I finished writing my novel’s first draft. Now what?

Editing Tips for What Comes Next

In March of 2019, I sat down to tackle an unfinished manuscript that had been giving me fits off and on for over ten years. I was determined to finish it by the end of this year. I’m happy to say I did just that! I finished the first official rough draft a week before Christmas.

That’s my problem sometimes with a novel’s rough draft. I dive in head first with what I think is a great idea. I pound out a few thousand words, but then I lose steam after a few weeks or few months. I don’t know what comes next. I don’t know how the story ends. Or maybe I don’t even know enough about the characters to be able to tell their story in its entirety. At least, not yet. Often, a story idea might get abandoned completely. Or I go work on another project and finish it instead. With this particular book, all of those things happened!

But this year I was determined to finish it! So, I printed out everything I’d written to date over the last decade and started over… again. And now, this finished first draft is nothing like the original idea I sat down to write! It’s even better! Several years ago I changed the sex of my lead character and had to rewrite everything, only to abandon it once again for several years.