I love talking about the writing process. To me, it is the most fascinating aspect of the whole endeavor. Sometimes I can go entire days thinking about nothing else but the work that goes into the actual work. That might just be me, but I wanted to share how my process has evolved over the years as well as where I would like to improve going forward.
Writing process
I still follow the same steps I have since the beginning.
- Outline – a chapter by chapter breakdown of the novel
- Dialogue – a hand-written version of the character’s conversations throughout the novel
- Script – the mashing of the outline with the dialogue to produce a beat by beat spine for the novel
- Draft – the actual writing of the book, using the script as a guide
- Edit – turning my jumble of words into something impactful and coherent
This works for me. I’ve thought about dropping the dialogue and script phase to increase my speed. On the whole, though, I don’t think it would add anything other than more editing steps down the road. The dialogue and script portions of the process tend to weed out a number of soft points in the outline. They also help flesh out subplots and smaller character roles by giving them some time to breathe.
I like to think of each step as its own level of editing as well. It really is. By looking through the narrative multiple times during the writing process, everything by the end is a million times more thought out than it was at the start. (I hope…)
Changes to the writing process
It’s funny to think about, but I have noticed a need to work from beginning to end more and more. At the start, I always talked about being able to jump in at any story point and go. This might mean following a specific character through a novel (or season) or a subplot or just a plot point.
Lately, though, whether it is through outlining, scripting, or drafting I have started at the beginning and worked my way through to the climax more and more.
I don’t know why. Maybe it is my tired dad brain telling me to keep things simple. Maybe I have a better grasp on the narrative as a whole so I no longer need to attack it willy-nilly. (Sure, let’s go with that… but it’s probably tired dad brain…)
The staggered approach
Once upon a time, in the golden days of writing, I typically followed my process from start to finish with a book. I don’t remember the last time I did this.
DSA Season Two was outlined at the end of 2018. It was scripted in 2020 and drafted in 2021. Edits took over the last five months of 2022 and it is finally seeing the light of day in September of 2023. That’s a ridiculous process with way too many distractions stuffed in between.
Greystone almost followed suit. I outlined the back half of the series in 2020. Insane, right? I am taking my time to put each book together separate from the rest for the rest of the process. No scripting the whole thing (though I debated doing this…), drafting, and then editing. Each book gets the time it needs, and then the additional details will come at the end if necessary.
Hopefully…
Continued evolution
Every book is different than the last. I continue to find that the most fascinating point of the entire exercise. I certainly never get bored. There is always something new to figure out, or a new revelation on the process to integrate into the steps to make the best book possible.
