I have edited four first drafts of novels ( PB, With the Band, Churchbred, May is Due South—learn more about those drafts here)—none of them are published yet, but I’ve told myself that if I can get a draft done and revise it, it can live on the shelf for however long.
I will tinker and move things around for ages, but that’s not the point. The first draft is the most important to get done and edited because then it’s like… you really did it. Even if nothing comes of it, you wrote the draft, you edited it at least once, and that’s more than a lot of people. If you haven’t done those things, no worries and absolutely no judgement. It just means you need a bit more help and encouragement and guidance—and maybe a Reedsy learning membership…
Shameless plug, I apologize and full disclosure, I am a Reedsy affiliate and I receive commission if you sign up for something using my link BUT NEVER FEEL PRESSURED TO DO SO, but it’s what I recommend to anyone who just needs somewhere to start with writing without getting overwhelmed. There’s six yearly conferences, weekly masterclasses, and monthly workshops. I can bog you down and answer as many questions as you need, but it’s easier for everyone if I just say, “Reedsy can help with that.”
Okay, back to the reason for this blog: editing your first draft and how Reedsy gave me invaluable information. I went over what each session was and my favorite tips on Instagram(LINK TO IG POST). To recap, there were four sessions, but I didn’t watch live because I took my grandmother to church and yapped it up at my local bookstore. By the time I got home, it was Love Island (UK) time and then I made dinner and before you know it, House of the Dragon was on.
BRING AEGON THE USURPER TO ME— I zoned out for ninety percent of the episode because I was in my feelings. (was the moon in cancer?)
Anyway, the four sessions, in order:
What Every Author Should Know About the Editing Process with Abi Pollokoff
Writing Your Second Draft with Cat Camacho
Revise Like an Editor with Noah Charney
Say More With Less With Jenna Love Schrader
What every author should know about the editing process with Abi Pollokoff was the one I thought I didn’t need the most. However, I think it’s what every writer needs to listen if they have no idea about editing and whether or not they need one. Even I, who thought she knew everything she needed to know about editing, learned some things. Like hey girl, when you eventually look for an editor for whatever reason, you should ask them they’re communication style and make sure it aligns with what you’re looking for. I’ve heard stories of people wanting editors to leave comments in the document and not just the report. However, my favorite thing Abi said?
“Be prepared to rebuild.”
So many writers may go into it thinking, “I’ve wrote the cleanest draft to limit the possibility of massive changes.” Hell, I was that writer with Churchbred. I thought if my draft was perfectly outlined and had minimal errors, I wouldn’t have to change anything major. Just add some interiority, some sensory details, make sure everything’s lined up properly.
Dearest reader, I restructured the entire book and felt like a failure, but I had a supportive writing group and writer friends and community that encouraged me through the process. So if you’re writing your first draft and it’d make you feel better to make it as clean as possible, that’s fine, but just know that you may change a lot of it so why get attached to the “cleanliness?”
Next up was Writing Your Second Draft with Cat Camacho. Cat dropped so many great questions and I am not sure if I can share all of them here, but they were based around plot, pacing, and characterization.
My favorite question/tip/note from each one:
Plot: Don’t lose time—have a timeline for each chapter. So for chapter one, make sure the reader knows “hey, it’s still Sunday morning,” and have the proper transitions to make sure the reader is never confused about when we are.
Pacing: Is there anything repetitive and can anything be trimmed without losing anything from the story?
—I actually do a pass for TMI, or too much information. Like girl, why are you bogging us down right this moment about how her mom keeps trying to set her up with weird men from her church? There’s a time and a place, this page is not it.
Characterization: Is anyone acting out of character in order to advance the plot? A.k.a don’t manipulate events to advance the plot.
The third session, Live Editing with Noah Charney, was my favorite session. I put it on and washed dishes and listened to Noah recite passages that were submitted and offer revision advice. He made macro level suggestions and micro level suggestions. I didn’t know how much I loved to listen to live editing until now. Which is great for me because he does them one Monday a month. Does anyone do this on YouTube, Twitch, or Instagram?
I think it helps to recognize,”actually, I might be doing that in my own work.”
My notes from that session were:
media res=in the middle of the things
Start in media res or in the middle of things. I think that’s a delicate thing. I personally love to start in the middle of things, even if it’s in the middle of the day, but there has to be enough to intrigue and confuse to keep them reading. He also mentioned “finding the weird,” because someone’s main character was just too normal and having an ordinary day.
The last session, Say More With Less: Cutting Filler Words and Sharpening Your Language with Jenna Love Schrader gave me PTSD because I flashed back to that time a beta reader pointed out that I started so many sentences in Churchbred with pronouns. Not just any pronouns, I. I was horrified because how had I not realized that on the umpteenth pass?
So please, check your manuscripts. Don’t be like me. So many softwares may have something that’ll tell you what most of your sentences start with. One of my favorite writing softwares that I’m using right now has a feature that tells me (ELLIPSUS POST HERE).
Here’s some more words and phrases that she said to check your documents for:
Intensifiers & qualifiers: really, very, completely, absolutely, literally, just, basically, actually, definitely, certainly, probably
False starts and sequence killers: started to, began to, continued to, tried to, and then, suddenly, until
I’m going to be honest, I did not think I’d learn too much of anything from this conference because I’ve edited many first drafts. I thought at most, I’d come away with one or two great tips, but I learned so much. Not just about editing my first draft, but more about what Reedsy offers. I will also be looking for live editing sessions everywhere now because once a month is not enough. Not even joking, I need to fall asleep to live editing. Is that weird?
Either way, tell me if this helped or if you’re gonna go sign up for a Reedsy event. They also have great free resources if you need them!
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