My Writing Process (2017)

 

My Writing Process

Every author and writer has a different process for drafting and editing. They go through a different number of drafts or stages before getting to the book you see on the shelf. This is my process:

1. Rough Draft

Usually I use NaNoWriMo to get this draft down, though in grade school I used a notebook for the same effect. For the rough draft, you are not allowed to stop and edit. You have to churn out a certain number of words a day, and it's not going to be pretty. It's a mess that you cringe to think of anybody ever looking at. It might even include passages like these (from a yet untitled novel about griffins):

 Tyra rolled her eyes. “What about the other women in the vale?”

“Aren’t any. White Leader’s a top hunter. He gets first pick of humans, and until Runa he always went for males.”

#It seems like all this explanation should be earlier. Or maybe not.

His other two picks were both men, tall and strong. Both were fishermen. Name1 had a wife and two youngsters at the village. Name2 was older, with his four children all grown. None of them spoke to each other. 

The chain that had been attached to her collar lay in a corner.

Edit: she’s still wearing it.

Tyra examined it. 

A girl screamed again. Tyra was getting tired of the screaming, though her heart had sped up again without her permission. (I counted the word 'scream' ten times in this section).

Since I am not allowed to edit, I sometimes go back and add a line explaining the changes that I'd like to make. Occasionally I include several paragraphs brainstorming how this section ought to go, or outlining what I think should come in the next couple sections. The rough draft has no chapters, but I do have heading titles to help me find the sections quickly.

Again, the rough draft is for nobody's eyes but mine. If you're working on NaNoWriMo, congratulations! You've got a start! But please please please do not assume that you have a full publishable story on your hands. Yes, amazon will publish it for nothing, but it gives indie authors a bad name.

Ahem, coming off the soapbox...


2. First Draft

This draft takes the longest, often several months. I start by listing out every scene in the novel with a few key words. For example, here's the first chapter of The Spectra Uprooted:

Part 1: Introduction 

Chapter: Harvest Festival 

Wrestling match 

Eating 

First raid: numbers scare off raiders, Bract worries they will be back

Zuri is brought in/Keita’s identity revealed 

“captured” by grasslanders

I move these clips around into chapters and add in a few lines for scenes that I think ought to be added.  My goal is to have the story build to a climax in each chapter, with all of the scenes in that chapter adding up to it.  Once I've got this guideline, I fill out the scenes that I've described that still need added. Also, because I'm slightly OCD about page numbers, I keep track of chapter length on an excel sheet, which I've already described. I also make the changes that I noted during the rough draft. 

When I'm almost done with the first draft, I go back to the beginning and read each character's voice as if I were doing an audiobook. This helps me make the characters' dialogue distinct from each other.

By the time I am finished with the first draft, I have a decent story that I am willing to share with beta-readers. The plot and characters are in place and in order. Going over each scene allows me to rewrite most of it, so some of the more awkward prose gets corrected.

3. Prose Draft

The prose draft mostly involves cutting extra words to make the story flow better. Red flags of words to change include could and 've had to, -ly adverbs, passive voice, etc.  I like to use prowritingaid for a free analysis of my first few pages, looking for problems that I'm likely to find in the rest of the work. After working on the computer, I request a physical copy from Staples, where the extra words are more obvious. Here's a page from The Spectra Uprooted:

This copy can also be shared with beta-readers. I can leave it with friends to add comments.

After I make the changes I've marked on my physical copy, I format to the correct page size and add the maps, acknowledgments, and other material. Once this is done I start working on the cover, which means that I can't make any more major changes without risking a change to the cover's spine width. My beta reader and I go over it one more time and then I request the proof copy.

4. Proof copy

There's nothing so exciting as getting the proof copy in the mail! At last, it looks like a real book!

Now I get to read the whole thing, pretending I'm a reader. I also circle small changes and especially typos that need fixed. I might have to add a label to the map or make sure all the fonts match. And, if I'm designing my own cover, I check to make sure that's working (if not, I have to order a proof all over again, which is not fun).

Timing:

From start to finish, this process takes about a year to complete. I choose my own due date when I first start writing, usually my angel baby's birthday (September 5th). That gives me time to work on marketing and side projects and preparation before NaNo comes around again. 

