Days, weeks, maybe months of work typing away at the novel or story that I’ve been working on has finally come to an end. Hopefully, I’ve made my notes. More hopefully, I know in my head where most of my story issues are.

Most likely, I don’t though.

This is honestly the part that I struggle at the most when it comes to writing. I’m not sure if I just didn’t have a good base in editing, or if it’s because I started growing up in a culture where we don’t fix things, or what, but editing has always been a real struggle.

Here are the tips that I do have for it though. Things that have helped me in past.

Take some time away

Just like every author says, get some time away from your work. Maybe work on something else, or take some time off before you attempt to tackle the process of editing.

I know everyone has that experience of being in high school and having a paper due the next day that you haven’t started.  Once you finish it at 2 A.M. and start to look over it you think it looks great.  Until someone else reads it for you and you realize that you’ve left out words, misspelled things, and your grammar is terrible.  Now technology has made that better, but having the draft fresh in your mind isn’t good because you see things that aren’t there.

So I like to put my 1st draft away for a while.

Reading through

I like to try and make a pass through the 1st draft without doing too many changes.  I’ll reread what I wrote and make notes and underline things, but more often than not, when I get back to my computer I don’t even look at the changes I wrote on the draft.

But I think it’s good to know what you were trying to do before you undo it all.

2nd Draft

I don’t make this next pass a fine tooth comb pass.  Often times, I’ll realize that I missed something, or I didn’t like the way something I wrote went.  I’ll check my notes that I left myself from when I was writing and start trying to change things so I can connect the dots a little bit better this time.

I’m also looking at the story though.  I’m checking for emotions and plot points and if I don’t have any of either, I’ll have to check to make sure I even need the scene.

On my second draft, I’m making changes.  I like to save my first draft somewhere and start tackling my text in a different color so that I can see what I changed.  I’m starting to look at the words that I used too and making changes there.

One thing I don’t do is let anyone see this draft yet.

Once I finish with draft though, you guessed it, I take another break from it. Probably not as long as the break between the 1st draft and starting to look at it, but I do like to get some space.

Draft 3

If I haven’t moved to a corner and cried my eyes out by this point, I’m starting to look at the words I used even more.  I’m want to improve the language and the story, not by making sweeping changes, but just enhancing it.  I’m also looking at the pacing of the story.  If I get bored and can’t make it through a passage, then how can my reader get through it?  I’ll need to tweak it.

Once I’ve made a pass, I’ll bring more eyes onto the project.  I’d like to get feedback from a couple of people.  I’m not looking for praise here, but actual problems they had.  I don’t think you can catch every problem yourself.

Using their feedback, I move forward with my next draft.

What is your process like?  Do you have a group of people that you like to use for your writing?

Check out my entire process Here