Today’s the last day to reach your writing goal for NaNoWriMo. Whether you reach the goal or not, you should congratulate yourself for attempting to write a novel. That’s an achievement worth applauding. Regardless of your word count, what do you do after NaNoWriMo? The best advice I can give you is …
Nothing
At least for now. I’ve complained long and loud about NaNoWriMo being in November because, for Americans, it’s a tough month to devote to writing with Thanksgiving waiting near the end. But it may be a better month that I’ve ever realized because December follows it. With all the holiday activities demanding your attention, December is the perfect time to do nothing with your manuscript. Romantic suspense author Di Ann Mills calls this hiatus “cooking time.”
Don’t look at the manuscript again until at least January 2. You’ll come to it with new eyes. Sections you thought brilliant may seem merely flat now. Or a scene that was particularly tough to write may read much better than you hoped.
Now that you’ve let your story sit and have reread it, it’s time to …
Edit, Edit, Edit
Everybody needs to edit their manuscripts and often pretty heavily. Some newbie writers believe the first draft is the best, but I’ve never written anything that didn’t improve from a second, third, or twentieth review.
Since editing is so important, I had planned to feature this subject in December and wrap my blog’s theme for 2023, “The Journey of a Book”. But Christmas is interfering. I think more readers will be able to learn from my posts on editing in January after all the hoopla of the holidays.
So for December, my theme is Christmas writing prompts and reposting the most popular posts from the seven years I’ve been blogging. Come January, we’ll be ready to tackle editing. If you’d like to catch up on the themes from this past year, follow the links listed below.
The Journey of a Book–2023
- January — Writing inspiration
- February — Love and Romance genre
- March — YA genre
- April — Setting
- May — Historical Fiction
- June — Characters
- July — Christian Fiction
- August — Plot
- September — Publishing
- October — Mystery
- November — NaNoWriMo
- December — Coming next week–Christmas prompts and most popular posts
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