Just Keep Writing (first novels)

I think it's best to stick to one idea all through a single draft and then go back and try it another way if you need to later. But that's just how I do it, to save a story from the rewrite before it's finished monster (unless there is a plothole or something that needs filling of course).

I'm not sure what you mean "will become 16 or 37." Do you mean the voice of the character sounds older or younger at times? Or do you mean you actually present him/her as a 16-year-old or a 37-year-old?

I took several years to complete my first manuscript. I started it, wrote what amounted to five chapters, and then shelved it for several years before I picked it up, fleshed out an outline and completed it. It wasn't a tiny 100K effort either

In my opinion you should note the discrepancies somewhere, in a journal or notes in your document, and keep going forward. Finish the first draft, and when you get to editing (after leaving it alone for a while) you can straighten out inconsistencies like you mentioned.

If your story is like mine, my writing style changed quite a bit from the first word to the last as I learned the craft. Doing critiques for many other people helped with the craft as well so when I got back to editing I could take my lessons learned and give my manuscript a thorough scrubbing.

Keep going, revise later.

I kept notes on everything I wanted to change on the next draft, because I absolutely knew that what I was writing wasn't exactly what I envisioned. Getting it all written though was more important that getting it perfect first time around.

You will learn so much about your characters as you go. You won't learn them if you sit there perfecting the first few chapters.

Velvet27 said:

Keep going, revise later.

I kept notes on everything I wanted to change on the next draft, because I absolutely knew that what I was writing wasn't exactly what I envisioned. Getting it all written though was more important that getting it perfect first time around.

You will learn so much about your characters as you go. You won't learn them if you sit there perfecting the first few chapters.

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I know so many writers that got hooked into trying to make first chapters so perfect that they are still rewriting those first chapters to this day years later. I think it's nice to polish, but not so much that you never finish a story to begin with

Another voice saying "keep going." Like previous posters, I kept a journal (more of a checklist) of all the changes I knew I would need to make, but if you lose momentum it becomes way too easy to stop and never start again. Just keep going as though the beginning is the way it should be, and know that you can revise later. And you will revise later. No matter how much you hate revising and you want to make it perfect the first time around, you will wind up having to revise and you will have only slowed yourself down trying to avoid it. (I have this argument with my husband all the time.)

BookmarkUnicorn said:

I know so many writers that got hooked into trying to make first chapters so perfect that they are still rewriting those first chapters to this day years later. I think it's nice to polish, but not so much that you never finish a story to begin with

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Ah yes, I was almost one of those. I was about 20k in and just kept going back to polish and got nowhere. I gave myself a stern talking to and sorted it out. I don't think I would have finished otherwise.

I have to echo the sentiment of 'keep going.' It's much easier to work with words than it is anything blank, and if you think your project needs work, then having a draft to work with is easier than ambiguous ideas. Keeping a list of specific things that need work is a good idea. Perhaps if you need to feel as if you've done a bit of revising each day, re-reading the previous day's work (and only that work!) and correcting typos/identifying places that need either strengthening or changing might be of help.

Re: "my 25 year old main character will become 16 or 37 for example." I'm also not sure what you mean by this, but I'd take into account the scale of change. I'd look at how far you are in the draft (about half? mostly finished? or just started?) and what impact changes will have. Changing an MC's age from 25 to 16 will probably have more of an impact than 25 to 37 (logistically, restraints on events in the plot which are realistic, etc; unless you're writing SF/F, dystopia, alternate world or something along those lines.) Though, in the end, the advice is still the same: write until the end, no matter which version of the end that is.

Yes, to everything. Write down additional ideas and noticed discrepancies, and once draft1 is done, fix everything. In my first and second novels, once editing began, I had to change people's ages, their jobs, their weapons, and the floor they lived on. All part of the game.
Later on you learn to reduce the sloppiness maintain a minimum of consistency even during first draft, but it takes lots of writing to get there.

Several years???