So, there's my writing process. What's yours?

2021 Note: The books I used as samples are now published. Mira's Griffin changed quite a bit since those snippets! Keita's Wings (the new title for my first series, of which The Spectra Uprooted is third) is now complete. I've written a new blogpost with more information about my writing process, along with changes I've made in the past four years.

Excel for Writers

 One afternoon my college roommate, an accounting major, found me pouring over an excel sheet. “You use excel?” she asked incredulously. 

“Yes,” I answered. “It’s useful for writing.”

She still stared at me. She didn't seem to believe that a wildlife conservation major with a perchance for fiction would be using the same program she used in her classes.

Excel can be a useful tool for the writer. In fact, I was using it as early as middle school for keeping track of my characters (and their Pokémon—this was 2000).

Here are some of the ways I use excel for writing fiction. Some of these are influenced by genre. I write fantasy and create my own world, so I need to keep track of more information than, say, a romance writer might. Others are useful no matter the genre.

Names

“How do you name your characters?” comes up frequently in writing circles. I am something of a name enthusiast. I read name dictionaries and online lists for fun, and when I come up with one that fits my story, I add it to my name excel sheet. In The Spectra series, I go for names with meanings that tie in to that character’s clan. For instance, characters from the Cole clan have names meaning fire or red. The columns go across the top and then I fill in the information about each name. I include a column for “bearer” so I know if I’ve already used the name.

This way I can sort the names by gender and/or clan to help me narrow down the perfect name for my character. For instance, if a new male Sprite character appears, I can scroll down the alphabet to ‘S’…

And I’ve got a whole list of possibilities.

Timeline

I also use excel to keep track of the history of my fantasy world. At the top, I have a column per year (around 300 years). This way I have a quick reference for births, deaths and marriages; important events in both kingdoms and characters’ lives; and the reigns of kings. I broke them up by clan to spread things out. It may be chaotic for someone who doesn’t know the world, but I can find what I need and that’s what’s important.

Characters

Have you ever read a series where one of the characters switches middle names between books? What about eyes that change color? Annoying, right? A character sheet on excel can be a great way to keep all those little details straight, especially for minor characters. You can add whatever details are most important to you. Here’s an example of mine (by the way, I hid the columns for spouse and children—too many spoilers!). I can sort by book in the series or parents/birth order if I’m looking at a whole family.

Chapter Length

This is a tool I use to help with pacing. I keep track of the name and number of each chapter, and then copy down the page numbers from my table of contents. This calculates the length of each chapter for me, so I can determine if parts are too long or two short, and compare one book in the series to another. Yes, all of the Keita’s Wings books have the same number of chapters—I find it a useful tool for book length, but if this is unappealing to you please don’t. I can be OCD about some of these things. The different colors on the chapter names are groupings I find useful, based off of characters and setting.

Agents and Reviews

I’ve also used excel to keep track of agents and reviewers that I’ve contacted about my books. For reviewers, I listed their name, website, when I submitted to them, and what response I received (information has been removed for privacy). I colored the rejections red and the accepted invitations green:

I did the same thing for agents before I decided to Indie publish, which also included columns for hints I’d dug up about the sort of books they were looking for.

Moneys

Now here’s the sheet that my accounting roommate would approve of! Where is money going and where is it coming from? It’s important to keep track! At the end of the year I move the total costs, total profits, and year total to another table so that I can compare years and look for patterns… and do taxes (shudder).

What, you don’t think I doctored the profits, do you?

Word Count

I must admit, I had to get my husband’s help to set this up. I participate in NaNoWriMo each year, and one of the most motivating parts is entering your wordcount into their tables and graphs. So we put together a table that can give that same motivation throughout the year, with adjustable goals (let me know if you want a copy and I can email it).

Not Excel, But Still Useful 

Here are a few other useful files I keep for my books that are not on excel:

Calendar:

I chose to use ‘Word’ for the calendar, but excel would work just as well. This helps me keep track of the dates in my story. I have to make sure that events are realistically spread out, especially when my characters are traveling!

Oh look, I left out a few death dates...

Family Trees

Main character Keita meets her cousins and other relatives in several of the Spectra books, so keeping track of them all is important. This information is on my excel timeline as well, but it’s handy to see them grouped by family in a linear, visual way. I have one of these for most of the major characters (including Keita’s mother’s side of the family on a separate sheet).

