I'm 57,000 words through, and struggling, primarily with confusion and tiredness. I'm one of these writers who needs to be completely happy with what I've written so far in order to carry on; the reason is because I have to think of the story as chronological and 'complete' (however open to change I actually am), or I get horribly confused.

Herein lies my problem: sometimes I decide 'What I need now is to enhance a subplot in the middle, end, or inbetween the two (either that, or I don't know where something I've thought of should go, at all). But I find it nigh on impossible to 'plonk it where it needs to be' straight away, because I'm always finding that in order to make my new idea make sense, I have to read the flipping novel from the beginning again. (Control freak, much?) But when I do that, by the time I've got to the bit that needs enhancing, I have just enough energy to say 'Yes, that's what needs to be made better!', but not enough energy to actually write the improvement. I've had yet another good (yet pointless) reading day, and not got any further on the writing.

Does anyone else suffer this 'Need-a-chronology-now-or-I-can't-carry-on' Syndrome? When is it a blessing? When is it a curse? How do you overcome it? What am I even on about? If I don't know what I'm on about, how on earth am I going to write good prose?

Thanks all for any help you can give me. Thankyou.

Mark

Mark I can see your problem.

I think the most important thing to do at this stage is to finish the first draft. Leave the tidying up and making sure everything's in the right place etc for the redrafts. You should make notes as you go along on anything you'll want to address at a later stage, and I think you'll find that it's easier to make changes once you've finished the first draft (you see the story as a whole then - not just a series of plot ideas).

I must add that you've done really well to get to 57k words, but you should really see the first draft as the foundations to your novel. There's plenty of work to do in order to get into shape yet, and plenty of time in which to do it. Don't get bogged down in the fine details, just get it written and go back to it.

Best of luck with it,

Nik.

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PS 'Good prose' comes with refining. No one gets it right the first time.

Is the problem, Mark, that you can't remember the precise detail of what you've previously written?

I'm on my second novel and this time i've done the following which really helps:

I've bought one of those folders with about 20 plastic pages inside, into which you can insert paper.
When i finish a chapter (first draft) i print it out and insert it into a page. On the front of the page i stick on a summary of what happens in that chapter.
I am now on chap 13, so i have 13 chapters, separated but in order, and a summary of each one on the front.

It has life SO MUCH EASIER.

I would agree with Nik, unless the changes you want to make are drastically going to alter characters or eg the ending, i would just concentrate of getting the first draft finished.

Casey

I've bought one of those folders with about 20 plastic pages inside, into which you can insert paper. When i finish a chapter (first draft) i print it out and insert it into a page. On the front of the page i stick on a summary of what happens in that chapter. I am now on chap 13, so i have 13 chapters, separated but in order, and a summary of each one on the front.

What a fab idea, Casey. I do something similar with a little notebook. I imagine yours looks a little neater after a couple of drafts and without a thousand bits of paper and post-its jutting out at every angle!

Nik.

OK, here's the problem, I think. Thanks so much, both/all of you, for the excellent advice so far.

I believe I actually have the bones of the story there at 57k, and that's where my problem lies. It's all there, really, so to 'dip in' and put something where it needs to go seems like a mammoth task, since I'm having to think of it all as 'one big thing' in order to put an amendment in the right place. It's a bit like putting hedging sheers through a hawthorn bush to get at what you need to... hmmm. I guess where I am IS the second draft, really, since what I've got is a story, until the end, but it needs beefing up, and lots more words added. I'm thinking it's some pretty hardcore character development that's needed.

Nik,

I try and make it look neat, because it might be the nearest i ever get to holding anything ressembling a book that i've written

Mark,

When it comes to the edit most people are either adders or hackers. Maybe this just means that you are an adder.


Casey

Mark, if you know what you want to add, write it at the end of the ms, then go through and find the place it needs to go. Even if you’re too tired to do much about it by then, just cut and paste it in - with a couple of stars or something before and after (I use the word ‘blah’, which I never use in my narrative, then I can just search on it) – then you can leave it and go back later to smooth out the rough edges.

Casey – great idea!

Gotta go

Dee

Casey - great idea!

Lots of excellent advice and things to try here. For myself I try to push forward on a first draft, and anything I want to change that diverts me from that forward drive I make a note of and keep going, so that I end up with a whole first draft and a list of jobs to do on it. If I change something important, I make a note, and carry on with that new idea in place, but fight the temptation to go back and change it in earlier places. The time to go back is when you've got the whole thing done, and can judge pace and tone and most of all structure, which are the things that benefit most from the forward-march approach, and suffer most from zig-zagging to and fro, and picking at it. But that's just my way, and others have other ways.

It can be really helpful to remember that everything - and I mean everything - in a first draft is provisional, even tell yourself that it's only one giant plan for the real thing, which is the second draft. There are novels where not a single word in the final draft is the same as the first, or at least not in the same place. It feels daunting to realise that, but actually it's liberating, because the only truly impossible job in writing is getting it right first time. Getting it right in the end is a much worthier and more useful goal.

Emma

It's worth pointing out, too that adding is just a really really hard process. It's not just you, Mark, who finds it so.

You've had some terrific advice here, but I'd like to add a note about your next novel; is it worth planning your plot and pacing and backstory in more detail before you start? Everyone has different techniques for novel-writing and what works for one writer is a no-go for another. (I know authors who hate to plan in detail because they prefer the novel to 'write itself'.) But it's an approach worth considering, because you might find it suits and it does help you nail down the structure before you get well in.