Oh man, my first draft was a hot mess. Actually not really, but sorta. I spent a lot of time writing scenes for my first draft. Some in chronological order, others I just wrote what I wanted and planned on fitting it into my outline as needed. However, the thing I fucked up the most on is I actually WROTE beautiful sentences. Ya, huge fucking mistake. That shit is so slow and time consuming. I’d spend hours writing up a 1,000-2,000 word scene, all beautiful and pretty and ready to send to my critique partner.
And guess what?
Im not using half of that shit lol.
I used to think “oh I need to craft quality sentences in order to maximize my writing time”. After im a mom of tiny goblins, my writing time is so few and far between, every second counts! Wrong. In the time it took to write those one off scenes I could have been speed writing my entire draft. So yeah…
Number 1: Dont write actual scenes, just speed run that shit.
Instead of writing beautiful eloquent sentences, just word vomit the whole thing. Not other does this get you out of the “edit as I go” trap, but it also allows for more intuitive story telling.
Number 2: Don’t write your ending.
Sure you can have a general idea of how you want things to end, but its honestly kinda better having a vague understanding of it. Cause when you know exactly how it ends two things happen. First, you’re now stuck on a singular road. All plot points must lead to that ending point. While that’s not terrible, it can definitely add some constraints that can make you feel boxed in while writing. Its not the end of the world, but for some it can be a creativity killer. The second thing that happens is your story is now over, it’s complete in your mind. This satisfaction of having it mentally complete can keep you from actually writing the damn thing. This isn’t true for everyone, but it’s definitely something that rang true for me.
Number 3: Talk about your book more.
Don’t just tell people you’re writing a book, you need to actively collaborate with a thought partner to bump ideas off. Sure you can sit in your lil echo chamber of thoughts and preserve everything from outside creative influence, which honestly makes sense and I totally get it, however, sometimes chatting up people can help you talk through a plot point. There were some ideas that I had that it wasn’t till I said them out loud that I realized how half baked they were. So yeah, go chat people up, tell em your story, and tell em your crazy ideas. By doing these things I was able to finally finish my first draft. Now I get to go back and sift through the word vomit and see what I want to keep and what needs to be reworked or tossed. And then from there ill write the pretty little sentences that ill have a higher likelihood of keeping!
