To define a writing process by dictionary standards is simple it is “the specific steps used in writing; choosing ideas, pre-writing, drafting, revising and editing, proofreading, and publishing the final version.” Yet to define it in the terms of a working thing that one uses in their own literary pursuits is much harder. A simple superficial definition will not suffice. As it would leave out crucial things that make it possible to understand what it is that truly makes up a writing process. My writing process for things that I find interesting such as my books is complex and a mixture of emotion and logic. While my process for things that do not interest me like academic essays is a simple logic based method.
Logic plays a part in both of my writing processes but the part it plays is very different. In my academic writing process it is the main part of each step because it has to be. All the guide lines are given to you and logic is what makes it possible to fulfill those. In my Psychology paper I wrote last semester I was given the topic sheet and criteria outline. The only way to complete the paper was to use logic I had to demonstrate my knowledge on the topic given and fit that demonstration to the criteria to receive a passing grade. Logic allowed me to look at the assignment and complete it to the fullest because I carefully chose what information to put in and what to leave out. This got me an A. While in my creative writing I only use it in a few steps when I need to be detached from my writing so I can pick out what needs to stay or go. Logic is present when I draft and edit because these are crucial stage in writing that can make or break a piece. If you leave in something that should have been taken out simply because you liked it could make a piece fail. Where if you look at the situation logically you can easily drop scenes that serve no purpose.
In order to get to the point where I can pick what stays and goes I need ideas first. How I get ideas for my creative writing can be any number of things. Sometimes it can be something a friend says or does. Sometimes it can be a song. Many times in my books I write a whole scene that is inspired by a song. There is a scene in my novel based off the song ‘Your Heart is an Empty Room’ by Death Cab for Cutie. The main character, Luna, is talking to her new ally Lady Hope and their whole conversation centers around the fact that Luna does not love because she has nothing in her heart. Ideas also come for friends and things they do. These ideas from friends often inspire characters and the behaviors that make them unique. One of the main characters in my series, Lucas Cameron of Vayger, is based off my friend Luke. They both act the same in situations and some of the bonds Lucas shares with another character, Zayden'Ash, are the same ones he and I share. I find when I put parts of my friends into the characters I write it not only makes them easier to write but to the readers it makes them real. I think to have real feeling characters is the best thing that any book can have because the reader can relate and feel as if they know that characters.
A step that I have sort of made up and branched off of the actual writing is one that I use only in my creative process. When I get ideas for scenes I often write them out. Many times these scenes are chapters or even books away but I write them anyways so I can foreshadow the events or link it in smoothly. Another part of this step is also writing out extra material such as facts and character profiles that make it easy to keep track of things. The reason that I think this is lacking in my academic process is because when I write my essays I sit down and write it start to finish with little to no interruptions. With the Literacy Narrative once I got the idea I sat down and wrote out the whole essay in an hour and a half without any breaks. It is just easier to sit and write essays start to finish because you have a set of rules that need to be followed and you cannot stop to think about what you can add to make it better because that would deviate from the criteria.
Drafting is always the most important step and depending on the length of the project the most time consuming. With my academics the draft can take anywhere between an hour to six hours. My senior year in high school for History I had to write a ten page single spaced paper. After I did all the research I sat down to type it and it took almost six and a half hours to type all out to the point where I was satisfied with it. When it comes to my other writing the length of the project dictates the time. A short story or poem is in the same time frame as academic writing. While manuscripts take a lot longer. With my novel A Colorless Myth it took me five months to type out the 198 page manuscript. That was mainly because I was working on a time frame for myself and I worked close to five hours a day on it. While the first book in my series The Snowy Waste has taken me over four years to type out the 331 page manuscript. I took more time on this because I want the final product to be amazing and I changed the plot quite a few times so I had to tweak things as I went along. Plus I had a lot of other projects in between that prevented me from focusing on it as I would have liked. Drafting for academic writing is, just as in every other step, a logic based thing because you have to make sure to include every point on the topic to get the grade. While in my other writings drafting is a mixture of emotion and logic. Emotions help me to write scenes to their fullest potential so the reader will feel emotion as they read it. While logic helps me to see if something will ruin a scene or enhance it. If I can look at it logically then it makes it a lot easier to drop unnecessary things.
