First Novel

Diviner said:

Is it typical that first novels are learning experiences and rarely publishable?

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Yes, but not invariably.

Mine has certainly been a learning experience. I could take a lot of the things I am learning and revise again, but I don't know the value of this.

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If you do revise it, may I suggest retyping it from hard-copy?

And last, but not least, is rewriting considered BIC time?

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No. You should do some original writing every day, regardless of what else you do.

(Else you run the risk of waking up ten years from now with a twenty-times-revised-yet-still-unpublishable first novel.)

This is just my opinion as a person like you, working on my first novel...

If first novels are just written as learning experiences, and automatically turn out to be "unpublishable," then why the hell write it in the first place? If you have put all this work into it, don't put it aside just because you hit a little snag. Keep at it, and improve where improvement is needed, even if it takes longer than you expected. I've been working on the same story for over seven years and it could be another 2 or 3 before it's finished. I certainly wouldn't put work towards something as big as a novel, to have it turn out to be just a learning experience. Turn your "learning experience" into something positive - a PUBLISHABLE novel. The reward will be greater. You've come this far...don't stop now. JMO.

But what has that amount of time gained you? If you have redone this one work for 7 years how many books could you have written in that time? 7 more, 14 more--or more. Maybe by now you would already have one book or more out there.

Nothing says you can't come back to first novels, but like everything else, you need learning time. You go to school and spend years learning, you don't spend 12 years in 1st grade. You do first grade and then move to 2nd grade where you improve upon what you learned in 1st grade, you go on to 3rd and improve upon what you learned in 2nd--and so on.

Writing can be seen much the same, that first novel is 1st grade, the next is 2nd grade, you improve upon what you learned in the first one and so on until you get to the point that it's ready to sell.

You can't spend all your time in 1st grade.

Shawn

I haven't redone it for seven years. The story has been in development for that long, with bits and pieces being written throughout, and it going through several major format changes - originally a network soap opera - turned novel series - turned epic novel. The story is complex, 80 characters, 2 umbrella stories, plus all of the character subplots and it all coming together as one story in the end. Now, I may be different in my thinking (as someone who hasn't been published yet), but I don't intend on putting hard work into writing a novel, only to have it be something that's not publishable. I would want to keep working at it UNTIL it's publishable.

And I JUST decided to get into novel writing. All of my first projects for the first six years as a serious writer, were ideas intended to be TV shows or Films. Thanksgiving 2004, is when I decided to jump into novel writing...

Diviner said:

I am beginning to realize that my work may not be publishable as it stands, partly because it is too long for YA and too simplistic (in my opinion) for adult readers.

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Here is a site with good info on everything up to YA: http://write4kids.com/colum44.html
They say a YA MS should run from 130 to 200 pages.

What reactions did you get from the beta readers? Did they say it was too long?

I don't know the specifics of your project but is there anyway you can rework it? Cut down the word count -- or perhaps make it into more than one book. Series of books do pretty well in the YA market.

Well good luck either way!

Writing my first novel was my steepest learning curve. It's still not very good IMHO, and not something I would be willing to submit. But I will never regret writing it. One day, I may be good enough to rewrite with enough skill to make it bearable to people other than it's dewy-eyed mother, but even if that isn't the case, I'm so glad I wrote it. I learned so much, and I care about the story.

My second was a lot better, but still a bit of a mess. Actually, a lot of a mess.

I'm editing my third to a standard where I feel I can submit to an agent with a straight face, but I know this novel would be nothing if I hadn't written the other two. I'm working on others, and I'm hoping they'll be better each time.

I'm not sure how you judge when to move on from a novel and leave it, at least for now. I just felt that was the right decision to make in those instances.

If you don't write your first novel you'll never write your second.

Over at Nicholas "The Notebook" Sparks' site, he tells us where his first novel is. It's in his attic, next to his baseball card collection. His second novel is right beside it, the only difference being that it has a collection of rejection slips. It's his third-written (first published) novel that made him a best seller.

Personally, my "first" novel is still on a disk somewhere. It started out as a short story I wrote in High School. I never finished it. My first finished novel IS being published. But I worked at it, got lots of help, and found a small publisher.


Someday I'll go back to that first novel - I think it had promise, storywise. Once I apply all that I've learned to it, I think it will publishable.

YA usually runs around 40-60 thousand words. BUT... since HP, I think publishers are putting out longer books for children.
Can you make it two books?

I feel sheepish to say that The Pacific Between is my very first novel. I have written short stories and a serial before, but not a full-length novel. Granted, it took me two years to write TPB. Whether it's good or not, I'll let you be the judge when it comes out. *as UJ said: buy one; buy many; they make perfect gifts.*

Meanwhile, I'm writing my second book and I can already feel that it's a better novel, even in first draft state. I just need to get past the current block and keep going. And I don't mind if I learn a few things along the way...

Judging from my own first novel...

I'd have to agree that James is right on the issue of a first novel generally being unpublishable. I've started reading my own first book (it was only published last year, btw) and I just could not get into it. My writing definitely will be needing work. But I imagine I'll be getting it back from my publisher pretty soon -- we're in termination negotiations, didn't much care for them -- so I can see a glowing opportunity to sit back down and re-write the thing possibly presenting itself in the near future.

But I obviously wouldn't say never to publish the thing. (If I did, I'd be a hypocrite, as I've already had my first book published.) Rather, I would write it, and then let it sit for several months in a drawer, untouched -- six or seven months is about ideal, so that the story will wear off and you'll be seeing it from a fresh perspective when you pick it up again -- and then read it over. You'll be amazed at all the things you will find able to do to improve upon it, what with your writing skill having improved over that period of time.

