4 Steps to Start Editing a Mess

We’re getting ready for Camp NaNoWriMo this July! This month, we’re talking to Wrimos who are using the Camp format to work on non-novel projects. Today, participant Sofie Riis Endahl shares some of her tips for diving into editing work when your manuscript seems like such a mess that you’re not even sure where to start:

You did it! You finally wrote the last word of the last scene of the last chapter! You wrote a novel!

But then you took some weeks or months or years away from the keyboard, and now when you read your manuscript again, an awful thought hits you: The supercalifragilisticexpialidocious novel you wrote is maybe not that supercalifragilisticexpialidocious after all. 

This is ok. It’s a draft––maybe even a pretty rough draft, maybe even a just a mess of words and ideas (and plot lines that you lost track of about halfway through).

But where do you start editing? And how do you avoid just making your novel an even bigger mess?

1. Read your novel.

First of all you need to print out your manuscript (or convert it to ePub and read it from your tablet), preferably in different font than the one you wrote it in. Then read it as if you were a reader or editor. Jot down your thoughts in the margin or in your notebook. Mark the good things with green and the bad things with red. Mark what you don’t understand, what you find boring––mark that joke that should be funny but just isn’t.

2. Know your novel.

To edit your novel without making it a bigger mess than it already is, you need to know where your novel is going and what it’s trying to convey. Maybe you already answered these questions before you started writing––but the answers might have changed, so answer them again:

What is the theme of your story? (What is the message? What is the truth that your protagonist realizes at last that makes him able to kill those dragons or stand up to those bullies?)
How is your protagonist different at the end than who she was at the beginning?

What is your story’s 1st, 2nd, and 3rd plot point? What is the climax?

3. Make a diagnosis.

Now you know your novel––but to turn your mess into a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious novel, you need to know what exactly makes your novel a mess: you need to diagnose your novel just as if you were a doctor. Look at your notes and markings from when you were the reader: Were there some plot holes, or parts that didn’t make sense? Or maybe you barely have any descriptions? Or maybe your characters all sound the same?

Write down all the problems and how you will fix them. Maybe you will let the protagonist overhear a fight between the antagonist and the protagonist’s ally to fix that plot hole. Maybe you’ll add at least two descriptions to each scene. Or maybe you’ll start writing down things other people say to work them into your characters’ dialogue to make them have distinctive voices.

4. Make a plan.

Now you know what you need to focus on. But if this list is too long, you might have to edit your novel twice. Make a plan of how you will edit it. Maybe you will edit one section at a time. Or maybe you’ll rewrite the ending first and then edit the beginning.

It is often a good idea to have two kinds of edits: the macro edit, where you edit plot and character development, and the line edit: where you correct typos, add descriptions, and so on. Once you have a plan, all you have to do is follow it!

Good luck!

Sofie Riis Endahl is a 16-year-old Danish girl. She uses her age to bring authenticity into the 9 (not yet published) YA novels, she has written. You can find her short stories in a host of Danish short story or poetry collections, including Piger 2017 (Girls 2017). She has also written stories in collaboration with Save the Children, including Børn på Flugt (Child Refuges). She is an active user of the writing website Movellas, where she has worked as blogger and community manager.

Top photo by Flickr user risi ikeda.