Okay, you have the shape of your story down on the page, you know it’s time to revise, maybe you’ve even gotten some feedback already from peer readers. What next?
Now it’s time to read through your draft and take notes, asking yourself questions about plot, character, setting and theme as you go. You may need to read the draft through several times. Often when I am reading with character questions in mind, I can’t really focus on the setting, and vice versa. For some writers, it works best to break everything down and read several times looking for different types of things to revise. For others, one pass works well because it helps the writer keep the big picture in their mind. It may take a couple of tries for you to figure out how you work best. Also, your approach will probably change as you grow as a writer.
Whether you are considering them all at once or breaking it down into multiple read-throughs, here are the questions you will want to consider at the revision stage of writing:
Plot
At the revision stage, your plot should be mostly sound. But the question to ask here is, does it make sense to the reader? Are all the events causally linked, or are there gaps between events where the reader might get lost? The plot should run through the story like a river, gently propelling the reader along. Are there slumps, long slow periods where the reader’s attention may drift? Finally, does the plot mesh naturally with the emotional journey of the characters, particularly the main? Do events create development changes in characters which lead to actions which create more changes?
This is a good place to take another look at plot structure. Consider the beginning, middle and end of the story. Do they all have the necessary elements of beginnings, middles and ends? If you are using a plot graph, revisit it. Does the story you have written on paper match the story you have graphed out? Where are the differences?
Character
Again, your characters at this stage should be like old friends. In the process of planning, drafting and rewriting you’ve gotten to know them. But this can actually be a handicap when revising, because this familiarity can blind you to the way the character is actually coming across on the page.
Let me give an example. When I was working on early versions of Dream of a Vast Blue Cavern, no one in my writing group liked Stasia, the lead character. For the longest time I couldn’t understand why. Finally, my editor pointed out to me specific actions Stasia was taking that made her unlikeable. I finally got it. The Stasia I had in my head, the Stasia I knew, was impulsive and headstrong but also had a huge heart, but all that was coming across in her actions was the impulsive, headstrong part. I hadn’t shown her soft side to the readers.
So, when you are asking yourself if the character on the page matches the character in your mind, I advise you to look at their actions objectively. If your Warrior is the strong but silent type, and you secretly know he loves kittens, show him petting a kitten! Small gestures like this will go a long way.
Have you shown enough of your hero so the reader can relate to both her heroic qualities and her flaws? Have you established just enough sympathy for the villain to make him a complex character in the reader’s mind? Is your cast varied enough to be emotionally resonant with a large variety of readers? Have you established sympathy for the characters before the main action begins?
Setting
If you’re anything like me, you’ve been putting up cardboard sets during drafting, promising to paint them later. Now is the time to apply that paint. For every single scene in your book, ask these specific questions about setting: What is the light source? What temperature is it? What are the predominant colors? Shapes? Sounds? Does the setting live on the page, or is the scene full of talking heads? What effect does the setting have on the characters? Can you imagine each scene as if it’s playing in your head like a movie?
Or, perhaps you are nothing like me, and you revel in describing setting during drafting–perhaps to the detriment of the pace of the story. Do you need to cut back on setting to let the characters and plot shine through more brightly? Have you spent paragraphs describing something that can be conveyed with one word? Have you married description to action so that your story keeps moving forward?
Finally, does every setting in the book make sense in terms of the storyworld you’ve planned out? Have you stayed consistent in terms of magic, society, politics, and physical landscapes? Are there any abrupt jumps in setting that might disorient the readers? Does the setting reflect and enhance the themes in the book?
Theme
While your theme(s) may be opaque during drafting, by this stage you should start to be able to identify them. Can you state the prevailing theme of your book in one sentence? Are there too many themes diluting the meaning of the book? Is the theme too deeply personal, do you need to work more to tie it into the universal human experience? Or is it too broad and abstract to really hit home to the readers? Does the theme shine through in every aspect of the book–the actions of the characters, the colors of the settings, the mood of the dialog, etc?
Keep Calm and Carry On
This process of looking at your draft and asking such critical questions can be overwhelming. This is the bipolarity of the writer, having to look critically at the work. This where it is easy to be too hard on yourself.
Take a deep breath, appreciate the many places where the answers to these questions are positive ones, and then sit down and get to work fixing the places where you’ve gone wrong. As long as you keep the vision of your story alive in your mind, there’s always hope for getting closer to it on the page.
What questions do you ask when considering what needs to be revised in your draft?
