You finished a rough draft: Now what?? I know so many of us struggle with how to take our first draft from where it is now to where we want it to be.
- Braindump of ideas as soon as she finishes draft — what’s still in your head?
- What’s the overarching story question that’ll be answered?
- Zeroes in on POV character arc now that she knows the characters better
- where is the character at the beginning?
- mirror moment: midpoint recognition that they’re resisting change
- who does this character need to be at the end?
- Looks at turning points / bones of the story:
- ACT ONE
- Opening scene/ hook
- Key event — locks your character into the story
- Meet the antagonist/ learn the mystery
- Meet cute
- ACT TWO part 1
- Into the new world
- Pinch point
- Midpoint
- ACT TWO part 2
- Reaction to midpoint
- Second pinch point
- Second doorway — catapults into third act
- ACT THREE
- All is lost
- Climax / profession of love
- Resolution
- ACT ONE
- Checks scene by scene:
- does the progression from scene to scene work?
- Are there plot holes that need filling?
- Is the scene needed?
- Does this scene support character arc, theme, plot?
- Makes scene index cards: character goal, outcome
- Fills in the holes, rewrite and write new scenes — she likes to fill in holes first rather than going through the whole book from the start
- THEN attacks sentence by sentence edits, amplifies what’s already good — here she goes from start to finish — some people do multiple passes of whole book with different targets, she does multiple passes chapter by chapter
- Listens through text to speech or naturalreaders
- Beta readers — she has them all comment on the same draft
- Copy editor / line editor — find inconsistencies and pacing issues
- One Final Read! She doesn’t like to let it sit for too long, maybe a week, trying to experience as a reader (tries to read in one sitting)
- Proofreader
