Hello readers, and hello writers, if there are some out there tonight. Again, I missed my goal of writing a post every week, and for that, I’m kinda sorry. Anyway, it’s been a rather big week for me and I’ll tell you why. About four days ago, I finished the first draft of my new novel (not related to A Guardian Angel, which you should check out) and I get to turn to my Alfred Arnold series, which I am rebooting and completing.

If you’ve ever written a novel, you know that release you feel when your first draft is finished and you’ve got a moment to sit back and breathe. Towards the end, you notice that your words have turned dyslexic and need constant retyping and when you speak to people, you find your rich reserve of vocabulary has been depleted and you’re left with strange words, like “Chewy” when someone asks how you are. Maybe that’s just me. I should get that checked out. But now, what do you do?

I’m not a professor though sometimes I profess, and I am by no means a teacher though I often teach. But I am a writer. The difference between the two concepts here is that I simply do one thing, while I am another thing. A verb has become a noun, and with that, it is promoted in significance. Writing possesses me, as it possesses so many others, and it becomes what defines me. When people ask, “Who’s Phoenix?”, those who know me say with certainty, “He’s a writer. Stay away from him.” Because I am a writer, I think my views on the transition from first draft to second are not without merit, but as anyone’s opinion, should be weighed as the reader sees to measure them.

So after you’ve finished your first draft, the most important thing to do is to step away from it. Your mind has been enveloped by this story — you’ve lived and breathed it every day that you set to the keyboard and engraved it for all to see. You now have a bias towards it. This can be either negative or positive, though in most cases it is positive. It’s your baby. How now can you be asked to judge your child when you have only just birthed it? You can’t, so don’t. Stephen King, some dude who writes books or something, suggests six weeks before you pick it up again, and when you do, you ought to read through the entire manuscript in one go. That can be difficult for larger projects or slower readers like myself, but I think what we’re trying to do at this point is get a feel for this novel rather than pick it apart. The meticulous part comes later. So if you have to, skim through it. Read it like a reviewer would on a deadline. That’s likely who will be reading it after your friends and family (directed at self publishers like myself).

When I do my first read through, I keep notes. At the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writer’s conference in Denver last year, I received this cool ass book of sticky notes that has perfect ones for taking notes on the copy itself. A lot of people can do their read electronically, but I have to get it printed out and read it in a quiet place. If you do it on the computer, note taking is even easier, just Google “edit notes <insert word processor name here>”. Just jot down certain things that catch your imagination, or things that grate against your intellect. When I did this with A Guardian Angel, I remember writing down “Completely and totally reduce the hugely vastly large number of very really badly written adverbs.” And then I did. But I might have forgotten it if I hadn’t taken a note. THANKS SCHOOLING! You tired whore, you.

These notes and impressions you jot down are not far off to what a reader will think when giving your novel a try. If there are huge discrepancies, like “How did Andy fly when the nation was in anarchy?” then they will turn off your could-be readers. These are the things you’re going to be tackling in your second draft. Myself, I do three drafts of each novel, the third being more of a sculpting than a recreation. You do it how you like. No one way is right.

I know you’re excited. I am too. The worst thing we do during a first draft is rush the ending. That’s okay! Nothing is so bad that it can’t be remedied with a rewrite. Just jot down what seemed to be missing, or why it left a bad taste in your mouth. Before you begin the second draft, you can figure out how to fill the gaps with an outline. It can be simple, for example: “Chapter 2 – add back story about Max” and then you can wing the rest. You just can’t be discouraged by rushing your ending. It happens to all of us at one point or another — we’re so excited, ready to burst through that finish line tape, so we sprint. And when you sprint, you lose grace. So when you do your rewrite, try doing it backwards. You already know how the story works out. There’s no reason to write it in order other than some sort of obsessive tick. Start with your weakest chapters and work up. Just make sure not to sprint on the chapters that were already good. Take it all in stride.

What else can be said about a first draft? Probably a lot, but I haven’t more to say but some words of encouragement. You did it. Yes, you have a long path before you, but you actually stuck to a project and saw it completed in one form or another. That is a rare talent. If it wasn’t, everyone would do it. Everyone has a story to tell. But you told yours, at personal sacrifice. I’m proud of you and you ought to feel the same about yourself. Now continue. Writing is as sleeping — though you have woken and the dream is just behind you, another one is waiting with the next night.