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?)
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