Four Stages of Writing
Hello, I'm back! Sorry for the wait, but sometime in the between THEBLOODOFOLYMPUSFINALLYCAMEOUTAARRRGGGGG!
Anyway, to business.
Hmm… four stages of writing? I wonder what that means.
It means every time you write something you have to do it in four steps.
WHAT? But that's grade seven English! Only for essays and other extremely boring assignments!
Ha ha.
No.
Not at all.
Sorry.
(Not really.)
I know what you're thinking: "What is the point of those steps? I've got my idea—I'm just going to start writing." I know I used to think that.
You have no idea how wrong I was.
-o-O-o-
But yes, this is different from the actual four steps of grade seven. In grade seven it was like:
Make a brainstorm with sad little bubbles of forced ideas branching out from your title—THE FREAKING TITLE—then handpick the not-so-bad ones and start writing; write a second copy; edit it; have a buddy edit it; have a second buddy edit it; have a well-discussed conversation about it over some coffee in the library; write it out for a third time; have another buddy edit it because you can never have enough buddies(!); write it out for the FOURTH FRIKKIN' GOD-DANG TIME; add smiley faces and a million unicorns, and hand it in!
Then get a B minus.
Most of those steps are completely unnecessary. I will now tell you what you actually have to do.
First, the actual four steps!
1) Pre-writing
2) Write
3) Edit
4) Publish
PRE-WRITE
Pre-writing! The first and MOST IMPORTANT stage of the four.
What the heck, Bookworm? Why do I need to pre-write? I can just go ahead and start writing—
In the immortal words of our king and ruler, Rick Riordan: To be published, first write out your manuscript. There's a test every author at some point has, especially on your first book: can you actually write? Anyone can have an idea, but few can actually take that idea and develop it into a plot, characters, and a story. (He didn't actually say it like that. I'm paraphrasing.)
And these steps will help you complete your story.
You can have an idea, certainly! But if you skip pre-writing you can later realize you have no idea what you're going to do with the story. This is why this is important.
I remember back in school, the teachers told you to brainstorm in the form of bubbles; write your main idea in the center of the page, then extend your three or four secondary points from that first bubble, then add ideas to those subtitles, and keep expanding in a diagram.
These are good for, like, essays and whatnot because you can clearly see your points and your explanations and la-di-da-di-da.
But do not do this for stories.
Do not do this!
The problem is that there is a difference between essays and stories: essays and other similar presentations have points that you expand on, while stories are basically a timeline of events. So, if you decide to organize your story in the wrong format, it will annoy and infuriate the heck out of you. When you do this, all the ideas become forced, and you waste so much time, and—just don't do this. The stress is definitely not worth it.
Dot-jots.
They are amazing.
I use dot-jots for assignments at school, my own stories, and even fanfictions. And because I know you're thinking: YES, EVEN THIS STORY HAD A PRE-WRITING STAGE.
So did Life at the Wilderness School.
So did Dumb Ways to Die.
So did The Blood of Olympus. (Man, you have no idea how much pre-writing I did for that one. It took up eleven pages of dot-jots. I could show you a small part of it if you wanted me to, if you need an example. It's right here on my laptop.)
Even the threeshot, Demigods Go Greek, had a pre-writing stage.
-o-O-o-
When doing this stage, keep it vague. But also… don't. Add little jokes you think up in parentheses. Add entire dialogue, if you want! This'll help you remember those things when actually writing. Just don't sit there and actually TYPE. These should be things that just pop up in your head.
But what about oneshots? Do you need to do a pre-writing stage for them?
The answer is… yes. As much as a pain it is, EVERY WRITING PIECE MUST HAVE ALL STAGES OF WRITING, EVEN ONESHOTS.
Don't roll your eyes at me. I am dead serious right now.
...
Not necessarily sane.
-o-O-o-
But how do you WRITE pre-writing?
Well… just list what will happen in that chapter, right off the top of your head, and then go back and organize it a bit. Repeat this step with every chapter until you have your entire story with a pre-writing stage completed.
You can do this in either big dot-jots or small dot-jots.
Big dot-jots: Each chapter is one giant dot-jot. Add mini dot-jots inside of it. (This is what I mainly do.)
Small dot-jots: Just write everything down, and figure out the chapters later.
But find what pre-writing technique works for you! Maybe what's easiest for you is a mix of dot-jots and bubbles. I dunno.
-o-O-o-
Now the question is… where will you write your pre-writing stage? You're sort of obliged to type out your actual story on a computer, but you can pre-write on paper if you want.
I myself don't handwrite this step. I do everything on Microsoft, mostly because I can add things I think of later without cramming everything into a small tight space. But when writing I have to be continually flipping through documents or to the end of the page where I have everything written out. On paper, you can just have the plan sitting beside you.
It can be either. You decide whatever works for you.