Maps

I have a ‘master map’ which shows the entire Spectra continent and all important places. This helps me get traveling dates straight (see calendar) and lets me visualize where the characters are and what directions they are facing. When I publish a book, I take the relevant section of my master map and turn it into an insert for the front of the book. Here’s the map that was included in book 3, The Spectra Uprooted: a map of the kingdom of Spritelands, and a small inset of the whole continent.

Various computer programs can be a real asset to your writing. These are the ones I’ve found the most useful. Feel free to try out any new ideas and let me know how they turned out!

Keita and Drake

Bonus story: Keita Sage is being forced into betrothal. After watching her friend Zuri talk her way out of trouble, Keita tries the tactics she observed on her father...

This story is a prequel for the Keita's Wings series, and shows up as a flashback in Keita's Wings 3,The Spectra Uprooted.

Keita sat silently beside her two friends, looking over the empty fields of the summit: a mass of monocultured grass, dull yellow and topped with weedy plumes. Every year Glen had told her stories of his adventures at the summit: exploring with the other boys, friendships, adventures, traps and nar-row escapes. And there they were, doing nothing.

He father materialized from among the simply thatched huts. A stern look sent her friends scampering. “What do you think of the other heirs?” the Sprite king asked.

“Carli and Zuri and I are friends,” she answered.

“And the boys?”

“I’m not sure. They don’t spend much time with us.”

King Drake nodded. They walked side by side until they reached a corner of the great walls that glowed despite an overcast morning. “The Lectrans and Nomes seem unusually close,” he said. “If they exclude the other clans, they could be plotting against us.” He glanced at her, then away quickly. “The other leaders think an alliance with another clan would help our cause.”

Normally she would have stayed silent, or presented a logical argument, or at least a snappy re-tort. But that’s not how Zuri had won him over. "I feel like a prisoner," she admitted.

His composure dropped. "I'm sorry."

That wasn't the answer she expected.

“This was so easy with Glen. He and Zuri just clicked. And so did your mother and I.”

Keita started. She knew her parents met here, at the Summit. She knew how everyone reacted. She knew about kingdoms and treaties, ceasefires and allegiances, but she did not know how her par-ents felt about it.

"Jasper and Brian are nice enough, but I don't know them, Dad!" She stopped. She hadn't called him that since he'd given her education to her unpleasant cousin Felix.

His eyes narrowed. "The rulers are concerned about recent events. These marriages aren't about limiting your choices. They're about keeping our kingdoms... and you!... safe. You heard of the Mers who were lost at sea? And Brian’s mother? If someone is picking off royals, we need to stand together more than ever."

Picking off royals? A chill travelled down her spine. For a long time she stared at the drifting clouds, planning. "What if..." she began. "What if I went on a trip—an internment, maybe—to the dif-ferent kingdoms? I'd have more time, get to make a better choice, and I'd still be bringing unity—maybe to more kingdoms than just one."

Drake frowned. "What if you ran away?"

"Spritelands means more to me than that."

He hesitated. "The others expect me to make an announcement tonight."

"Announce Glen and Zuri. You don't need both of us right now." She felt a twinge of unease, sacrificing her friend and brother, but neither seemed to mind.

For several minutes he thought. She hardly dared breathe. At last he nodded.

She forced back stinging tears. "Thank you."

If only it had worked that way.

Mother's Day Eve (a bad country song)

 I described last Saturday to a friend, and she said it sounded like a bad country song. Challenge accepted!

Note: Although it's not country, I sang it to "Piano Man". I'm not familiar enough with most country songs.

It wasn't the best day in history,
my last Mother's Day Eve.
It was only the tip of the iceberg
when our new puppy decided to leave.

Then my son soiled his pajama pants
--that's all the details you get--
Threw 'im in the tub to clean him all off.
The knob blasted off; all got wet.

Hurry! Shut off the well water
though we're stinky from shearing our sheep.
Grab your shoes and get in the car--
Got to get a part a'fore we can sleep.

Heading to town, our car broke down--
steam's bursting up through the hood.
To be fair I must mention friends happened by
To help us get back on the road.

