Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Fanfic Related Editing and Revising: The Writing Process

Finally, I get to the question.

How do you go through the writing process as you make your way through a story?

Do you just write linearly, installment after installment or do you take a circuitous route as I do?

What roles do your BRs play the writing process? Grammar/spell check or more?

Just curious
gerry

It really depends on the story and my mood. For short stories I will write in a completely linear way. For longer ones I tend to write a few key scenes then, as I said in the other thread, I try and find a way to link them all together. It's only when I get to the stage of a finalised plot that I write in a linear way (mind you, not a lot gets written before that ).

Immense, essential role! , is to give me ideas fitting in with the general plot, brainstorm with me over the general direction I'm going to take, then brainstorm some more on little details or plot choices I have to make. Once they get the written scene, they tell me what could be added/removed/changed for a better impact. IOW, my BRs are true gems!

Kaethel

Hmmm. No, I don't post with a small cushion, I post with a great big fat cushion, but I write so slowly that it soon erodes into nothing. Alas.

Yes, I write in a linear fashion (can't bring myself to write, let alone try to pronounce linearly <g>), but I don't write installment after installment. I just ramble on and on, and then when I post, I pick reasonable-sized chunks of story that won't erode my cushion too much while still giving my readers something to chew on.

Sometimes I tweak parts I've already posted because of stuff I've written later in the story, or because of the comments I've received, but if that happens, I don't usually change the version on the boards. I just post a different version to the archive. I don't think I've ever made changes that were so significant that the story being posted became impossible to follow as a result. If it has, everyone's been too polite to mention it.

BRs? They do everything except write the story for me. Grammar, punctuation, style, consistency, plot, technique - you name it, they've got something useful to say about it. Even better, they do it without making you feel stupid or inadequate. Wendy even manages to do it without saying a thing - it's what she doesn't say that gives you the big clue.

Yvonne

What, even when I tell you that something's 'twee'?


Wendy

Okay, you got me there, Wendy. That was pretty in-your-face whatever-were-you-thinking-of BRing. But there's also 'whoa!' and '!!!' and 'dear, oh, dear'. All expertly crafted exclamations, cleverly designed to be read in whatever way the reader chooses to interpret them.

Yvonne

Hi Gerry: I think I discussed this over on CC's question, except for the beta readers' role, and you know I positiviely depend on you for everything. I'd never finish anything if it weren't for your disappointed whining and nagging.

Adding to what I wrote on CC's thread.

I tend to wait till I have at least half the story done before I start posting. In the early days I posted as I wrote but as the stories got longer that put too much extra pressure on me to finish instalments to fit a reasonable posting schedule. In one respect the deadline was helpful in forcing me to write, but since this is not a 'for profit' enterprise it seemed silly to have to put oneself through that extra hardship.

As I've said I write linearly, but I also write episodically. What I mean is, I'm aware of the fact that this will be posted in instalments (or chapters) and gear my scenes accordingly. When I start writing a new part I usually have an idea of how for I want the story to progress in that part. If it turns out that I come up short or go too long for a normal post I either add another scene, or I look for a way to cut back to the previous opportune stopping point.

I never set up any 'what I need' specifications of my super secret mystery beta reader. They just do whatever they think a beta should do as they probably know better what the story needs than I do. Occasionaly I will ask a specific question, and lo and behold, it's usually answered!

Amazing.

Tank (who stills wonders what happened to that darn gremlin)

I could never, ever in a million years post a story before I had finished it. I have so much respect for writers who do. The stress would kill me outright.

Also, for me the hardest part is the beginning. I generally write that last. I start with an ending, or smack in the middle and try to grow the story to reach both ends. Once I've done that, then I really take a good look at what I've got, what themes appear and reappear, and how I might emphasis one or another- making sure I haven't introduced something and then forgotten it. (Which I have certainly done on more than one occassion.)

So, for me, the real work is in the editing. Which I why the idea of posting something before I've put it through the shredder really intrigues me- and scares me silly.

Also, I've had invaluable help from BRs,who from a distance are able to see how some scenes need shuffling. LynnM shuffled some scenes around for me in my last story. In the story before that, Lab and Sherry mixed things up a bit. And the results were so much better than what I had come up with.

The monkey wrench, and part of the thrill ride that posting is, is reader's comments. Since I'm not writing from a loose outline, but rather from a pretty set story, I post in fear and trembling. That they'll see something that will blow the next 20 pages out of the water. Or render my ending useless, etc... However, up to now (knock wood) I have found the comments to be really helpful in showing me what might need tweaking.

