About Me

My Photo
I write Young Adult and Middle Grade fiction. I'm a married mom of four, and live in the beautiful Okanagan Valley, famous for beaches and vineyards. I'm fond of Lindt's sea salt dark chocolate and hiking in good weather. My Young Adult rom/com time-travel CLOCKWISE series and contemporary/otherworldly Middle Grade IT'S A LITTLE HAYWIRE are now available on Amazon.

Friday, February 10, 2012

The Three "R"s - Writing, Revising and Renos

This pretty much wraps up my life these days. You can't find a more boring person. Since January (December, really) you can find me doing one of three things: writing, revising and renos.

look familiar?


This is book three in the Clockwise series, the companion novel LIKE CLOCKWORK. Why do I keep throwing my manuscript on the floor? It helps me to "see" it, like a story board for a movie. I know there are software programs out there that do this, but I like to see it all at once. I find threads that aren't working and can figure out how to fix them. Usually it's as easy as moving a couple scenes around, or adding a space for a new scene. Or taking one out. What characters need more stage time?

When I'm done working out all the scenes of my first draft on the floor, I pick them up, pile by pile and work on each scene, dealing with all the details I didn't worry about in my first draft.

Then, on my third pass, I start from the other end, the last scene first. I paste these into a private blog post, with a narrow column that's not white like my word doc. I find reading my words in a different format/color helps me to see them again, and helps my brain to refrain from auto correcting.

When I'm not writing first drafts or revising them, I'm working on renos in my house. Lots of painting mostly, and I really do have to pay attention to this need if I hope to have the house ready to list next month. That and the de-cluttering.

How about you? What's keeping you busy?

Have a great weekend!
Pin It
Posted by Elle Strauss at 4:30 AM
Labels:

11 comments:

  1. Have to say it's very similar! I love trying to find new methods to "see' my writing instead of auto correcting, which I totally do!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. I did the reading it backwards for the first time on my last ms, and that really helped to see the words and not just the story.

      Delete

  2. I do that too. Except I have a dog who walks all over the pages, so I put them on my bed.

    Another thing that helps me is using colored flags to mark the scenes--i.e. "red" for romance, "yellow" for scenes with the antag, "green" for subplot #1, etc. It helps me visualize the book and realize where I've dropped a scene/subplot/character for too long.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. I have a cat who sometimes has the need to sit on paper :)

      Good idea about the color codes. I kind of just do that in my head when I'm staring at the whole thing, but a color visual would be helpful too.

      Delete

  3. Dude, you need Scrivener (http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.php). It's a software program that does exactly what you're doing there, complete with sticky notes, except on screen. *And* it can do what Connie said, about the colours.

    Thanks for sharing your method! Do I have to pay you tuition fees one of these days for all the learning I got from you? ;)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. I used the beta Scrivener for PC, and unfortunately that turned me off. Early bugs. But I did like the cork board feature, only, you can't see all of the cards at once due to the screen limitations. This is why I like the floor, I can see the whole thing at once.

      No you don't have to pay :) I feel like you've earned everything I could ever share with you with all the reading you've done for me. Plus, I see my book is now in the library!!

      Delete

  4. I'm a spreadsheet person. I do my outlining mostly in Excel, then I print it out and make manual notations. Nuthing fancy, but it works.

    I'm outlining my first YA Paranormal right now. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. I admire spreadsheet people. I'm afraid my spreadsheets would stretch out for miles.

      Awesome about your venture into YA!

      Delete

  5. I need to do this!! It would be very helpful to pick apart things like this. Fortunately, with the two I'm working on, I've written the chapter by chapter breakdown on things, so I have only to lay them down side by side and make sure they add up and subtract those that have it coming. THANK YOU!!

    ReplyDelete

  6. Oh man, I would love to do this sort of thing. I'm so list and task oriented. But I tend to be impatient, too, so i normally skip steps like this. I bet it might save me time in the long run by cutting down on the number of drafts I have to write...

    ReplyDelete

  7. I've never tried to outline and don't know if I would be able to. I looked at your picture and description and thought you were speaking a foreign language. :) I have an award for you over at my blog.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)