Life gives you plenty of ups and downs.
The lesson I learned this time
was that when you look at your troubles
they always sound better in rhyme.

Keita's Wings backstory

 This short story reveals some of the backstory for The Spectra Unearthed.

The great wall of the Summit, the last place for Spectra royals, filled Keita’s vision. Her feet were numb, worn raw too long for pain. Her legs shook, her lungs shook from the acrid smoke she had left behind, and streaks of green crossed her maple-brown skin. Some of her family and friends were inside those walls. Others, too many, were not. Inside was safety and companionship. Outside, the Stygians were hunting—yet her fear was as numb as her feet and only the fire inside still lived, the fire that said the Stygians must pay for what they had done.

Two hours ago, she had cringed behind a ridge above her valley home. Fire enveloped the trees so that the slopes glowed red. Black dots that were her people ran, their cries piercing the distance. Her siblings were fleeing. Her father could not. Her cousin, once her tutor, now a Stygian, stood silhouetted against the flames, the cause of it all. Maybe she should have challenged him then, but the fire roared toward her and she had forgotten everything, everything but the devouring flames.

Two days ago, she crouched among boulders with the Castalia princes. Two figures broke their conversation, peered into the rocks. “They’ve heard us.”

“I’ll get him.”

“Too late. The word is out. Tell the others to start now.”

They ran. She was in horse form then, better able to carry the boys. Two were communicators—as she ran, their thoughts flew faster, warning their people, their parents, their brothers stationed in the other kingdoms… but they could not contact her home. She left them at the Summit’s doorstep and took off, the two hundred miles separating her from home flying beneath her churning legs.

Two weeks ago, she discovered the princes in their mansion library. “I hope the Stygians aren’t as smart as you are,” she’d said. She’d meant it as a compliment, but none smiled. An open history book lay before them, and they had been debating how five determined, powerful people might take over the continent.

“What I’d do is find a Stygian for each kingdom and attack simultaneously. And I’d assassinate all the royals so no one could fight back.”

Two months ago, she heard the word ‘Stygian’ for the first time. She had sneaked out of a Summit council, determined to leave before her father could betroth her. In kestrel form she flew over the mountain crags, until she saw them. Five dark figures crouched in a ravine. They knew what she was. She barely made it inside the walls. The kings didn’t believe her. Only the princes told her what she ought to have known all along. Stygians were once Spectra, but sinister oaths gave them the abilities of all six Spectra clans. Only the united strengths of the kingdoms could defeat them: a near impossible task among such different people.

Now she stood before the summit walls, chest heaving. She would be the last to arrive. Her anger eased as she remembered she could not defeat the Stygians alone; she must hope that enough royals escaped and waited now behind the walls. She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and climbed the wall.

Unglued

 My desert garden needs a touch of personality.

I'll make dinosaurs, fun for my kids to look at,

and superglue them to the rocks

or they will shatter in clumsy hands.

I take my birthday clay and shape

my first,

a megasaurus:

long tail, head sideways, claws curled.

Each time I set him to dry I must reattach

a limb.

An arm fell off, a leg, his head.

Then for shaping, peeling off the extra,

smooth with gentlest sponge.

Claws fall off.

Well, I can paint over that.

Right?

Set him to dry, two weeks this time.

Hue lightens as he ages, terra cotta to vague gray.

All in one piece,

he looks as good as my imagination.

Take him down to paint.

I'll make this a fun activity,

earn good Mommy points,

so I pull out a lesser statue for the boys.

Leave the room to retrieve the paint.

Crash.

Tattling: "My brother broke it."

Dinosaur is in pieces.

Broken.

I put him on the shelf,

say I'm sad but do not yell,

earn good Mommy points.

Later, send them outside.

Superglue his arms, a leg, his head.

Cracks remain, and pieces too small for the glue.

I can paint over that, right?

Begin to paint.

Nudge his head.

Head falls off.

Scream at the universe:

"I am having a bad day!"

Wonder, is there some Meaning,

a parable in this tale?

I am the statue trying to fit the ideal,

sometimes coming unglued
or losing my head.

I retreat, let the frustration dry.

Later I'll get the glue

and try again.