For instance (I'm running on and on, I know, but the magic gremlin keeps yelling for me to 'type harder')in ABA I had this scene just after Clark has lost Lois to the evil Tempus. Before I posted the next part, one sharp reader, KathyM, said, "The guilt will kill him." And, oh man, she was exactly right! But I had been so focused on moving the characters where I wanted them, I hadn't considered that. It took just a line or two, but it made all the difference in making Clark's reaction 'real.'

Is that more from me than you ever wanted to know? I love this thread, can't wait to see what others have to say.

CC

Tank wrote:
I have two questions for Tank.
1. What do you do if something happens in installment y where you realize that you need to make changes (either major or minor) in installment x?

2. How do you manage to leave each installment at a high point or at a cliff-hanger?

The first question is why I asked the editing question in the first place.

The second question is my fascination with those who post and write in installments.

Can't stay on...I just figured out how I'm going to get to the end of Blind Spots (now you know the name of what i've been working on for close to 2 years) and I have to go back 30 pages to fit something in to make it work.

gerry

I write linearly. And, usually, I start posting before a story is complete, but with a buffer.

Gerry asks how we manage this. I suppose, for me, it's always been part of my writing style (whether fiction or academic writing) that I start at the beginning and work my way through to the end. And, other than minor tweaking, my first draft is pretty much final draft. In other words, I tend not to move scenes around, and I don't often go back to add things in earlier in the story - sometimes, but not all that frequently.

As for plotting, I never produce outlines. I have an idea in my head about the main premise of the story, and everything else flows from there. As I said in the other thread - in fact, as Pam said much better! - it's a case of having the premise and then figuring out what needs to happen in order for the premise to work. So if Lois and Clark need to be barely speaking to each other at the point when my key premise happens, I need a catalyst for that to happen. Or if the premise is that a pre-revelation Superman needs to be comforted by Lois, I have to figure out what kind of circumstances might lead to that. But that's about all the plotting I do.

For longer stories, I make notes to myself at the end of the file, as my BRs will know. But they're very much skeleton: for example, 'C visits Lois late at night to try to talk', or 'L overhears Lex on the phone to Nigel' - that kind of thing, and that level of detail (or lack of).

And, yes, I rely on my BRs too! I've been very fortunate to have some excellent BRs, who not only cheerlead like mad and boost my confidence when I'm about ready to scrap a story I think is boring or tedious or just plain bad, but who also have terrific ideas and pull me up sharply when something simply doesn't make sense. They always see stuff before it's posted, so at least there's a chance that mistakes will be caught before I put my foot in it publicly.

Coping with discovering that something needs to happen earlier? I've never actually had that problem; but then I always post with a buffer anyway, so if I'm on p. 60 and realise that something needed to happen on p.25 I can go back and include it. For me, though, those sort of changes are minor; it's usually a line or two of dialogue or introspection to lodge an idea clearly in a character's (or the reader's) mind. For instance, in the story I posted this week, If I'd Lost You..., Superman's reactions to the Mexican landslide were key to the premise, but I realised when I was around halfway through that, if it wasn't to seem forced, the distrssing nature of the landslide needed to be mentioned, even briefly, in Clark's thoughts earlier. Because I hadn't at that stage started posting, it was a simple matter to add it.

But I do revise while posting - the boards are the equivalent of a mass beta-testing. If changes are major, I'll edit the posted section and mention it in a comment thread, asking for reactions to the changes. If they're minor, I don't repost the section, but they're there for the archive.

Yet another fascinating thread!!


Wendy

I think I'm right in saying that Masques has been the only story I've written so far that I did partly 'on the hoof'. I actually started with a darn big buffer, but to my dismay it ran out pretty fast <g>, leaving me with the last half to write as I posted. So I ended up feverishly writing the next segment as soon as I'd posted the last and as I was working on an EOD schedule, that meant I had about two days to write it, get it to Wendy, poor Wendy to get it back to me (which she did every single time, which still astounds me!) and post. Often I literally got it back an hour before posting. This may be par for the course for some authors, but it was a whole new experience for this one!

I'm on record as saying it was at once the most exhilarating and terrifying experience of my writing life. I learned that if I have a deadline the Muse actually comes through and the pressure actually produced writing I was content with from the first draft and which was posted with hardly any tweaking. Most unusual. <g> Whether I'd want to do it again though...the thought fascinates and scares me in equal measure.

