Writing Meme: "U"

[loaded_march]

repna also asked for "U", which is: How many times do you usually revise your fic/chapter before posting?


Except on one rare occassion (sorry, castmeaway), I will go through my Draft Zero and clean it up as much as I can, filling in anything that I forgot to fill in.  It becomes Draft One, which goes to my beta.

When I get it back, it becomes Draft Two once I finish going through the revisions.  Depending on how long the fic is, I might give it another read through before hitting Final Draft and posting, or I'll be so sick of the fucking thing that I'll post it without reading it again.

So, twice, maximum of three times?


Granted, I'm not as careful with fanfic as I am with original fiction.  I am usually happy with the fanfic because I'm writing for myself.  Original fiction, though, I tend to obsess over, because I really, really, really want to be published, and I polish and polish all the Things.  In one case, I completely rewrote one manuscript 7 times because I couldn't get the story right, took the last version of that manuscript and revised it 4 times before shopping it to agents, and at two different agents' requests (which only happens when they're really interested), I completely rewrote the entire thing twice but failed to address what they saw as flaws.  It took me a while, but I think I do know what was missing from the story and how to fix it, but by this point I've rewritten the thing 9 times, not counting the chunks I completely rewrote, and I'm kind of sick of it.  When I can stand to look at it again, I'll try rewriting it again.

(Incidentally, that story varied between 90,000 and 120,000 words, depending on the version.  I'm pretty sure that one story counts as my personal equivalent of the one million words of crap that need to be written before you get good.)

Comments

[scinscire]

Jfc. I really hope you'll be able to get that story published eventually. Good luck! o.o

[loaded-march.livejournal.com]

Thank you :)

[repna.livejournal.com]

Damn this q and a format, the answers just spawn more and more questions that beget even more and more questions!! I'm going to try really really hard and not let a follow up question slip by, or we'll be here until dawn...

So. Ouch on the multiple revisions! They do suck. And I'm gonna assume the million words of crap happened before LM, because that's all golden! :)

Also, hot damn, two to three edits. Impressive! :)

Crossing fingers for you to get published for realz soon!!!

[loaded-march.livejournal.com]

Rewrites suck more than revisions. Revisions suck more than line edits. And I hate all of the above, but I do it anyway because. Reasons.

Yes, the million words of crap happened before LM. The timing coincides. I was pretty burned out after writing and rewriting, and didn't do any more writing of any kind for almost four months before falling into Merlin.

[deedragonlvr.livejournal.com]

I also hope your original work gets published. I love your writing!