You are causing your own problems by constantly going back to change basic elements in what you've already written and if you keep doing this you will never finish because what happens on page 10 or 22 or 33 or 56 or whatever in any novel is always governed by what has gone before.

I can relate to a good deal of what you're saying. Something that has made a big difference fo me is making sure that my mc has a clear goal. (I've also found that the story comes easier when I come up with a title before starting.) A useful trick for the goal (which would have made my current project, itself about 18 months in the making for the first version) is to make sure it's something you could film. A writing advisor (C. S. Lakin, I think, is her name) calls this a 'visible goal'.

Everybody's character should have an ultimate goal.

There should be unspoken chapter goals, too.

All these goals are designed to raise questions in the reader's mind regarding how and if these goals are to be achieved and hopefully have him desperate to find the answer(s), and the only way he can find answers is to keep turning pages.

If the reader sees no goals with which they can identify they will see no reason to read on.

Layla Nahar said:

I can relate to a good deal of what you're saying. Something that has made a big difference fo me is making sure that my mc has a clear goal. (I've also found that the story comes easier when I come up with a title before starting.) A useful trick for the goal (which would have made my current project, itself about 18 months in the making for the first version) is to make sure it's something you could film. A writing advisor (C. S. Lakin, I think, is her name) calls this a 'visible goal'.

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You cannot hold every detail of a plot in your head or know everything about your main character(s) before you commit pen to paper. Both your plot and your characters will develop as you write. They're supposed to: it's part of what makes a good story.

So sometimes this will generate minor inconsistencies which will have to be worked out. But do it at the end - not halfway through.

There is no "best" way, and there is no "right" or "wrong" way, except what best for you, what's right or wrong for you. Not all writers work the same way, and what works for one fails miserably for another.

I do think you've discovered one of the reasons why taking years to write something can be problematical. You change constantly, so you then want the novel to change with you are your ideas.

My experience is that darned few writers actually take several years to write anything. What they usually do is write a bit, then stop for a long while, write some more, then stop. If you only count actual writing time, most writers finish novels relatively fast.

If you aren't writing constantly, the novel is not going to change with you, and you aren't going to change with it. There will always be things you want to go back and change.

But what you do is strictly up to you. There is no right or wrong way, except what does or doesn't work for you, and you need to figure out what this way is.

I think, in the cases of the 'takes years to write because of rewriting the same bit over and over' people I know, it's that very problem that keeps them from becoming published writers. If they could learn to finish as well as start, and to stick with one idea after that long enough to polish it, I'm sure their work would be better as a whole. No matter what works for you, it's nice to have a finished story to apply that to...

I'm a pantser, which obviously will take the story down different paths as I go along. But my personal rule is, except for the very rare exceptions, that if an idea goes off a tangent from the basic premise, I tuck that idea away for another story.

I'm in the same boat with "keep going!" - if you work in Word, what I do is utilize the comments feature as I write. If something isn't quite what I want, I tag it with a comment and just keep moving so it doesn't hold up my momentum but I don't lose whatever thoughts I was having on that section.

Personally, "keep writing" may not be the best advice.. well.. not 'keep writing as you are'.

My first question is--do you have an outline? If so, what kind?

I found that I was able to solve a similar problem myself by writing a stream-of consciousness-style outline. I started with the top, explaining what would happen in the story in broad strokes as if to someone who kinda new it already. "MC would meet these people, argue, but then they would fall in together because they are all traveling to the same place.. when they get there they find that the other guy had betrayed them all, so they join up to stop the forces of evil..." that kind of stuff..

I found that after about the first 3/4 page, I wasn't sure what happened.. I mean.. specifically. I knew where the story went, but I didn't know how to get it there in an interesting way. Not too suprisingly, that's also the point where I was floundering with my writing.

So, I focused on coming up with something interesting at each one of those junctures. something that i WANTED to write. Pirates attacking, a car accident, a case of diarrhea. .. some kind of interesting event to carry the story forward. What I ended up with was 12 pages of pure, interesting plot. When I re-read it, i WANTED to write it all. I wasn't just anxious to write the ending, or that middle scene, or that one part where your MC finds out they are wrong..... I wanted to write it ALL because i'd thought it through and filled in the uninteresting bits with interesting bits.

