Watching this magical YouTube video is the first time plot structure REALLY made sense to me. Of course I knew that a story needs a plot. It needs a drive to get from Beginning to End. But I hadn’t really grasped it until watching this video. It comes in at just shy of an hour and a half – but it’s totally worth it.
It’s supposedly more about screenwriting than about writing a novel – but needless to say, I found it applicable.
I love writing! I’ve loved it since I was a wee little thing. I blame my mother and the stories she read to me almost every night before bed. The first tale I vividly remember writing was a short story about how writing was invented. It involved cavemen, leaves, stones and a dubious interpretation of history.
“You might not write well every day, but you can always edit a bad page. You can’t edit a blank page.” – Jodi Picoult
From there, I kept writing: more short stories, some plays for school or church, poetry, a handful of novel beginnings and lots – I mean LOTS – of journal entries. My career helped me with my business writing skills but it wasn’t until I moved to Texas in 2017 that I started to take creative writing seriously. About a year and a half into working on my novel, I realized how much of writing is actually made up of editing.
Every time I sat down to edit, I found myself humming “Edit” from Regina Spektor’s 2006 masterpiece Begin to Hope while hopelessly, desperately, furiously searching for all the -ly words in my writing. Into the darkness of my living room, lit only by my computer screen, I would cry, “Regina, I can’t edit OR write!” Then she’d sing me “Better” and I would, indeed, feel better.
So began my quest to get better at editing. My friends at the weekly critique group I attend helped me find some of the most consistent issues in my writing. I watched YouTube videos, read articles and books, and got a certification in editing. But the quest isn’t over! I will never be done learning and the exciting part about that is now, I get to share all this stuff with you in the For Writers section of my blog!
If and when you’re looking for an editor, I am so excited to read your work and help it bloom. I know how exciting and terrifying it can be to share your writing but I’ll also say that one of the biggest things that helped me along this editing quest was, in fact, reaching out to an editor. (Yes, editors need editors too.) I work with a few different editors for different projects. A friend suggested the Novel Doctor himself, Stephen Parolini and the feedback he gave me was awesome. He was the first editor I had ever reached out to and he was constructive and honest. If I’m not able to help you, I wholeheartedly send you his way. I also recently began working with Kraken Editing & Literary Service Investigations and Kelsey is no-nonsense. Her feedback has been integral to my growth as a writer – and she offers research services as well. Every writer is different and therefore, it’s important to find an editor that works best for you and your project.
Shannon Hale said, “I’m writing a first draft and reminding myself that I’m simply shoveling sand into a box so that later I can build castles.”
