Last week I attended a fabulous workshop by Historical Romance author Robyn DeHart called Bigger Than Botox. Robyn used the metaphor of different types of surgery to illustrate the different levels of revision a writer needs to consider when rewriting. And given that I’m currently in the rewriting stage I found the whole workshop helpful and informative.
I’m not going give all the details of the workshop away (since they’re not mine to give) but I do want to share a few sage comments that Robyn made. The first is what revisions aren’t.
Revisions are not: proofreading, line editing, verb strengthening, spell-checking.
These are the little tweaks that we do once revisions are done. Revisions are big issue items involving plot, character, goals, motivation, etc. And Robyn provided excellent questions to consider when looking at the big picture things.
The other sage comment: you don’t have to do it all at once.
This is something I believe in as well. Novels are large. Let’s not fool ourselves about it. And crafting a good story that captures a reader’s imagination involves successfully incorporating all the aspects of the writing craft, big and small. Looking at all those aspects as a whole can be overwhelming. How can I make my plot makes sense, while making my characters likable, and keep the pace moving all at the same time.
The trick is, you don’t have to. When tackling revisions, pick something, be it plot, character, world building, pacing, etc, and focus on that. All of a sudden, the prospect of revising a manuscript doesn’t seem as difficult. At least that’s how it works for me. I start thinking, “ya, something small. I can look at my heroine’s motivation and patch up her character arc over the length of the book.” And when that’s done, I pick something else, and before I know it, I’ve looked at all the major revision issues and the book is ready for things like spell-checking.
So, because I’m currently revising and because Robyn DeHart has made be wonder about how other writers tackle revising, how do you handle revision? Do you have trick or technique that you use?
