Photo by Colton Sturgeon on Unsplash
Takeaways from Writing My First Novel
by Delicia A. Vaz
Working on my first book has been a rewarding experience. As a third culture individual, languages and stories have held my interest since I learned the alphabet. I’m an avid reader who enjoys solving mysteries before reaching the climax of a story. Over the last couple of years, I grew interested in writing fiction. Creative writing went beyond the realm of my technical portfolio since project management and data analytics are my forte.
With the idea of writing planted in my mind, I knew I had to do my due diligence as I seriously considered it. I prefer going into new projects with my eyes wide open. I didn’t want to end up writing a story that would never see the light of day or was subpar to the point where I would never read it had it been written by someone else. I wanted to use my time wisely. After all, I was going to devote a considerable amount of it towards my writing endeavor.
Tapping into my artistic side and channeling it into this new outlet proved to be fruitful. Along the way, I’ve learned several lessons. I’m going to share my favorites in the form of a seven-part series—Takeaways from Writing My First Novel. It’s beneficial to impart them while they are fresh in my mind instead of waiting until my book is published.
Writing a novel can be exciting and daunting because you might not know where to start. A basic online search will pull up numerous articles on the matter. You might experience a case of information overload. When you are trying to figure out the first steps, this can put you off almost instantly. It’s something I don’t want aspiring authors to feel.
Through a simple search on the web, you find diagrams for the writing process look similar to Figure 1. It is applicable to article writing or writing papers (for college). These same stages are used to explain the novel writing process.
Based on my experience, I found the stages were slightly different and visualized them as steps leading to a door (Figure 2). You can go up and down these steps depending on what you need to do. The stages cover the novel writing process from planning to venturing into publishing.
I’ve grouped the takeaways based on the following stages:
1. Preparation
It is exciting to pen your first story. You’re looking forward with the same enthusiasm you had for the launch of your favorite videogame or the release of your favorite author’s new book. If you are like me and don’t have a background in creative writing, then you might want to take a pause and prepare for the impending experience.
After all, you wouldn’t scale a mountain without proper knowledge and training, would you? Writing may appear sedentary, but it is a mental exercise. This monumental and loveable task challenges you in the most unexpected ways. Prewriting is also included in this stage.
2. Formatting
You could go ahead with writing your story and then format it. Most articles will tell you to do it during the Editing stage which already has its fair share of detail-oriented work. Since this is your first book, you run the risk of overlooking formatting errors. Even copy/content/line editors want your manuscript to be formatted to a certain extent.
From my previous writing experience, I’ve found the key is to set up your document from the beginning. By doing this, you save yourself the headache of formatting an entire manuscript of 250+ pages. It’s a crucial step and, in my opinion, deserves to be standalone. So, you can present your manuscript in a manner that fits the industry standards.
3. Writing
The main purpose of this stage is to get your ideas from Preparation into the form of a story. It is rough, contains grammatical errors and has some inconsistencies. No matter. The first draft is a piece of work. It’s tempting to focus on mistakes but don’t do it at this stage.
Get your words on pages. This is the most important task among all the others you will undertake. The groundwork you did earlier makes this a smoother process.
4. Revision and Editing
Typically, Revision and Editing are considered separate stages. I’ve paired them to create an iterative stage since they go hand in glove with each other. During this stage, you revise and polish your first draft. Sections are modified to make your story flow better. Assess whether you have given your readers a sensible story.
Going through your manuscript, line by line, is a tedious task. Here’s where you focus on the details and knock out those grammatical errors. Professional copyeditors/proofreaders do this for you. Still, it is a worthy learning exercise to try your hand at before you use professionals. This stage also encompasses the role of alpha and beta readers.
5. Pitching
Majority of articles skip over this part and go straight to Publishing. At most, you find a single sentence telling you to work on your pitch. I’ve given it a separate spot in this process.
You know the ins and outs of your story. No literary agent or publisher wants your entire manuscript the first time around. You need to create the tools to promote your book. This is the final stage before you figuratively knock on literary agents’ and publishers’ doors, which are their query inboxes.
Then, it’s time to step out of your comfort zone. If you thought the previous stages were hard, then I’ve got news for you. It might seem intimidating, but it is navigable. This is the final stage which coincides with the first steps of getting your book published.
Series Logistics: Each stage will have a dedicated article with my top five takeaways and some tips. The final article will be a summary of the series.
These insights are based on my experience. I hope they are helpful to those who are thinking about pursuing their passion for writing. For those who are in the middle of writing their first book, I understand it can become overwhelming. I experienced it as well. So, I hope this series can renew your focus and get you writing again.
I do not profess to have it all figured out. As an author, I became my best advocate and strictest critic. I used both mindsets to keep me going. I thrive in an environment of constant learning even when it is one of my own creation. It is the inspiration behind this series. There’s more to write and more to learn.
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This article originally appeared on my LinkedIn Dashboard on June 23, 2021 here.
