Behind the Scenes Special: Overview of My Writing and Editing Process

written by Betsy Flak on 2017-01-16

One of the things I'm constantly working on is how to produce books that are up to my high standards of quality--after all, one of the reasons I left my career as an engineer was because I wasn't allowed to spend the time to produce my best work--in the most efficient way possible. In short, I want to publish the best books in the quickest amount of time. That said, I refuse to sacrifice quality in order to churn out more books. That's not who I am nor what I want my books to be. (Side note: This absolutely does not mean those who are able to publish tons of books every year publish rubbish. It does mean that, for me and for where I am right now in my writing journey, I have to choose between publishing speed and quality.)

That said, I am a slooooooow writer. I started An Uncertain Death (Book One of The Clan-Vampire Clash) way back in 2014, and I don't anticipate publishing it until late 2017. Of course, there are a bunch of mitigating factors (I wasn't working full-time on it, I wrote two other books in the interim, I hadn't written anything more than a few pages in 15 years, I needed to give beta readers to time to read it, etc, etc, etc.). The fact remains: I am not a prolific writer (yet).

But I am getting better. The Impossible Creation, a prequel to The Clan-Vampire Clash, looks like it will be published within a year of writing the first word. Although one book per year is still small compared to most authors, it's a good goal for where I'm at now. When I try to push myself faster, I find myself rushing through it and (a) not enjoying it, which you readers will pick up on, and (b) producing lower quality material. Obviously, this is not true for all authors (see side note above), but it is for me. Hopefully, I'll be able to speed up over time without sacrificing quality.

And now to the point. For any of you who are curious (or perhaps budding authors yourselves), today I'm giving a brief behind the scenes tour of the process I currently use to write and edit my books. As a former engineer, I'm always looking to optimize this process, but this is the one that was (and is being) used for The Impossible Creation and will be used for Book 3. An Uncertain Death and Book 2 sadly missed out on the outline step, but they'll go through the entirety of the editing process (and multiple times, due to all the issues as a result of not outlining before writing--seriously, any new writers out there, outline before writing!).

First a process map (I used to be an engineer, remember?) of how I develop, write, and edit a novel, along with where each book of The Clan-Vampire Clash is currently located.

Although I plan to write blog posts about most of the steps in greater detail later, here's an overview:

1. Define Final Climax
   • What it is: Deciding where the series is going long-term, including the final action/battle scene for each book. (So, yes, I already know how the series ends for each character even though I have yet to publish a single book. No, I will not leak spoilers.)
   • Notes: Ideally, this should be done when first developing the series idea (i.e. Who is it about? What is it about? etc.). I say "should" because The Clan-Vampire Clash was originally planned as a trilogy without defining what was happening in which books. Upon writing Books 1 and 2 as one entirely too long novel (reminder: outline before writing!), I realized I had to expand it to six books. At that point, I couldn't just keep the ideas in my head any more and formally defined this for each of the planned six novels after writing the first drafts Books 1 and 2.


2. Outline
   • What it is: Your standard outline that you learned in school. Since I write from different perspectives and handle several plotlines over the course of a novel, this can get a little complicated. But don't worry, I've developed some tools (ok, spreadsheets--engineer, remember?) that help me go from forest to tree to veiny leaf.
   • Notes: I've mentioned that I'm not a very prolific writer right? Books 1 and 2 took me an entire year to write that first draft. And then they had all kinds of plot holes and other problems that I'm still fixing. Then I wrote Book 0 (The Impossible Creation, about the same length as my first draft of Book 1) in about a month after spending a week or two refining the idea and outlining (so six weeks total to generate a first draft). Plus it has waaaaaay less issues in terms of content. So, yeah. Outline people!


3. Write
   • What it is: Simple. Write the darn book!
   • Notes: The outline is there as a guide, but sometimes my characters rebel. Then it's time to return to the outline and tweak as necessary. For small changes, I don't bother. Example: Character X was supposed to go straight from point A to point B, but decides to take a detour. As long as they end up at point B, I probably won't update the outline. If they decide to skip point B entirely, then I'll update it, mostly to make sure I haven't accidentally introduced any plot holes or inconsistencies).


4. Self-Editing: Review Content
   • What it is: I read through the book, looking for big picture items (ex: plot holes, inconsistencies). I'm not concerned about details like word choice at this point. After finishing my readthrough, I address any issues highlighted (or decide to hold off to address them during the next step of self-editing).
   • Notes: I like to read through my book like I would any other (for me, that means on my kindle). I'll then have a spreadsheet open on my laptop, ready to track my notes as I read. I find this to be more efficient than taking handwritten notes or notes on my kindle. But, then again, I love spreadsheets.


5. Self-Editing: Analyze Line-by-Line
   • What it is: And here's where we get into the nitty gritty. I read each and every word of my draft out loud, analyzing the overall flow, the dialogue between and within characters, the sentence structure, the word choice, the imagery...pretty much all those details I more or less ignored while reviewing content. I'll also address any issues from the Content Review that I purposely left for this step.
   • Notes: This is by far the longest step in my process and the one I'm trying to make more efficient. That said, it's also where my books take a ginormous leap from poor/mediocre writing style to one that's vivid, expressive, and realistic (at least that's the goal--I'm not trying to toot my own horn here). I'll also lay in the groundwork for future books as well as Easter eggs if I didn't do so in the first draft. (Side note: One of my goals as a writer is to create books that, upon reading a second time, you notice things you hadn't before, since those are my favorite types of books.)


6. Professional Editing (AKA Editor Edits)
   • What it is: Call in the professionals! At this point, I've done all I can to perfect my books. Now I need a professional to give it that final boost. Here, they're looking at everything from writing style to overall plotline and pacing. It's my responsibility to accept or reject their changes as well as to address any comments or concerns they might have (or refuse to address them if I disagree). May go back and forth a couple times.
   • Notes: This is where The Impossible Creation is right now, so this is the most in-flux step at the moment. As such, it's also the one I'll blog about first--if you're interested, look for more detailed posts later this year. I also might add my own readthrough to the mix here.


7. Professional Proofreading (AKA Editor Proofreads)
   • What it is: Again, I'm calling in the professionals. This time, they're looking at spelling, grammar, and consistency, i.e. all those black-and-white issues. As usual, it's my responsibility to implement their edits.
   • Notes: I haven't done this yet, so we'll see how it goes.


8. Advance Readers Review
   • What it is: Now that I have my near-final draft, I'll send it to my Advance Readers, a subset of readers who have volunteered to receive a free advanced copy in return for their honest review (I call them The Certain Cell for reasons that will become obvious if you read my books). They also serve as a final spelling, grammar, and consistency check, just in case anything escaped my and my editors' nitpicking fingers.
   • Notes: I haven't done this yet, but I think I will conduct a final readthrough at the same time, this time operating as a customer reading the book. I'll only flag items that are glaring or bothering me as I read.

And that's "it". Seeing it all laid out, I can kinda see how it takes me so long to publish a book. Plus, this doesn't include the beta readers I used to figure out Book 1 (An Uncertain Death)! Nevertheless, I will continue to fight the good fight, also known as publishing as freqently as possible without sacrificing quality. Stay tuned to see how I do.