The Spectra Uprooted begins

This is the opening scene of Keita's Wings book 3, The Spectra Uprooted.

Keita Sage stood alone among a crowd. Like the other maple-skinned, dark-haired Sprites, she faced the wide wooden stage below. Two men wrestled atop it, arms and legs glistening under the autumn sun as they ducked and dodged. The moves were unfamiliar to her, and her thoughts wandered: to other festivals lost to time, to her friends who must have discovered her absence, to wondering why she felt so out of place among people who looked so much like she did.

The crowd's cheering made her whip around. One of the men had fallen. The other jumped on top of him and wrapped his well-muscled arm around the other's neck. Keita flinched. Before she knew what she was doing, she was pressing through the crowd. The man underneath was squirming, frantic at first but with less and less life, and still the crowd watched and cheered. Keita was a few feet away when the man fell limp against the wood, the sound of his fall hidden in a roar from the crowd. A green cast spread up his skin, and Keita stopped.

Of course. He had gone dormant. He would wake up in less than an hour, embarrassed but unharmed. Keita had been living away from home too long. If the man had not been a Sprite, born into one of the other five clans, he would be dead.

The crowd dispersed and Keita caught only one more glimpse of the hurt man, his skin now bright green, being dragged from the stage. The other Sprites, wearing the pale, yellowish green of the grasslander tribe, strode away in twos and threes, weaving among the huge cottonwoods that lined the bottom of a wide, gentle valley. Keita had seen only the tops of those trees from the prairies, until she came to the edge of the hollow and found the celebrating group. Piping music drifted from the clearing where couples danced, their bare feet thumping the hard earth in enticing patterns. In their speech and movement and in more undefinable ways, the Sprite band showed their allegiance to each other. From babies and childlings, children, adlings like Keita, to full adults, they formed a tight-knit community that she was too obviously not a part of. They couldn't reject her on Equinumn, the autumn equinox, but her strangeness fit her like a garment she could not remove.

This was not what she had expected when she had left the others. They were her friends, but the group was too large, too noisy, too busy to make friends with Keita's home. They weren't interested in celebrating Equinumn, and even her twin brother had ignored her attempts to organize an event or two among their own group. Finding a local village had been her only option.

"Had anything to eat yet?"

Keita jumped. A round, friendly-faced man stood beneath the closest cottonwoods, holding out a turtle-shell bowl of thick brown stew. A refusal was halfway out Keita's mouth when she remembered to bite it back. Not today.

"Thank you," she said. Her hands shook as she took the bowl.

"Name's Bract. I do the cooking for the childlings... and everything else, for my three." He pointed to a trio of youngsters in the branches of the nearest tree. Bract waited, perhaps for Keita to introduce herself, but she said nothing. At last he asked, "This your first meal in a season?"

"Thereabouts," Keita said without looking up. Her last meal had been just like this. The day was cold but crystal clear, and the stew sat warm in her stomach. Trees towered over their valley home, unscathed by the future fire that would roar through weeks later. Her father, strong, busy, alive, threaded through the crowds, while dancers proved that though winter came and Earth slept, life would come again. Now the whole valley slept, and Keita had been gone from it three seasons. Nine months. No food.

The man was still watching. Keita attempted to smile as she scooped a square of root vegetable into her mouth.

Warmth. Crunch. Salt. Savory flavor of summer richness, of festivals gone by, of happy days that would never come back. The bowl slipped from her fingers and thudded to the ground.

Warm gravy spattered her toes. The children gasped, and Bract's eyes widened. Waste of food was sin. Keita ducked to rescue what she could, lost her balance, and found herself on hands and knees in leaf litter. Her head spun, and her stomach contracted with pain. She heaved, heaved again, Someone's hands had her shoulders, raised her to a sitting position, let her back rest on rough bark. She took a deep breath, and as the pain ebbed a fraction, looked up into Bract's face.

"We eat at each festival for a reason, adling," he said. "We can't hold off eating more than a season or so."

Had she known that? Eating a meal was an important part of the season transitions. It showed that they could not escape their connection to the world, that even Earth's people depended on the web that connected all life. Apparently the meal was more than symbolic. She ought to have known, but she ought to have known a lot of things. Knowledge was scarce when your childhood tutor worked for the enemy.