even start in the beginning of the month.

I’ve watched a lot of Katytastic’s (youtuber. Go look her up, she’s awesome.) Nanowrimo vlogs and always found them rather inspiring to go and write. But my problem was I was always trying to write a massive 90,000 or even 100,000 word novel, so Nanowrimo didn’t really suit me. But finally I had an idea for a little contemporary story that I thought, hey, I want to write this. It only needs to be short. And I bet I can do it in 30 days.

I tried to wait until the beginning of May, I really did. But I was too excited. My outline was done, my character development was done, so in the middle of APRIL I decided to just make myself a 30 day chart and go for it. (I also have one or two scenes that I just needed to copy and paste in, and that’s against the rules in the official nanowrimo.)

Currently I am on Nanowrimo day 20. The word count goal for today is 33,340 words.I currently have 40,881, because of my complete insanity yesterday. I’ve got some more work coming up in the next few days though, so I won’t be able to write as much. Sunday and Monday are my free-est days, which is probably the only reason I’m so far ahead.

I really like the story but it’s obvious that a lot of plot things are going to be changed in revisions. And I’m kind of nervous to finish the story because I am literally less than ten thousand words away from finishing and, admittedly, I’ve never revised a story.

So. Damn.

I’m hoping to document my revising process a lot though in upcoming blogs, so that people can either give me tips or maybe I’ll even help you with your manuscript, who knows?

I get the feeling this story is going to be talked about a lot in upcoming blogs, so I’m going to need a code name for it. I don’t currently have a title for it, which sucks, and I am so paranoid that someone is going to steal whatever amazingly brilliant title I come up with. So for now, let’s come up with a code name. Except I suck at code names, so if anyone’s reading this, can you leave some suggestions below? If no one does then I’ll just come up with something in the next blog. Honestly, I don’t have many followers, and it pretty much feels like I’m just talking to myself. Because I don’t even edit these blogs, I can’t be bothered. I’ve got writing to do.

No I mean I literally have writing to do. So. Yeah. See you next week. Or I won’t see you. You’ll . . . read . . . me. Okay. I’m done. Bye.

My Current Writing Process

Hey guys! Sorry about the absence, the internet decided to stop interneting. Please forgive me! I’ll have to do another post soon but for now please enjoy this pre-written piece of writer ramblings!

 

I love hearing about other’s writing processes to try and work out my own. Warning, this is just the current process. It changes every time.

Recently I started a new story. So I thought this would be a perfect time to write down my process, and see if anyone can relate. Feel free to leave me feedback also.

So, what do I do when I get a new idea? I think, hey, this rarely happens. I should write this down.

Then I’ll made up a beginning, middle, and an end. Just a few points to help me work out where I want the story to go. I might change them up, I might leave them as is. I’ll also jot down all the plot points I might be thinking of into a notebook. That notebook because a mess of words, ideas, reminders, and everything that I’m thinking of that comes under this specific idea. It’s messy, it’s brainstorming, it’s awesome.

With my current story, it was acually just meant to be put on the backburner. But when I realised I couldn’t stop thinking about it, I decided just to write about 500 words of the first scene.

5,000 words later . . . I realised I was in love. And I had to keep writing it.

So I pantsed the first ‘draft’ and just word vomited everything that I wanted to. I skipped scenes, I made it so random, but I had a lot of fun with getting to know the characters and thinking up various situations for them, and of course going back to my notes and trying to vaugely put all of this in order.

Then I finished the ‘draft’. It was about 10,000-15,000 words long, definitely not enough for a novel, but I’d decided it was fun. This whole thing took me the span of a long weekend to do, and I don’t regret it. The pantser in me was free to word vomit as much as possible, and I was happy.

Then I moved onto outlining. I’m going to list how I outline in another blog post, but basically I use a three act structure and go from there. I thought up lots of plot points, and highlighted them in terms of which was a conflict scene, which was a moving plot forward scene, and which was a fun scene. I also thought up beginnings middles and ends to the sub plots and wrote up my character development sheets.This took me maybe a week or two.

Now I’m writing up the first draft, using the outline. The outline is still pretty messy, but it’s cohesive enough for there to be a moderately okay draft written around it. One thing that I’m finding though is I am definitely an underwriter. Either that or I don’t have enough plot points (which I doubt). So here is what I see myself doing very soon.

Finshing the draft (in maybe a month’s time) and realising that it needs to have a lot more words put in (I’m aiming for 50,000. It’s only going to be a small book) and revising it to have a lot more structure and plot points. Probably a lot more research done in order to not only add plot points but also real-ify my story. I MIGHT do a post on what I’m writing about, but I’m a very paranoid person. Then after I am happy with the manuscript, I’ll edit it. Then maybe do a professional edit. And perhaps try and publish it (now we’re looking maybe a year into the future.)

So this is my current writing process. I actually really want to write a post on what I’m writing about, but we’ll just have to see about that one. I’m also considering doing one on my outlining process. Let me know if there are any writing points you would like for me to bring up in the next post, and I’ll make it happen! (i hope).

Until next time.