novel writing

How to revise your novel in 10 simple steps: I’m lying

Do you really need 10 steps to revise your novel? Can’t you do it in three? Or is the true number 127? I have written 74,083 words of my book and the last two words were THE END so you’d think I’d know what I’m talking about. I don’t.

Here’s where I am so far, and I hope something I’m about to type will be of use.

1) I took the 5,000-word critique my editor wrote and the feedback from my wife and a trusted friend and combined them in one file. I don’t agree with everything they said, but most of it was worth considering and some of it was eye-opening.

2) I organized that file into something I could read. Blocks of text like Roman columns would be impenetrable. 500 bullet points would give everything equal weight, like potato chips.

Fortunately, Word has all the tools I need: Paragraphs, indents, boldface, borders, italics, underlining, and symbols for geometric shapes, musical notes, and my favorite, harpoons. Warning: Don’t make a craft project out of this. The idea is to create a hierarchy, not a hairstyle.

3) I sat and thought. I walked and thought. I napped and thought. This is also called procrastination.

4) Since the only way to tackle a large project is to take it one step (or bird) at a time, I’ve chosen characters as my first step. The consensus seems to be that I have too many, approximately enough to reenact the Battle of Hastings. This was never a problem for Dickens, and when I read Balzac last year I was impressed that he was still inventing characters in the final pages, but it seems that my skills are pitched a bit lower than those boys. For me, less is more…attainable.

My immediate goal is to figure out what each character is doing in my story, or what they think they’re doing. They may have wandered into my book from someone else’s. I will evict some. I will combine others by running them through the transporter during an ion storm.

My long-term goals are to finish revising this first book and begin writing my second book while staying hungry and keeping it real. Live my best life; fuck some shit up. More next time.

Say yes to your opportunities. You never know who is listening.

Loyal readers (all three of you) know that I finished the first draft of my novel last October. I waited a couple of weeks, then spent several days at the library reading my masterwork and ducking out for coffee. I finally handed the manuscript to two readers I trust:

William, who is a friend and a veteran book reviewer.

Deborah, who is a veteran wife.

While they chewed through the text, I inspected all the wreckage I’ve abandoned over the years. I turned a 900-word fragment into a 10,000-word story. I guess something clicked. I took a sledgehammer to a 2,000-word conglomeration of plot lines and now it’s one plot and 5,000 words. An old story caught my eye and I made it shorter. Writing a novel may have unhinged me, and several managers from my past might attest that I was not particularly hinged to start with.

My readers gave me invaluable feedback. My book reviewer friend wrote his as a book review—my first! And yet, I knew it would be a good idea to find a reader who wasn’t my friend and wasn’t my wife. Someone who wouldn’t hold back because they never had to see me again.

Readers, I found her.

A flyer appeared in our coffee shop from an editor looking for clients…a week or two after I wrote about a son recalling his mother’s advice: “Say yes to your opportunities. You never know who is listening.”

(Note: I loved my mother and my mother loved me, but this is not something she would’ve said. Opportunities carry risk and risk made her nervous. She was more likely to suggest I zip my jacket because it’s cold.)

After some back and forth on email, I learned that the person behind the flyer—to preserve her privacy, I’ll call her Maxwell Perkins—was a college student pursuing a career in publishing. I worked for a newspaper and I’ve observed many editors, and I know that how you communicate with your writers is half the battle. You can send Ms. Perkins up to the majors, because she has nothing left to learn at this level.

I hired her to read my book. Actually, I was going to put her off until I had returned to the first draft and revised it into the second, but Deborah informed me that I was—what’s the word? Oh yes. WRONG.

Three weeks later, my new editor sent me her 5,000-word critique and a Google doc with 177 comments on my manuscript.

I have plenty of work ahead of me, but this is revision and revision is the fun part. This is going to be a much better book. Thanks to Deborah, William, and Maxwell Perkins.