Five Things I Learned While Revising My Novel

I'm in the middle of revisions for my novel. My current draft follows my third (or fourth depending on how you count) round of revisions. I've gotten beta reader feedback, and I've started incorporating that feedback into my next draft. As part of my process documenting my experience writing and releasing a book, I want to share five things I've learned after going through a few self-edits and getting feedback from beta readers and a developmental editor.

1) The best thing you can do is take a break after each draft

The saying goes "absence makes the heart grow fonder" and that's as true for a manuscript as it is for people. I finished my first draft and was eager to start writing the second one. Two chapters in, however, I realized the "improvements" I made were minimal and fairly surface level. I switched to a different project for a few weeks, and when I came back to the manuscript, I had some clarity I didn't before and noticed things I'd overlooked initially, because I was too close to it.

2) Your problem areas aren't what you think they are

I tried very hard not to start editing what I wrote until I finished my draft in full, and for the most part, I think I achieved that. This means that I finished my first draft, and had a good idea of what scenes/details I needed to fix upon a rewrite. During my read-through of my first draft, however, nearly everything I noted as "need to fix" was not on my initial list. I had scenes that didn't work, I had characters that served no purpose and more, but I didn't notice them while writing the first draft.

3) Beta readers will notice things you're blind to

Beta readers are your friend. I lucked out and found several who provided me with clear and in-depth feedback about my manuscript. Since they didn't have the same familiarity with my book as I do, they sometimes noted issues in the story that I hadn't such as revelations being too heavily foreshadowed or plot holes I didn't notice. One pointed out a very glaring character problem that I'd completely overlooked. They also picked up on some parallels that I hadn't realized I'd put into the book. Since my book has mystery elements, getting their feedback helped me measure how well twists and reveals worked as written, and which ones needed improvement or adjustment.

4) You have to be open to criticism, but not allow it to change your vision

To date, I've gotten feedback on my manuscript from six people. It wasn't easy at first to send the manuscript I spent months on to someone and get back feedback about plot holes and things that don't make sense and characters they didn't like. The critique was necessary to make the next draft better, but in the moment, it can be hard to have someone not love "your baby" as much as you do. While it's important to be open to criticism, and seek it out to some extent, I had to quickly figure out what suggested changes I was willing to make, and which ones I couldn't budge on. I want my novel to be great, but I also want it to still feel like my novel, so with each bit of feedback I got, if it wasn't a minor suggestion, I asked myself these questions: what does the story gain by changing this? what does the story lose by changing it? does making this change conflict with my vision for the story?

5) Your work is better than you think it is

The thing about creating anything is that we're often our own worst critic. I thought my writing was "okay" because imposter syndrome is hard to overcome sometimes, and because I'm the one who wrote the words I was reading. I knew what I was picturing when I wrote a certain scene, and how close I got to capturing that image. A beta reader or editor doesn't have that restriction or my hang-ups about being an imposter. In fact, some of the things I was most insecure about were aspects of my novel that a beta reader or my editor highlighted as things they enjoyed the most. My work wasn't perfect, yours won't be either, but it's better than you think, because you're so close to it. We can't be truly objective about art we create.

Those are the five biggest lessons I learned while revising my novel a few times. Maybe some of these are specific to me, but I found them interesting. It was both easier than I feared, but more difficult in other areas.

I look forward to sharing more of my writing journey with you.

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