writersguide

    The first step to finishing your manuscript is to stop rewriting. I know that sounds like a contradiction in terms, but it is one of those truisms that takes a leap of faith. Only after I had written three manuscripts over a five year period did I realize that the only time to begin rewriting is when you have finished your rough draft. The next manuscript took five weeks. Yes, five weeks for the rough draft and polished rewrite. And yes, I was working a full time job as well.
    So 'fess up—have you been tinkering with the first three chapters or first 100 pages forever and never broken past that insurmountable barrier called perfection? If you have, it is time to stop. I became a "rewrite convert" when I realized the real writing begins once the rough draft is completed.
    Reread that sentence again and commit to memory like a mantra—the real writing begins once the rough draft is completed.
    This could be the most liberating advice you will ever receive. Stop fussing over the first three chapters or wherever your current work in progress has come to a grinding halt. Give yourself up to the inevitable fact that you will have to rewrite your book. Probably more than once.
    There, with that said, it is time to start the process of completing your first draft.

The Rough Draft: Shoveling Out Your Story

    If you have decided to commit yourself to finishing a rough draft, first reexamine your synopsis and commit your plot to memory. At the very least, write out your scenes on large index cards in sequential order and use them like a map. Next, disavow all distractions (television, reading, anything that will divert your attention from your characters). You are about to live, breathe, and eat your story. I try to put myself into my hero and heroine's shoes and focus completely on their story, much to my husband's dismay-for I find myself writing whether I am in front of the computer or not. Call it an obsession, but suddenly your story will find a life of its own and come pouring out.
    Now that you've renewed your love of your story and your enthusiasm is running high, rush forward with glorious abandon through your first draft, paying little or no heed to your internal editor. That is the most critical step in writing the rough draft: turn off that pesky internal editor. She has a time and a place in your writing and it isn't in the rough draft. She's the noose around your imagination that leaves you laboring over a paragraph or line of dialogue in search of the perfect prose, when you should be writing the story.
    With your editor bound and gagged, write as quickly as you can, as if the story inside of you is on fire and the only way to put it out, is to get it out. As much as I have to fight my natural desire to polish to perfection before I move ahead, I know my time is better spent completing a rough, and I mean rough, draft before I ever think about rewriting. Consider your only goal is to get the story down from A to Z as quickly as possible without looking back.
    One key feature of writing "on fire" is to stay focused on the scene at hand, answering that scene question and blazing on to the next crisis in your plot. (Consult Jack Bickham's books for scene/sequel writing if you are unfamiliar with this theory.)
    If you run into a roadblock—for instance, finding exactly the right word or a transition from one scene to a next—mark the text, forget the problem, and move on. An XXX, text emblazoned in bold, or a basic directive such as, ADD TRANSITION HERE, will work like police chalk marks at the scene of the crime. Easy evidence for you to come back and gather after you've finished the complete draft.
    But before you run to your computer, torch in hand ready to burn up the keyboard, there is one thing you must do while blazing through your manuscript: keep pen and paper handy beside the computer at all times. I usually have a legal pad by my side, and jot down the little gems and moments of brilliance that come to me as I go along-character changes, plot delineations, emotional insights which belong somewhere other than where I am currently writing. These may be as simple as "change Lady Mary's hair to blonde" or "Research and determine when gas lights were used in London" or "Add in chapter three a reference to the heroine's father and hint that he may not have been the Irish pirate he was purported to be." These notes are crucial, as they will become your personal roadmap for rewriting.
    You may consider all of this truly simple advice, and still feel that urge to tinker a bit as you move through the rough draft. But consider this: before I converted, I wasted time going back to rewrite and polish Chapter Four to add foreshadowing that suddenly became critical as I was writing Chapter Fifteen, only to find in Chapter Eighteen the foreshadowing was needless and then I would go back to Chapter Four and start rewriting to fix what I had wastefully put in. Consider instead that as you write you are a traffic cop directing cars around an accident scene. When you come to rewrite ideas or character roadblocks, make a quick note, then waive yourself around them saying very firmly to yourself, "Move along, move along, nothing to see here."
    Before you know it, you'll find yourself with a finished draft. Who cares that its full of potholes and XXXs and bad transitions—the benefit of starting the real writing with a draft is that you have a fully-realized plot. Now comes the process to make that diamond in the rough shine like something from Tiffany's, the kind of gem an editor would kill to acquire.

Rewriting: Finding the Buried Treasure

    Rewriting is the reward for carting yourself across the desert of blank pages to complete your rough draft, but just like the rough draft, it takes some preliminary work before you dive in. The best place to start is by writing yourself a revision letter. Since a revision letter is an objective assessment of your manuscript evaluating the plot, emotional development, and basic mechanics, you must first evaluate where your problems are.
    Start by re-reading all the notes you made during the initial rough draft, review your comments and notations from your critique group (if they have been critiquing along the way). Then sit down and read your manuscript from start to finish. Again, keep a notepad and pen at your side. Jot notes onto both the manuscript and the notepad, listing ideas, questions and the page numbers. I would also suggest flagging pages with post-its or paper clips for easy reference later on.
    Now, as you start to read, look for:

Sentences or paragraphs that stop the story's flow
Repetition
Excessive narrative
Well-motivated actions/decisions by your hero and heroine
Historical inaccuracies
Scenes that don't add to the plot or character development
The romantic development
Overall continuity and/or inconsistencies in characters, place and time
Grammatical errors
Areas where you could enhance or strengthen your theme

Question everything. This is the time to be ruthless with your writing. Often when I finish this step my manuscript is bleeding with red pen. I cut long passages or entire scenes if they do not work-sentimentality for a pretty passage has no place in revisions. Make sure every word, every sentence, every scene adds something to your story-if not, cut it. If you have a hard time being objective with your work, consider asking someone whose opinion you trust and respect to read your manuscript and follow the same steps I've outlined above. The goal is to come up with a comprehensive list of trouble spots and areas that could use some additi onal work or removal.
Once you finish reading, review all your notes. Consider if there are consistencies to the various criticisms you have received or if you need to do additional research to answer your questions. Now, instead of starting immediately into the rewrite, take your notes one step further, and write yourself a revision letter. Turn your notes into the same type of letter that an editor might write. A section may look like:

Page 87: Check the OED for "cubbyhole." When did it come into common usage?
Page 107: What is Sophia risking in making love to Giles in the graveyard? Pull her fears to the forefront.
Page 212: Is this scene necessary?

This may seem excessive, but you will be amazed that once you have completed this process, the problems in a manuscript rise to the surFACE, and along with them the answers on to fix them. You will also be looking at your manuscript as a cohesive whole rather than as disconnected chapters. It will also make you review your manuscript one more time and help you add the layers of emotion and character development that give your book that rich, polished feel. This process also has the added benefit of showing you your own weak spots and where you need to strive for improvement in your own writing. With every book, I discover something more I need to learn about this craft we call writing, and I also see my own improvement as a writer, which is a reward in its own right.
Now that you have your revision letter in front of you, forge ahead with complete confidence. Finishing your manuscript will no longer feel like such a daunting task, and the final pages will have that professional gleam to attract an editor's eye.

Elizabeth Boyle was an anti-piracy paralegal for Microsoft before settling down to write full-time. Her first novel, Brazen Angel, which won Dell's Diamond Debut Award in 1996, also won the Romance Writers of America's RITA Awards for Best First Book and was a finalist for the RITA Award for Best Long Historical Romance. She lives with her husband in Seattle, Washington. Look for Brazen Heiress and Brazen Temptress. You can click here to e-mail Elizabeth or visit her website.