Generally speaking though, I follow Yvonne's pattern above. There were a few ideas and suggestions that were made on the mbs that I did incorporate into the final version of Masques...Paul wanted more of an actual wedding. One reader wanted the ending to tie into the 'epiphany' at the beginning. Someone else queried why Alex was so keen to toss in his career in the military. All of these and more I worked into the story after I'd posted the last of it and before I sent it to the Archive.

If someone points out a major plot glitch - and I agree with it <g> - I'll go amend a post. I think I did that a couple of times. But only if it's something really embarrassing.

And part of the scary factor of Masques was that on more than one occasion a comment on one segment lead me to suddenly radically change what I'd planned for the next, or a few further ahead as someone suggested a really great idea I hadn't thought of or an offhand comment they'd made made the Muse suddenly sit bolt upright, whiskers twitching. Then, instead of having two days to fill in the blanks of the next segment half written, I'd be dashing off whole, entire new scenes I'd not previously thought of.

It was all a whole lot of fun, but exhausting.

Betas have much the same effect for me, just on a smaller scale. I love the back and forth conversation between author and beta - whether I'm fulfilling the former or latter role. I haven't written a story yet that didn't take on new life, expand in page count, sometimes considerably, and go off in whole new directions I'd never planned - all thanks to something my beta has said.

LabRat

Gerry had a couple of questions.

To answer number one... I think Wendy did a good job of doing that. I write similarly to what she described, and as I have a mystery beta reader, problems that might need to be solved by the inclusion of something in an earlier instalment are generally caught and corrected before I start posting. But, if something slips through and the gentle readers point out the slip-up, there is still the 'final' archived version to make such revisions to. I've only had a problem that couldn't be fixed by a few sentences (or less) one time. Back when I was writing (and posting) a Matter of Confidence (which was one of the last post as I write, non-beta read stories), the readers pointed out that, in an effort to reach an emotional situation I wished, I had forced my Lois out of character. I had to agree with their assesment, and so I was forced to scrap much of the previous 20 or 30 pages and go back and rewrite them. This was early enough in the story for me to basically 'start over'. So, after a short time, I reposted 'the revised version' of those first few instalments then picked up from there.

As for how I end on 'high points', or 'cliiffhangers'. That's not always true, but it's what I strive to do. Blame it on the fact that we are all children of the television age. Since I see the movie, or in this case, the TV show as I write I'm always looking for the commercial break. Often when I start a new instalment I know how I want the instalment to end, I just have to figure out what to 'fill-in' to get there.

Tank (who is in a rare good mood because he had a good night at poker last night)

Up until the Butterfly Legacy, I started posting a story before it was completely finished. I had the entire story worked out in my head, just not the words needed to make it happen. I found that both exhilerating and terrifying, especially when I got to a point where it was time to post the next section and I just couldn't manage to get that section to where I was happy with it. The pressure actually became more painful than pleasurable, and I vowed never to put myself in that position again.

One of the both nice and horrible things I've discovered about having a story entirely written before posting is the reader's unexpected comments. The nice part is that the story is written, and other than a tweak here or there, I don't feel the pressure to second guess myself or say "Oh, maybe I should do this instead." The story I meant to tell is done.

On the flip side of that coin is having someone ask a question that will not be answered or ask to see something that won't be shown, which leads to a lot of turmoil for me. I'm afraid of disappointing readers because I've aroused in them something that I never expected so didn't plan to rectify.

As for installments, I usually write in scenes. And the scenes vary in length - for example, in BL, one scene was only 4 pages long while the longest weighed in at 11 pages. I resisted the urge to "fluff up" the short scene, feeling that more just for the sake of more only added more. But I do find that I tend to write scenes that end up being roughly the same length, and if it runs too long, I try to find a good cliff-hanger/breaking point and turn it into two installments.

Lynn

I always write in a linear way. I like keeping things in order. Although I often picture the next scenes in my mind (when I'm not writing, that is).
This has come in handy especially with the long stories... because I usually post with a tiny amount of buffer. (I'm impatient. Sue me )
For some reason, though, the feedback I get doesn't often provide me with suggestions as to how to continue (except for what's obvious). So, I write what's in my mind.

As for my BRs, first of all they deal with grammar/spelling/vocabulary etc.. All these usually need some polishing They also point out to me structure problems.
Usually, I find my way out of the dead-ends on my own. In most cases, though, when I'm not sure about something, I ask for their opinion.

AnnaBtG.