Do you craft your draft? - by Liz Carter

As it’s the crazy run up to the release of my first book, and I’ve been writing plenty of articles about #CatchingContentment, I thought I’d write about something different. I’ll let you into a secret: I know my book is non-fiction, but way before I wrote this one I was working on some fiction stuff. Specifically, YA fiction. It’s still an out-there dream of mine to get some fiction published, and maybe I’ll have some time to work on it soon.

I was thinking a little about how we write, whether fiction or non-fiction, and how we’re all different. And I wondered how you craft your draft?

Me - I write fast.

Some would say too fast, but it’s how I work. I get in a flow and I can’t get out of it; it grips me in its vice until it’s ready to let me go, shaken and shattered. And it’s incredible. I love the process, the passion, the adrenaline high.

One crazy day I wrote 20,000 words. I had a free day, no children around, nothing to disturb me. I don’t think I ate. It was like a wave I just had to ride, and the feeling was like no other. I think it was 2am when the wave crashed on shore and I collapsed on the sand (and headed for the ice-cream van.) Most days, I think 2,000 is a fairly realistic goal for me, although it varies. On days busy with work, I may get 400 down last thing. I try to do something each day, though, to keep that muscle primed. 

What about you – do you have a word count target for each day?

And then comes… the editing.

Some say that you should take utmost care in your first drafts so that editing isn’t so strenuous. You should give your words time and take things slowly. Make each word count. Others say the opposite. Get the words down, then you can craft them.

I’m with them. If I stop every second sentence, doing the whole is-this-telling-not-showing thing we all do, then I’d lose that lovely itchy flow and it’d all be gone and I’d be banging my keyboard in fury. Instead, I use an adjective or even a dreaded adverb. As a placeholder. It makes sense to me – it doesn’t mean my finished work will be full of adverbs and adjectives and other unmentionables. It means I can stop at each sentence in the edit stage and say ‘Aaah. ‘“Yes,” she said, grumpily.’ Now how can I show that? How can I bring this to life?’

If I tried to beautifully craft each word, each phrase, every piece of dialogue in my novel as I drafted it for the first time, then I would be there a very, very long time. But I don’t need to be. We don’t need to hold ourselves to a perfect standard of showing-not-telling writing in order to produce something wonderful, for the wonder will come with the work. The inspiration will come with that initial free flow of ideas where you sit there and your fingers fly over the keyboard, barely pausing to take breath. Then you go back and make it all great.

As for show-not-tell, I prefer show-and-tell, because I think you need a balance of both. Too much description can be a bad thing, just as too little can sink a story. I like the words show-and-tell anyway, because they remind me of my young self, sitting with my 30 five-year-olds in a circle, eager to share their item of the week with their classmates. Their Barbie dolls, Transformers, matchbox cars and, on one memorable occasion, their dad’s solid silver whisky flask. (‘Does your Daddy know you brought that to show us today?’ ‘No. I just borrowed it.’ ‘Oh. Shall I keep it safe for you?’)

Show-and-tell is good.

What are your thoughts on the initial crafting of your books? Do you rush ahead like me, desperate to get it all down, riding on that euphoric writing wave, or do you find it more intuitive to write as you mean to go on – to check that thesaurus every few words, to chase those adverbs away? We’re all different, and different ways work better for different folk.

We all reflect the creativity God has imbued in us in different ways. And thank goodness for that!

Photo by Lonely Planet on Unsplash

 

 

Liz Carter is a writer and blogger who writes about the painful and messy times of life. Her first book, Catching Contentment, is published by IVP on 15th November and can be pre-ordered here.