Hello everyone, here is an update on how my book is coming along. I had been calling it the editing stage, but really it had a different name. Revision.
Revision vs. Editing
Revision is different from editing for a number of reasons. It’s looking at your overall work and seeing it for what it is (at first glance) and revising it to what you would like it to be.
The way I did this was by downloading my book into a pdf file and transferring it over to my iPad through airdrop. There, I opened up the document in the GoodNotes app. This was great for me, because it felt like I was reading a book just as I would on my kindle app. It made me change my role from a writer to a prospective reader.
With my apple pencil in tow, I was able to do a read through and make notes, annotations, highlights, and marked it up as much as I would when critiquing anything. This really opened my eyes to the strengths and weaknesses of my first draft.
What happens after the revision process?
After the revision process, I was left with corrections. I now knew what to tackle next during editing. I also made sure to page number my rough draft, this is helpful when referencing different chapters and adding things that will tie everything together later.
For example, my novel has some mystery involved, and it’s been fun “planting” hints and clues that I had not really thought to add during the writing stage.
Revising is essentially the process of making your novel better than it was before. Imagine placing a bunch of cards back into a deck. The writing stage is initially when your cards are scattered everywhere. Think of revision as placing them back in the deck and shuffling them around until it feels just right.
My next update will likely be the editing process, the moment where the cards can finally come together into a neat stack. Stay tuned! 🙂
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