We all have a process. Humans, we say, are creatures of habit. Whether I am aware of my habits and the steps I follow in an activity, I likely am consistent in my adherence to those habits and steps.
I have THE CALL scheduled with a prospective literary agent for this Thursday. (She liked my #DVpit pitch <3) I’m very excited and reading through all sorts of materials to prep…for a thirty-minute phone call that can’t ever cover the amount of material I’ve gathered. Especially when one of the main goals of the conversation isn’t to gain objective knowledge but experiential and subjective knowledge. This agent and I will decide whether we like each other during this conversation.
One of the questions I will likely be asked is: what is your writing process?
Well, heck. I know exactly….and not at all what I do when I am writing a book. There’s a lot of writing and editing and tons of extraneous drafts. If I were to go into this meeting (read: interview) without mapping my process out, I would probably sound completely unprofessional and less than competent.
So, below is my process. It’s pretty messy, I’d guess (since I haven’t written it down yet). I think my perseverance and thoroughness is what brings everything together for me.
What is your process? Do you try to make your writing process more succinct or orderly? What is your favorite part of your process? I think mine is step 6, Tear it Apart. I really like it when a story really starts to embody its potential.
*Location: anywhere I can use my laptop and listen to music without being visually or physically disturbed. I need longer lengths of time to concentrate; two hour periods are infinitely more productive than thirty-minute blocks. I prefer a coffee shop or my apartment/house.
Method
0 – Idea Development: I can only write from my heart when the topic or concept at the core of my character or story is something I find deeply interesting. I can’t know exactly what is going to happen or how when I start a story. If I can see clearly the three steps it takes to get my character from A to D, I won’t write the story, no matter how cool or fun it seems.
I keep an on-going list of concepts and scenes that inspire something within me. Faion (TMW series) was born when a scene of a man standing in front of a window popped into my head one day years ago.
Now that I have an idea–the heart of my story and my drive to write–I need characters.
1 – Character development and worldbuilding: I ask myself: What kind of person would be involve with this concept? IMAGINATION. Acting. When I write, I try to become my characters. All of their motivations and responses are as organic…as…made up reactions…can be. I write out scenes, following ideas, trying to determine what a character is like. It’s all exploratory. If I need to, I do research into what an experience a character has is actually like.
Sometimes characters are part of the inciting concept, often they aren’t. Conflict and character tend to go hand in hand for me. A character who isn’t challenged by the inciting concept likely isn’t interesting to me. So that character won’t get written.
Worldbuilding, for me, also involves the inciting idea, characters, and the inherent conflict those two have.
So far in this hypothetical walk-through of my writing process, I’ve written tons and tons of notes, fleshing out the intricacies of the inciting concept and the effects and implications of it, on how all of that affects the world and the characters. Which leads me to the “story” part of my story.
2 – Conflict, Motivation, and Goal development: These usually come late in the game for me. I want to know who my characters are before I decide what they are going to do. Honestly, I like to know my characters so deeply that *I*, the writer, do not decide the conflict or their motivations. The characters decide these things because the conflict is unavoidable due to their personalities and goals.
3 – Writing it into life: Once I have determined these three aspects of my story, I begin “writing in earnest.” Chapters and story arcs begin to form. I am a VERY detailed and heavy editor, but at this point I do not do any content editing. I just write and write and write until my characters get from point A to point L. I don’t leave any room for writers’ block. Just keep writing, no matter how bad the writing seems.
I never want to write anything that is cliche in a bad way, and I believe that writing multiple drafts and following tangents helps to get the really bad ideas out of my system so that I can pinpoint the most interesting and organic path a character can take.
Once I have the basics down, I begin to shape the story.
4 – Shaping and Filling: Sometimes I do this by putting everything in an outline or a web. I want to see how everything connects. Then I imagine even harder, putting myself into each situation and moment, trying to fill in the scene with all the relevant details. I move on to the next scene and the next, until I finish the draft.
Then I do it all again, filling the story out. The first read-through, I might focus on emotional motivations and experiences, the second physical environment, the third consistency, the fourth clarity. During one of these rounds, I overwrite, putting way more detail than is necessary. And then in a later round (clarity round), I simplify it, only keeping exactly what is relevant to the scene.
5 – Rest: At this point, I should be in love with my characters and believe I have a non-cliche, mostly unpredictable, interesting, and compelling story in my hands. So before editing, I let the story rest for a couple weeks. At a later point, it should rest for a month. Also, I don’t need any readers yet; there is no way (in my experience) that this story is ready to be read by anyone but me. Once it has rested (once my brain/imagination has rested), I’ll pick it up again.
And then I’ll tear it apart.
6 – Tear it apart: Question everything. Follow every action through to its logical and illogical conclusions. Consider what characters are involved and what characters should be involved that I have overlooked. Look at how every part of the story comes together. Throw out sayings and scenes I liked that are not effective. Tear it apart.
7 – Editing, Revising, and Rereading: Do these. During one of these rounds of edits, I’ll search for words that I feel I’ve used excessively and cut them or use synonyms. I also have this pointless desire to make paragraphs end as whole lines and I edit until each paragraph is succinct enough that it does so when possible.
8 – Readers: Ask people to read and give feedback. Respond to feedback in my writing.
9 – Edit and Reread: Do this until the story is done. I know my story is done when I don’t make any substantial changes during these rounds. Then the changes and edits that can be made are only cosmetic and depend on my mood or frame of mind.
I’d estimate that all of these steps could be completed in three months of consistent and focused work. Six months is probably ideal.
Sierra Steele | Author Blog 