The dictionary definition of editing is “to revise or correct, as a manuscript”. To me that is a rather funny definition because it makes this step seem so short and easy. Yet recently it has become something extensive and time consuming for my book. This is the step that I have found can make or break a piece. Which is why in both processes it is logic based. With academic essays my editing is not quite so extensive. It usually consists of a read over where I look for misspellings or sentences that have weird word order or irreverent information. But with my books editing consists of a number of, what I call rounds, of editing. Each round consists of me reading through my entire manuscript looking for and fixing specific errors. First revisions is where I run through to make sure characters and plot line up. Right now with my book I am running first edits on it and I found that one of the main characters attitudes and speech patterns do not match up with that character later on in the book. So I have to fix the earlier version to match him up with the rest of the book. I also try to catch misspellings and fix contractions in the narration. I cannot remember where I first heard it but someone had told me never to use contractions in your writing because it comes off as something less than spectacular. So I only use contractions in character’s speech patterns and even then only a few of the main characters use contractions. First round of edits is where logic helps me to remove “space filler” scenes. After first round I really start working on fixing characters, adding details I might have forgotten, I also word smith and tighten my sentences so it is just as easy to be enchanted by the tale as as by words that spin that tale.
We all start writing young. But I do not acknowledge the beginning of my writing till the summer I started to write my book series because that summer was when I really started to develop a solid writing process. Before then writing was simply putting words on a page for a grade. That summer I started to truly write. Now I have been writing for almost six years and my process has changed quite a lot from my early days. The part that has changed the most is my editing. When I first started I wrote in notebooks so I tried to edit as I went along and I was convinced that it would be enough. As I wrote more though I realized that editing while writing was a bad idea. It left too many holes in my work. The true editing revolution did not start till I began to type things. When I traded paper in for pixels I started to see how fantastic editing was. So my editing process is just about as extensive, if not more so, then my gathering ideas and writing. As for my academic writing the process has changed as well, but not in a good way. Somewhere along the way I started putting in less effort and found that I still got the same grades so I now put the minimal amount of effort to get the grade as opposed to actually outlining a school essay before I write it.
Every part of my process works in tandem with the other. It makes it possible for me to loop back to other steps or even skip a step every now and then. So I would say the fact that I have had so long to work on my process has allowed me to hone it down to the point that every step works. In writing my books I know that I have certain triggers that allow me to get into a mood where I can get ideas or write or edit. Therefore those steps must work since I can consciously get myself in a state of mind to attack those tasks. While in academics it is obvious that my process works because I get the grade. There is not one essay from freshman year in high school till now where I have not received a passing grade.
Even though I know that every step of my writing process works I also know that I am stronger in some parts then others. Such as editing. The main reason that I focus so much on editing is because can change a piece so much. I have worked these past years to make editing my strongest step. This is because I want to become efficient at it and make it something that will work for me. The quote “You write to communicate to the hearts and minds of others what's burning inside you. And we edit to let the fire show through the smoke.” by Arthur Polotnik is something that really communicates the importance being strong in editing.
My Process went through a lot of changes the first few years I started to write. Now I have a stable process that allows me to work through my pieces and make them into something worth reading. Therefore I am not so sure if it is still changing. Perhaps I say that only because I am living in this moment. I am sure in a few more years I can look back to now and pick out things that were changing but for the life of me I cannot see changes happening now. This is because when every I sit down to work on any type of writing whether it be for school or just because I have too many ideas in my head I do the same things to get to the polished gem. Although I know there are some things that I would like to change. I am not sure if the amount of time spent writing is actually considered part of the process but that is one thing. I would like to be able spend more time writing because to me it is something that captivates me every time and never ceases to amaze me. As for the rest of my process… I am open to whatever changes can make my writing better and put me in league with Patrick Rothfuss and Laini Taylor and other authors that I idolize.
The number of words I have written and pages I have scribbled on have yet to dry up my reservoir of ideas. Which means I have years worth of writing a head of me and I look forward to it. This makes me extremely grateful that I have a process that will allow me to tackle these challenges. I have the perfect combination of emotion and logic to help me make each piece shine weather I am interested in it or not. I look forward to using my process to its fullest extent and even pushing the limits a bit to make it even better. It has taken me six years to polish my processes into what they are and if in another six years my process is different… cool. Writing is about doing what you love and improving that skill so you can share the inner whispers of your heart. A writing process that works is the only way to get there.
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