An old, unpublished book on a hard drive would benefit from a relook before release. This is where I find myself with the first Retrokid… it was started in 2020 and finished a year later. What have I learned since then? Both skill-wise and about the universe and its characters? Can I trust myself to responsibly edit and revise without going overboard? I could have surgically targeted my edits if I knew my way around the book....
In prior posts, I’ve mentioned my versioning system, but I want to explore the topic a little more today. If I can save one person from the misery of losing their hard work, then I will have done my job. However, I’m not going to jump into that right away. Instead, I’ll share some of my background, and you’ll see why it’s pertinent. I’ve been making websites or writing code for my most of my life....
Last time we talked, I was just finishing draft 4.0. That’s the last draft with no grammar checking. With 4.0 done (woohoo!), I can dive into what may be my least favorite part of writing a book… a computer telling me how bad my English is. It’s time consuming, tedious, and torturous. To call it a necessary evil may be correct, but it’s not exactly how I feel about this step....
In my last post, I discussed how I feel about fourth drafts but only briefly described how I approach them. Today, I’ll go a bit more into detail. With the second and third drafts, I usually have a revision plan that consists of to-dos, fixes, and notes. The fourth draft shouldn’t have any except for some themes or tones that I want to track. That means I jump directly into reading and editing, as explained in the previous post....
Every writer’s process differs, but most phase the work into drafts. Usually four, and I’m no different. In the past, I would toss out the first draft and start over, which means I technically had five drafts, but I don’t do that anymore. And while I enjoy all the drafts for different reasons, I like the fourth because it’s all about quality. For all the drafts prior, including all the minor versions (for example, I will often have a 3....