Rough Drafts and a Fresh Pair of Fresh Eyes

Reflection on everything first draft related, and how good a beta reader can be.

When I wrote the first draft of my novel, The Storm Summoner, I wasn’t sure if I should start with Keera – so I didn’t. I started with the person that would become her teacher, her mentor, early on. I thought it started well, but the second chapter I switched into Keera, and I sort of phased in and out with her and Alarik for a while.

I wrote also from my main villain’s POV more than once. I suppose it’s not a bad thing to do, but there were certain things I gave away by doing that, that I didn’t know for sure I wanted to do. I elude to certain things outside of the villain’s POV that other characters gleam from a certain situation, but decide to keep from Keera, for a very long time. They do this because they think she wouldn’t be able to handle the truth. That this information might break her mentally, and force her into a corner where she could lose her Queen status.

The first rough draft took me about 6 months to write out. With proofing and editing myself on the way, which yes, I know that’s perceived as “bad” to do. They say just write, then come back and fix it later. (Which I may listen to the next time, and not just for saving time at the beginning.) Outside that, I sat back, really impressed, almost to the point that I thought, “Hey, maybe I don’t need to look this over too much. I’ll get a beta reader and just see how they like it and decide from there if I want to start sending it to agents.”

Well, I took one last look over it and decided no, I’d take out the main villain’s POV and see what that looks like. I decided that it was better, I could always use the parts I took out later, for something else. Or maybe even a whole different book, because there would be enough material.

I found one beta reader, and as soon as I sent the manuscript to her, I had a weird feeling. This draft wasn’t good enough. Immediately after she began reading it, she pointed out a couple things, and I was like “crap, I knew it!” and I even knew a couple of the points she made. One of them surprised me, but it also made sense. I know the details, and I didn’t convey them fully with the reader.

The first draft, even edited, was not ready.

They never are.

So back to the drawing board I went, and I looked through all my beta’s notes, and came up with an idea. Since I had more than one high point in the book I wrote – why not separate those ideas into their own books? Then I could expand everything and make it easier to understand for everyone else. I needed to write it like I was introducing this to the world and they knew nothing about it… because they don’t know this world, and I needed to remember that.

How it was suggested to me, by my beta reader who is also a line and developmental editor, is that I should write it, leave it for a bit, go back and edit it as much as I can on my own, a few times with breaks in between, then get 3-4 new betas to read it. Edit it again and get a professional editor if I have the money, then beta it out again. So, I’m likely going to do that… and give out fun little snippets along the way as I do it. Maybe I’ll give out some of the original content that I won’t actually use, but will appear in some way in the book, maybe from another POV, since I’m thinking I’ll keep it just as Keera this time.