Synopsis writing is essential but dreaded. How can you explain your whole story in a short summary? Recently, I had to drop everything and write a one page outline for my new novel. This is for reasons that will either turn out to be bloody brilliant or will be forgotten, consigned to history and never spoken of again. But whichever way it works out, getting the synopsis right was important. So why is it such a hard job? And how do you do it well?
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Have you been asked to critique someone’s story? Been given a short story, screenplay or novel to discuss and have no idea where to start? Fear not. This is a guide to giving good feedback on creative writing. It explains how to deliver your critique and the key questions you should answer. As a reader, it will make you very popular with your writer friends. As a writer, the crib-sheet for reader questions will help you edit your own work.
It may also improve your love life. I’m not even joking. Ready?
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I just finished the second full draft of a novel. I’m going to take a couple of weeks of for Christmas, then get started on the third. But the titles “second” and “third” don’t refer to a number of revisions (I have worked through each chapter many, any times). Rather they refer to specific stages in the drafting process. In this article I will describe what I mean by a second and a third draft, and illustrate my personal checklist for revising third drafts. How do you turn a rough draft into a ready draft?
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Planning writing can feel pointless. A lot of us depend on deadlines, caffeine fuelled all-nighters and forgetting how last time we promised we would never do that again. But for a book or PhD sized project – really anything where the finish line is years away and the work too large to write in a night – that approach is unsustainable. Probably. I mean, I’m prepared to give it a go. But there has to be a better way!
This article is about making the choice between planning your work based on content objectives (five thousand words by Friday, a 12 chapters by December) or duration objectives (20 hours a week, 0800-1200 Monday to Friday). We are always operating a balance between the time we have, how much we are prepared to invest and how good the work is going to be. Choosing the right intermediate objectives helps you prioritise the outcomes you want. So how do we choose the right sort of targets?
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Last month I finished the first draft of my first novel. I had a beer and took a holiday. I’m back and the manuscript keeps looking at me. I try to ignore it. It laughs, says “I thought so,” and then stops looking at me in a way that makes it really clear it is still looking at me. So what do I do with it now?
Obviously, I’m not going to let anyone read the first draft. There’s a long process of editing to get through before I even think about trying publishers or agents. But how do you turn a first draft into a final draft? (more…)
