Editing: How long does it take you?

Lego Bono said:

I'm curious, fellow writers, but after you've wrapped up your MS story, finally typing in that last dot, and the editing process then begins, how long does that process last you? Is it as exhausting for you as it is for me?

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The first novel I wrote...I might have spent a year trying to revise and edit it, I don't remember. The second novel, maybe six months or so (I also don't remember...these are just vague impressions). Third novel, maybe a few months; fourth, couple months...

My patience is wearing thin.

I have less and less ability to stay with a novel without dissolving in hatred for it, so I keep trying to do them more efficiently. I only have so long before I just can't work on it anymore. In a sense, I'm glad I have that "hating my work" thing built in, so I don't get hung up on anything, but on the other hand...it often prevents me from writing at all. 'S a bit shit that way

As others have said or illustrated, it's different for everyone. Do whatever works.

Jamesaritchie said:

But like Isaac Asimov said of his own stories, if I don't get it right after a quick, clean up second draft, no amount of work will ever make it right.

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I wonder if fiction vs non-fiction makes a difference in this case? I've sold magazine articles that were barely edited. But for some reason, it takes a lot longer to polish my fiction to a respectable level. Curious!

Orianna2000 said:

I wonder if fiction vs non-fiction makes a difference in this case? I've sold magazine articles that were barely edited. But for some reason, it takes a lot longer to polish my fiction to a respectable level. Curious!

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That's entirely possible, but I suspect some writers are better and faster at fiction, and others are better and faster at nonfiction. I can write personal essays as fast and as easy as I write fiction, but such things as feature articles take me a heck of a lot longer than short stories of the same length.

I seem to work a lot faster and easier when telling a story, though I have no idea why.

Hmm. It must be something about the way our brains are wired. Although, considering how much I despise mathematics and analytical thinking, and how imaginative and artistic I've always been, it seems like I'd excel more at fiction than non-fiction. Then again, it wouldn't be the first time my brain got its wires crossed!

I'm editing my first novel length piece now. My first draft I wrote in three months in 2012. I added a lot of extra chapters - subplots etc - a year or so later.

What I have found is that the newer chapters require much less editing than the original ones. I put that down to becoming a better writer. So, while the process this time has taken me about four months, I am confident that my next novel length piece will be significantly faster.

I hope so.

Orianna2000 said:

Hmm. It must be something about the way our brains are wired. Although, considering how much I despise mathematics and analytical thinking, and how imaginative and artistic I've always been, it seems like I'd excel more at fiction than non-fiction. Then again, it wouldn't be the first time my brain got its wires crossed!

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Maybe everyone has been getting the left brain, right brain thing all wrong? I'm not fond of math, but I'm really good at it, and I'm an analytical thinker, but I'm much better and faster at fiction than at nonfiction.

Or maybe we're just all different, and have no clue how we really do anything? Maybe we can't get any closer to the truth than Kipling did when he wrote In the Neolithic Age. Two of the lines read[SIZE=+1]:[/SIZE][SIZE=+1]

"There are nine and sixty ways of constructing tribal lays,
"And every single one of them is right!"[/SIZE]

Jamesaritchie said:

Maybe everyone has been getting the left brain, right brain thing all wrong? I'm not fond of math, but I'm really good at it, and I'm an analytical thinker, but I'm much better and faster at fiction than at nonfiction.

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The exact opposite of me!

Unfortunately, I just read that the right/left brain dominance concept has been proven false. Scientists measured the brain activity of a bunch of people and none of them used one hemisphere more than the other. Kind of disappointing, since it made sense! I need to do more research into how the brain works. Maybe there's another theory that will fit.

Orianna2000 said:

The exact opposite of me!

Unfortunately, I just read that the right/left brain dominance concept has been proven false. Scientists measured the brain activity of a bunch of people and none of them used one hemisphere more than the other. Kind of disappointing, since it made sense! I need to do more research into how the brain works. Maybe there's another theory that will fit.

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I read that, too, but I wonder if it matters because they couldn't tell what people were using their brains for, since both halves were firing up with every activity.

What probably matters is how well a specific area of the brain works, rather than if it works. Those who excel at painting, or music, or writing may use one hemisphere as much as another, but this doesn't mean some areas of the brain are better at something than the same area in other people.

Jamesaritchie said:

What probably matters is how well a specific area of the brain works, rather than if it works. Those who excel at painting, or music, or writing may use one hemisphere as much as another, but this doesn't mean some areas of the brain are better at something than the same area in other people.

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You know . . . getting way off topic, here, but I have synesthesia. (I visualize numbers and letters as having color. Days and months have their own colors. People do, too, sort of like auras. I perceive time in a three-dimensional way.)

I also have dyscalculia, which is the numbers version of dyslexia. (I can't do math in my head. I have trouble visualizing spatially. I can't tell left from right, or read a map, or tell time via an old-fashioned clock.)

And even though I'm right-handed, I do a lot of things left-handed or backwards. Bowling, softball, golf--all left-handed. Ironing and sewing--left-handed. Spins in ice skating, I turn the opposite way as most people. My handwriting even slants backwards when I write cursive.

It's perplexing! And now all this stuff about writing and editing, left brains and right brains . . . it really makes me wonder if I have crossed wires somewhere. I wouldn't be surprised.

Orianna2000 said:

You know . . . getting way off topic, here, but I have synesthesia. (I visualize numbers and letters as having color. Days and months have their own colors. People do, too, sort of like auras. I perceive time in a three-dimensional way.)

I also have dyscalculia, which is the numbers version of dyslexia. (I can't do math in my head. I have trouble visualizing spatially. I can't tell left from right, or read a map, or tell time via an old-fashioned clock.)

And even though I'm right-handed, I do a lot of things left-handed or backwards. Bowling, softball, golf--all left-handed. Ironing and sewing--left-handed. Spins in ice skating, I turn the opposite way as most people. My handwriting even slants backwards when I write cursive.

It's perplexing! And now all this stuff about writing and editing, left brains and right brains . . . it really makes me wonder if I have crossed wires somewhere. I wouldn't be surprised.

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I know people who see music, and other sounds, for that matter, but who truly see music, and I guess that's along the same lines.

I thinks it's difficult, maybe impossible, for those of us who are wired differently to really understand a different type of wiring, but it strikes me that such wiring could be highly valuable for a writer. I wish I could experience it.

Jamesaritchie said:

I know people who see music, and other sounds, for that matter, but who truly see music, and I guess that's along the same lines.

I thinks it's difficult, maybe impossible, for those of us who are wired differently to really understand a different type of wiring, but it strikes me that such wiring could be highly valuable for a writer. I wish I could experience it.

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Yes, some people with synesthesia literally see the colored numbers/letters and music, etc., while others only visualize the colors mentally. Same disorder, just different ends of the spectrum. I forgot to mention that I "see" music in color, too. In my mind, I visualize streaks of color that oscillate and dance around. Different instruments produce different shapes--violin produces textured bands of color, while piano makes individual droplets of color. The colors change depending on the notes being played, and the movement gets more frenzied with loud, violent music. That's why I can't stand listening to heavy metal or rock music--it's overstimulating. But soft, gentle music is really lovely to see!

So far, it's really only proved valuable once, when I was able to write a love scene between a telepath and a human by describing the telepathically shared emotions as having color. It gave the scene a surreal, otherworldly feel. I probably wouldn't have thought to do that if I didn't have synesthesia.

How long it takes me

It took me 3 months, and I worked on it daily.

Last year's NaNoWriMo is on draft 3, about 75% of the way through. I'm guessing I'm about halfway done. In general, I expect to have to rewrite about 90% of the actual prose in a major edit.