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Editing update

So I am now working on Chapter 5 of editing for the NaNoWriMo 2010 novel, which has the horrific working title of “1950”.

I’ve organized all the scenes through chapter 9.

I’m not quite sure if I have a good sense of what I am doing in this draft yet. It seems very trial and error in a lot of ways. I’d like to be more aware of what I’m doing so, you know, I can do it again. For the other two drafts.

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Editing and planning….

CampNaNoWriMo

I’ve started the editing process. I set up a plan which vaguely goes like this:
Prep:

  • cut all chapters into scenes
  • mark thematic elements
  • character lists
  • mark point of view
  • short research as necessary

Draft 2

  • Scene organization
  • place scenes in structurs [start with major ones]
  • placeholders for insertions
  • write missing scenes as go through draft from beginning to end

Draft 3

  • Scene arc
  • treat scenes as small stories
  • review internal scene integrity
  • full rewrite, beginning to end

Draft 4

Fact Checking

Draft 5 and onward

Word-level revision

The plan is to get through draft two in September and then three in October. Once that’s done I’ll have a reading draft to show to some initial readers to see what they think overall. The last two+ drafts could take a year. It’s hard to work too much on that in advance.

At any rate, this will free me up for:

NaNoWriMo 2011

Generally, I’ve been what in NaNo they call a pantser—that is, I do everything by the seat of my pants. This year I want to try to write from an outline. Generally this kills it for me, but I am hoping it won’t tank my November draft entirely. Also, one of the characters in my draft from last year—well, his backstory kind of took over into its own story, and I’d like to run with it.