The Real Work of Writing is Revision, or so they say
Episode description
You’re on what version of this vampire novel? Tenth? Yikes. It’s called revision and it lasts an indeterminate amount of time. What to google to prepare for this conversation:
- How many revisions does a novel need?
- How long does revising a novel take?
- What is a reasonable revision schedule?
- What is a good revision process?
- Where should someone begin when revising a novel?
- Why does revision get such a bad rep?
The answers, of course, are 10, two weeks, every waking minute until it’s done, and beginning-to-end, repeat.
Only joking. Mostly. In truth, revision is as personal as writing and every writer does it differently. Show’s over. Joking again. We’ll unpack a few approaches and set some expectations and also explain what these different levels of revision actually are.
Revision - this is a holistic look at the story, characters, plot, etc. You’re re-visioning, seeing it again. This requires distance on the original creation of the thing.
Editing – this is the scene-by-scene paring down or pillowing out of the novel. Where do we get too much description of 17th century modes of travel and where could we use more description of the murder’s collared shirt?
Proofreading – this is grammar, punctuation, and if you’re a true stickler, it’s where you
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