Should I edit the first draft until I'm totally satisfied or should I leave that to the third draft?
After having waited for three months for the first draft of my novel to "cool off," I've finally decided to work on the second one.
But now I'm presented with who options: 1) edit the this first draft until I'm totally satisfied 2) edit the first draft, skip those parts I'm having problems with, and try to figure them out on the third draft.
Pros of Option 1:
I won't have to read my novel like 6 or 7 times until I get sick of it (not that it happened to me before. Maybe it won't).
I'll finish the editing a bit faster.
Pros of Option 2:
Because I distance myself from a scene immediately after writing it, the third time I'll have a fresher mind to decide whether it's a good one or not.
Since there are some scenes I want to rewrite completely I'll be less likely to remove scenes that I wrote until satisfaction.
Have you faced this dilemma before? Which option you practice, and why you think it's better than the other?
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/9167. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
2 answers
Don't rewrite unless you have to. Read it over and fill in missing details, edit the work you've already done, and hand it over to an editor or a friend and have them read over it. They might give you more ideas to go with, and might see things that you haven't yet.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/9209. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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This is a Your Mileage May Vary question; there is no one right answer. My suggestion would be to go through the draft once more, fix what you think needs fixing, and then find a beta reader and/or an editor for the next round. You need input from outside your own head.
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