-o-O-o-
But what if I wrote a oneshot earlier, and I just want to develop it? Do I need to pre-write then—
Yes.
But I know where it's going to be headed, so there's no need—
Still pre-write, because,
1. You may forget
2. You have your ideas in a nicely listed order that you can look at and read, and not inside that head of yours that's pre-occupied with other things
3. You can easily spot what you're missing and fix it
-o-O-o-
Also, I'm not saying that pre-writing abolishes all writer's block. I had pre-written the Blood of Olympus (my fanfic, not the actual version, which sucks), but still got stuck at one of the chapters (and then never updated it again ha ha ha don't kill me please...).
I'm saying that the more you pre-write, the less chances for writer's block will arise.
WRITE
This is the part that people like to get to right away. Writing! The actual bit of it!
There's just one main idea here: do not stray from the pre-writing. You'll be left improvising last minute because your beautiful strategy failed you. But, yes, stray from it as well!
…What?
Think of it this way—your plan is an elastic band. It's bendable, but if you put too much pressure on it… SNAP! You're left with two pieces of useless stretchy-stuff. Occasionally you can kind of fix it by tying the two pieces together again, but it just doesn't have the same effect.
Simple.
-o-O-o-
Also, I highly recommend that you don't start actually writing until the pre-writing is complete. What if you change something to the plan later on? Then you have to go back to what you've written, which you wouldn't have to do if you had just held your reins more firmly and had not started writing.
(But, like, if you have, like, 90% of the pre-writing done and you know how it's going to finish anyway, then don't let me be the one to hold you back.)
EDIT
Another one of the steps a lot of people often skip. I mean, yeah, writers are humans too. We make mistakes. When we edit, we miss things. That's okay. Rick once admitted that when he gave the manuscript of one of his stories to his son, his son caught forty mistakes. (And then Rick owed him four hundred dollars because they had made a bet that for every mistake his son caught Rick would have to pay him ten bucks. And, yeah. I know what you're thinking. Where did I learn this? Default answer: BECAUSE REASONS.)
But you actually have to try and EDIT. I mean, I read some stories and there are just the most RIDICULOUS mistakes that would have been easily caught if edited.
-o-O-o-
Always edit AT LEAST twice. Once immediately after typing up your manuscript of the chapter to make sure you didn't mess around with facts by accident, and once at least a few hours later. THE LONGER YOU WAIT THE BETTER.
It's like wine—the longer the better. The more time you wait before looking at that manuscript again, the more refreshed your memory of the thing is so that you can catch even MORE mistakes. I know some writers that once they finish their complete manuscript of the book they lock the copy up in a cupboard somewhere for, like, months before coming back to edit again.
And, remember, that's AT LEAST twice. You can CERTAINLY do more. Actually, I recommend you edit as many times as possible. Before handing this chapter in, I had edited it, then left it alone until earlier today when I edited it twice, then waited until now to publish it, quickly going over it one last time.
And if you are reading your own published story some time later, chances are you are going to catch a mistake. So fix it. You can do that.
-o-O-o-
Now, what if you are feeling nervous about your manuscript? You aren't totally sure about one thing or another. You sort of want to have it revised by someone else, but you're uncomfortable giving your stuff to strangers to edit. And I TOTALLY get that.
It's YOUR choice if you want a beta reader. (I'll beta a story, if you want.)
If you feel anxious about it, just remember it's not a life-long commitment here—just ask if they can revise a few notes, they'll hand it back to you, and HASTA LA VISTA. DON'T EXPECT TO SEE ME FOR A WHILE.
-o-O-o-
Another habit I got myself into… edit while writing.
So say I'm writing, when I decide I wrote enough, so I go back and edit for bit. Then I continue writing, and a few minutes later I go back and edit that new part that I just wrote.
You are allowed to do this.
No one ever said you couldn't.
-o-O-o-
JUST ONE MORE THING...
Another thing you can do is read aloud what you've written.
I know this doesn't make sense, but if you read aloud you're forcing yourself to pronounce every single word. This way, you can see if sentences flow correctly or not.
PUBLISH
Now, what do you believe we do in this stage of the process, O Wise Bookworm of the Wisest?
Read this subtitle.
Once.
Twice.
Let it sink in….
Oh.
RECAP
Pre-writing
Write
Edit
Publish
Find which one works for you: paper or technology.
Do not stray from the pre-writing… too much.
In prewriting:
List what will happen in that chapter
Go back and organize it
Repeat
Use big dot-jots or small dot-jots.
Don't EVER start writing until all your pre-writing is completed—or, like, 95% of it is.
Edit AT LEAST TWICE.
The next chapters (hopefully not so late in the future [imsosorryimsosorry]) will be a new category, so this is actually the last chapter of "Contents"! See you soon!
-Bookworm :)
(guys the Blood of Olympus scarred me holy holy holy still can't get over it aaaaahhhhhh...)