Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Foul Mouth Second Drafts

All writers have different methods to get to the end of the road.  For me, the second draft is all about readying the novel for the rest of the process.  It's about coming back to the work with fresh eyes after a break, looking at it objectively, marking the parts where there can be additions, marking the parts that need rewrites, and removing the junk a first draft will always have.


  1. Reverse Readthrough - I don't write Foul Mouth books chapter to chapter.  I write the "school" story first, then the "shop" story, and only mix them later.  When I start editing I put the emphasis backwards, starting with "shop" then going through "school", to try to balance the focus.  Usually this readthrough has some typos fixes, the occasional inspirational or clarifying sentence, but nothing large or earth-shattering.
  2. Passivity - probably the most important part of editing, this is a word by word search of certain phrases that hold back and create a flat boring read.  I'm looking for "was", "wasn't", "weren't", "were".
  3. Words That Suck - also a word by word search but here it's just my personal pet peeves, the words that the writing mind uses as a crutch but the editing mind should nix.  I don't like "thing", "obvious(ly)", "sudden(ly)", "because", "no doubt", "well", "stare", "smile", "mumble", etc.
  4. "That" Edit - one word.  Often worthless and unneeded, get it out of there.
  5.   Character Edit - For "Fanged Lady" this was focused on Annie B, only her scenes, trying to focus on her dialogue and focus on the scenes from her point of view.  For "Cat Killing Coyotes" it will be T-Bone.
  6. Chapter-By-Chapter Edit - The first time I get to read the novel as the reader would, chapter to chapter, switching from "school" to "shop".  Here's where I mark addition places and rewrites for the third draft, probably more typo fixes too.

No comments:

Post a Comment