Congratulations! You’ve finished your first draft of your story. Now the daunting prospect of checking what works looms. In this blog, I’m going to break down what to look for to head into your next draft.
1. Consistency
When writing your story, whether it’s a novel or script, what can kill it off is consistency. In your first draft, it can be the first time to get your story down in full. What that also means is that as you go along, inconsistencies can crop up. Your characters could change name part way through. A set up doesn’t get paid off right at the end of the story. Your tone may change from more comedic to shockingly tragic or deadly serious. It happens to the best of us.
To ensure you keep consistency, have your story’s plan to hand as you read the story through. Once you’ve given your story a rest (just so you have fresher eyes between finishing and reading the completed thing), read it through. Make notes as you go. Did a character name change? Did the tone stay the same? Does the genre groundwork do what it should?
Use your plan to double check any issues you may have spotted. This is the point of the readthrough. It gives you a chance to see how your story holds up as it is so you can amend it. Don’t worry if you spotted things you want to tweak. We’ll get to those bits next.
2. Holey Moley
As promised, this is where you look back at those notes you may have made on what your draft needs work on. As writers, we can get so absorbed in writing the story in that moment that we forget we need to check for holes. In reflective mode, this is your chance to fix any problems. I’m going to say the dastardly phrase that doesn’t mean what you think it does. Plot hole.
When I talk about plot holes, I mean where things don’t make sense. I’m talking about Character A having the gun at the start only for Character C to suddenly have it in the crux of the fight with no passing or snaffling from Character A. It’s a massive inconsistency that catches many of us out.
Reading through again, look at your draft with an almost hawk-like stare. If something makes you pause or jars your focus, note it and why. When you come back to look at those notes, it’ll make it easier to try and pin down what that damn hole is. Having your plan to hand will help as you’ll be able to see what you were aiming for.
3. Flow It Out
Here, what we’re looking for is how your draft flows. It can be so easy to get stuck or get bored part way through. In this reading, we want to look for when you lose interest. If you start glancing at your phone, taking your focus away from your story, then this is a point to look at.
Is the story dragging? Are you feeling like you’ve just stood under an infodump shower of information struggling to take it all in? If the action before you feels like that, it’s a problem but not one that can’t be solved. No panicking. If it’s a script, it’ll be find ways to make it more snappy. Perhaps break up the dialogue with more action while shrinking the dialogue. Don’t use twenty words when you can use five.
When it comes to novels, check whether the flow has faltered because we’re not moving anywhere. Is this where you’re trying to give information they need to know? Not all background we create as writers needs shoehorning into our stories. Try breaking up the words with actions that lean into its genre. If it’s a thriller, try and add some more tension. Maybe your character’s trying not to get caught hiding in the cupboard. They can hear what the baddie’s saying but there’s a growing tension that they could be discovered at any minute. If we can see them moving round the room, getting closer and closer to the hiding place, it adds tension to your draft. Will they get found out? Only you can decide that.
4. Manuscript Length
Whether you’re a novelist or a scriptwriter, you’ll have had a length in your head as to what you’re aiming for. Certain genres in novels have a rough estimate of length they’re expecting. It could be between 70,000 and 100,000 words. If it’s a script, maybe you’re aiming for 120 pages or slightly more as a cushion. Remembering what sells that genre’s offering is always useful.
When you’re analysing whether your draft is too short or too long, consider how much information you’ve given. When I’ve been editing my murder mystery novel, I’ve found that I’ve written just the skeleton of the events without going into much detail of their environments. It’s meant I could go back into the draft for editing with more detail of where they are and what fills the space with them, as well as fleshing out what the characters look like.
That doesn’t mean you can go back in and infodump on your audience. It’ll more than likely make things more sticky than they were before. Just go back over the areas you thought were a bit lumpy. Do what you can to figure out why they didn’t and use the genre conventions of the genre you’ve chosen to get yourself out of that corner.
5. Get Influenced
There are so many examples of stories out there in a whole host of genres. You’ll have (hopefully) found out by now I’m an avid reader. If you’re unsure how all those others writers have managed to solve those awkward moments in their stories, go and read them. Reading books and/or scripts from your genre will really help you see what has come before you. It’ll give you a chance to see how others have done it to then put your own twist on it. Painting ourselves out of corners with our manuscripts can be tricky but getting ideas from others and how others write similar stories to our own can help us unclog that problem.
6. Specialist Reading
What can also be helpful is checking in with a manuscript reader. We may have put in a character that is different to ourselves, such as have a disability or are LGBTQ+ or are of a different ethnicity to ourselves and so on. What we may not realise is, having a question from that community through a sensitivity reader can actually help unlock those problems we have.
There may be an aspect we hadn’t thought of in their existence that helps you to delve deeper into the world and/or characters you’re creating. All you need sometimes is a different point of view looking at your draft to unlock the magic hidden under your words.
Editing your draft can be hard to allow your story space to breathe and be as awesome as it can be. Give yourself time to celebrate finishing that draft before analysing what you’ve got. Not everyone gets to where you are. Giving yourself grace to tweak and fix any lumpy bits will do you better in the long run. Don’t try and do it all in a day. Burning yourself out won’t do your story any good either. I wish you luck on your editing journey. You’ve got this.
Happy writing!