First off, I want to thank all of you who helped me with the
cover! I REALLY, REALLY appreciate your
feedback. You’re wonderful! Thank you so
much!
I’m terrible at making decision, but – thanks to your
assistance – I have selected the third version for the cover of Riddle in
Stone.
GOD HELP ME IF I PICKED WRONG!!!!
Second, I want to recap why I’m blogging.
The main reason is because my publisher and agent told me
to. Robbie does what he’s told.
Good Robbie!
But I’m also hoping that I can help any of you who want to
become published. I’m not an expert or
anything by any means, but I’ve learned a few things over the past couple years
and some of it may be of use to some of you.
So what I want to talk about today is “the first draft.”
You see, I think one of the biggest issues new writers
(including myself) have is that we get discouraged easily. We write something one day, read it the next,
and think, “Holy crap! This sucks!”
And it does.
That’s where most of us give up. We throw the paper in the
recycling bend and vow never to write again!!!
Sound familiar my dear reader?
I think it was Hemingway who said, “First drafts are shit.”
No matter who you are or how long you’ve been writing, your
first draft is going to stink compared to the final draft. That’s just how it is!
Writing is rewriting.
And rewriting….
And rewriting….
And rewriting!
I have to remind myself of this now because I’m beginning the
third manuscript of my series and I keep getting very discouraged whenever I go
back and read the pages I’ve written.
They’re horrible!
Absolutely HORRIBLE! I can picture my incredible wife reading them and
saying, “Honey, I love you. But this is all crap. Please move out.”
But first drafts are supposed to be horrible. That’s their
function.
The first draft is a skeleton. It’s where you put the bones
of the story. The second, third, fourth,
and tenth drafts will be where you flesh out the story, adding details,
correcting spelling errors, and so forth.
I’ve written about fifty pages of my third manuscript and
there are incomplete sentences all over the place. There are scenes that are
half finished. I have characters who are
named “X” and “Y.” I introduced a
character and I have no idea what his purpose is. I don’t know what he’ll do in
the rest of the story. He just popped in!
If he doesn’t do anything worth doing, I’ll kick him out. Most of those
fifty pages will be deleted by the end anyway!
And that’s okay….
First drafts are shit.
The joy of first drafts is that you get to see, in rough cut,
where everything is going and who turns into something unexpected. Maybe this strange character who popped onto
my page will be brilliant and steal the spotlight. Maybe he’ll deserve his own story. Who knows?
First drafts are the creation stage. Everything after that is
the “fixing” stage.
Please don’t give up because the first draft is beyond
bad. Keep writing and fix it all
later. Follow the stream and find out where it takes you!
Well, that’s my two cents worth for today. Thanks for stopping by. And thanks again to
all of you who have helped and befriended me over the past month or so. You’ve made my writing, and life, much
better. Thank you all very much!
See you in a few days.
