Revision

[EUOL]

So, how do you do it?

For ELANTRIS, I have a five-page list of changes (some major, some very small) that need to be made to the book.  I'm looking them over, and trying to devise some orderly method of organizing them so that I can get them put into the book.  

In the past, I've usually done revisions one of two ways.  First, I've 'spot revised' by correcting little problems, usually using a physical copy of one of my books that my readers have marked on.  

Second, I've simply re-read the book on-screen, with a few vague goals in mind (such as 'I need to cut ten percent of the book'), slowly polishing the story.

This list of changes, however, is going to require me to work in a slightly different way--I have to be keeping my eyes open for specific places to insert new explanations or clarifications (this is the type of change that is most common.)

Any comments on your own process?

[Spriggan]

I usealy send my stuff to you and let you worry about it, allwayse adds a few points to my papers.

[Entsuropi]

Thats what I like about Spriggan. He knows exactly how to use his time to maximise time-wasting.

[Spriggan]

And that I expliote my brother to get better grades.

[stacer]

I can't edit on-screen. This may be harder to do with an entire novel, but it's important to me to have a hard copy I can mark up--and I mean *really* mark up.

I'll mark anything, from little tiny grammatical errors to inserting whole sections. If I'm moving entire sections, I'll cut pages physically and move them. That way, when I go back to the computer, I have a hard copy I'm referring to, as if I were the computer person that just got handed corrections from an editor.

Then, when I'm making the corrections on the computer, I have another chance to think about the corrections I've made and whether there might be a better way of doing them. Also, then I don't have to think so hard about the little things while staring at a screen, which strains my eyes and makes me tired for the big things I want to be thinking about.

[JP Dogberry]

I get feedback from a few people, and also take a break from what I've written for at least a couple of weeks before I come back and read the whole thing (My longest so far is only 9k words, may be harder with a novel). Then I basically take notice of what makes sense, and what just plain sucks and "I can't belive I wrote that!".

Then I change events and stuff that's factual, insert of remove bits, and worry about the perfect words for every sentance and spelling and stuff last.

[Spriggan]

in all seriousness, When I actualy use to write (my freshman year) I would pass a few hard copies of what ever it was around my dorm floor.  That worked better then the net then (that was 6 years ago) and in a few hours I'd have about 10-15 people that have read it and marked comments on the paper.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I make a note page for each chapter/section, listing the suggestions I need to consider and the changes I need to make. THen I go through, knowing what those things are, and try to correct everything at a go. It takes a few reads as I think progressively smaller, and grammar, unless it's completely nonsensical, tends to be small, so doesn't get noticed at first.

[Peter Ahlstrom]

Aren't you supposed to be finishing up your revisions here pretty soon? this sounds like a major undertaking!

You might print the whole thing out in really really small type (as small as you can get and still see)--but leaving good margin space--and spread them out on a large floor (church gymnasium?) and go through with different colors of markers and mark up the margins where you should change stuff...

meh, I don't really know what I'm talking about. I don't think I've ever actually done anything like that before, but it seems vaguely familiar.

You might try making an index. Isaac Asimov always wrote his own indices (for his nonfiction books)-- he'd go through the manuscript and a bunch of 3x5 cards, laying the cards out on whatever surfaces, and mark down on the cards whenever something in the manuscript came up and what page. You could divide by topics or characters or plot clues or whatnot. Maybe this would help see where you have extra material that you could take out (though I can't imagine...).

When I went through Dragonsteel to try to compress the first 6 chapters to 3 (or whatever it was), I looked for the important things that happened to see if there was a way to get to them earlier. I looked for characters whose roles could be taken by other characters. I looked for scenes that could be combined. I looked for things that wouldn't matter later in the book. And I did this all with a printed copy. Definitely want pen to be able to circle stuff and cross stuff out, and paper to flip through rapidly.

Anyway, hope this helps in any way.

[EUOL]

I don't think I've ever actually done anything like that before, but it seems vaguely familiar.

Douglas Thayer, BYU creative writing professor.  He does it that way (I'm sure he's not the only one.)  Thing is, I'm a 'one-drafter.'  I like to get things right the first time through, and I generally do.  Therefore, revising is a smaller 'fix small spots' process.  

It helps, Ookla, but mostly I was just curious about people's methods.  What I decided to do with this one was organize the changes by viewpoint.  Since ELANTRIS uses that screwy 'chapter triad' system, I could look at each change, and decide which viewpoint it belonged to.  That cut my list into thirds (well, actually fourths, since there were a few things that were more global.)

Then, I took each of the changes and assigned chapters to the ones that I could obviously place.  That cut down the list a lot too.

Now, when I begin revising a chapter, I can look at this list and re-read the global changes, any changes slated for that chapter, and the un-attached changes assigned to that viewpoint.   Then, I can read the chapter, and look for places to make changes.  Seems to be working fairly well.  (Except for one major change, that I'm going to do last, once I have the whole book fresh in my mind.)

[GorgonlaVacaTremendo]

I revise everything the same.  From my meals to my magic decks to my literature to my flashes and so on.   Whiddle it down, I like that method.  Unfortunately, it takes more time, but is infinantely supirior to a once through when you finish...