3 months later I had a 118k word novel.. after 8 months and a few re-writes, I had a real novel

Not everyone works with an outline though, some people have to use the action of writing the actual story as an outline, sort of using that first draft as one, and then going back and adding in all the extra parts they weren't sure of. My guess is the topic maker is one of those 'fly by the seat of their panters' I've heard so much about here lately. I'm kind of one to. The excitement of the writing process itself sort of pulls your plot forward, and sometimes it surprises you.
I'm not saying it's the best way or the quick way to write things, but it is a style in its way

BookmarkUnicorn said:

Not everyone works with an outline though, some people have to use the action of writing the actual story as an outline, sort of using that first draft as one, and then going back and adding in all the extra parts they weren't sure of. My guess is the topic maker is one of those 'fly by the seat of their panters' I've heard so much about here lately. I'm kind of one to. The excitement of the writing process itself sort of pulls your plot forward, and sometimes it surprises you.
I'm not saying it's the best way or the quick way to write things, but it is a style in its way

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Yeah.. I used to be one as well. But I never finished anything I don't have my outline in front of me when I write, and I don't even know if I'd call it an outline, but going through my whole take at that level made writing the whole thing 1,000x easier for me (individual results may vary).

beachbum21k said:

I've been struggling to complete a first novel for several years and I feel like I keep making progress and getting closer but I wanted to check in on some advice that I've heard.

One of my problems is that my idea evolves as I work on the first draft and my 25 year old main character will become 16 or 37 for example.

I think that I've heard that it's best to just keep going when you haven't finished an actual first draft before and then you can go back and redo a lot of the first half of the book.

Any comments or advice?

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Finish the first draft first.

Then put it down for a week.

Return.

Read it - make no corrections - just read as if you just bought it at a store.

Put it down for a week.

Return.

Read it again for grammar - edit it.

Put it down for a week.

Return.

Read it again as a reader - from start to finish.

Put it down for a week.

Return.

Rewrite and set a rewrite deadline - stick to it. Something like one week or two, depends on available time.

Put it down for a week.

Return.

Read like a reader again - start to finish.

Decide if you like it. Go from there.

And, don't ask friends, lovers, children about how good it is.

If you like it - get a good editor and have them review. If they make suggestions don't take offense use them.

Have it professionally proofread.

Once completed, read it again start to finish.

Find a reviewer who is not competitive and who is not indebted to compliment you. Ask them to critique your book privately.

Consider their feedback.

If a rewrite is needed commit to it.

If there are changes over 35% of your book - rewrite the entire title.

If there are changes under 35% of your book - finish it.

Set a deadline - stick to it. Don't deviate.

Many authors have a decent first book but wrangle with it so much it appears they'll never publish it. Publishers will terminate authors who can't finalize their title and at each near galley - they are back to the drawing board. It becomes obvious it won't happen.

Conversely, if researching facts, etc. takes five years . . . take the time and do it right the first time.

~Q.

Um...Well while a week between each step sounds interesting I'm not sure it would work for me. Too much time to overthink and 2nd guess things. It could be a sign of how much of a newbie I am though. Not to writing so much as publishing.

As it is, we're talking a bit more about writing that first draft itself in this topic I thought. Everything after that, while important, doesn't matter if we can't get the meat and potatoes of the story on paper first.

beachbum21k said:

I've heard that it's best to just keep going when you haven't finished an actual first draft.

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This^^^

Because...you cannot edit what does not exist. Keep drafting and have fun with it. You can cut, add, edit, and drive yourself nuts with revisions later.

You know what might help? NaNoWriMo. It kind of forces you to get a good chunk of a first draft out of the way.

Sunflowerrei said:

You know what might help? NaNoWriMo. It kind of forces you to get a good chunk of a first draft out of the way.

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This!