How does your skill improve, btw? By writing other stuff, constantly. If you're writing other stuff, you're not stuck in the rut of re-writing the exact same story over and over again (That's the main mistake I made with my first novel, and that's why I now know it's not truly good enough the way it is -- in my opinion -- to be published.) It's always good to have something to work on other than the same story again and again and again. This allows you to maintain a creative flow to your writing.

James said something very interesting above, and from experience with both computers and manual typewriters, I must agree with him on the idea of this: If you re-write your work, I recommend highly doing it from hard-copy. The reason for this is that when you're operating from a computer word processor, re-writing basically ends up being a large computer editing process. Inserting words and/or phrases, and taking words and/or phrases out.

But with a hard-copy to re-write the entire thing from, you can literally re-write the entire story, based upon, but not necessarily using the same wording as, the original hard-copy.


My own two cents on the subject... maybe three. But it definitely works for me. Just something to think about.

Diviner,
If you've tried your best to cut down the length of your story, and are reasonably happy with where it's at, leave the decision up to an editor. If you send out queries, and are told right off the bat that it's too long, then you'll know. If it's accepted, rest assured that it will be chopped up.
I also agree that YA works are getting longer. My 12yo reads adult books, but what turns him away is heavy narrative or complicated structures to follow. Length doesn't scare him.

First novel

Diviner said:

Is it typical that first novels are learning experiences and rarely publishable? Mine has certainly been a learning experience. I could take a lot of the things I am learning and revise again, but I don't know the value of this. How much noodling should a writer do on a first novel? When do I decide whether to send it out or to put it away?

And last, but not least, is rewriting considered BIC time?

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I'd say it's not only typical, it's to be expected about 99% of the. Some first novels do get published, but in my experience, most of these are by writers who have a fairly high degree of experience in writing and publishing other things.

There are literally hundreds of thousands of completely unpublishable first novels out there. And second and third novels.

Even when first novels are publishable, they seldom make the cut at large, mainstream publishers.

Lightning strikes, lottery numbers are hit, but in my experience, expecting a first novel to be pubishable falls right into these two areas.

And quite often, even when a first novel is publishable, the second won't be. Nora Roberts sold her first novel, and then had to write eight more before managing to do it again.

Writing is both a talent and a skill, and as a skill, it must be learned. If you wanted to be a painter instead of a writer, would you expect a first painting to sell?

You have to evaluate each project separately. Sometimes a novel is good enough that reworking it over and over will make it publishable, but there are times when it's best to let one project go and start another. I think each project is a learning experience, and you learn more and faster by writing new novels than by rewriting an old one over and over.

You just have to look at this novel, get it critiqued by those who know what to look for, and then make a decision.

Novel

EGGammon said:

This is just my opinion as a person like you, working on my first novel...

If first novels are just written as learning experiences, and automatically turn out to be "unpublishable," then why the hell write it in the first place? JMO.

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Because there is no alternative. As UJ said, if you don't write the first one, you can't write the second one.

And I don't really think it's a choice. I doubt anyone intentionally writes an unpublishable first novel, and pretty much every writer I've known believes their first novel is good and is publishable. This doesn't make it so, no matter how much effort and time is put into it.

Whether you put seven weeks, seven years, or seven decades into a first novel, it can still be completely unpublishable, and usually is.

Sometimes, quite often, in fact, the ONLY way to learn how to write a publishable novel is to write several. Rewriting the same one over and over can be counterproductive. Most learn much faster by telling different stories filled with different characters until something clicks, not by reworking the same story and the same characters over and over.

Two comments/questions:

1. So, if I quickly write a novel (do my best, but get it done in a month) can I count that as my first novel? Since it will be unpublishable, I'd really like to get that out of the way, sooner than later. (I'm only being a little facetious.)

2. I've heard a few authors say that it was great to get that first published novel out there, but it was much harder to write the second published novel. I would think that the learning curve on the first one would make it a little less difficult to turn out a better second one. Where am I going wrong? (I do realize the first published novel is usually not the first written novel. But still . . .)

Inspired said:

I would think that the learning curve on the first one would make it a little less difficult to turn out a better second one.

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You'd like to think so, wouldn't you?
--Vizzini, The Princess Bride

1. So, if I quickly write a novel (do my best, but get it done in a month) can I count that as my first novel? Since it will be unpublishable, I'd really like to get that out of the way, sooner than later. (I'm only being a little facetious.)

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Every word you write has to be the very best you can do. Yes, I give people permission to write garbage -- but that means I give them permission to write and think that it's trash as they look it over. Not to deliberately set out to write badly.

2. I've heard a few authors say that it was great to get that first published novel out there, but it was much harder to write the second published novel. I would think that the learning curve on the first one would make it a little less difficult to turn out a better second one. Where am I going wrong? (I do realize the first published novel is usually not the first written novel. But still . . .)

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The more you know the more you realize how little you know. What you try next is more ambitious. You've grown, your abilities have grown, and the size of the demons you face have also grown.

And there's the never-ending fear that you're a flash in the pan, that you only had one good book in you, or that your editor will realize that you were just faking it the first time around.

This is a dismal occupation. Stay away if you can.

Learning curve

Inspired said:

Two comments/questions:

1. So, if I quickly write a novel (do my best, but get it done in a month) can I count that as my first novel? Since it will be unpublishable, I'd really like to get that out of the way, sooner than later. (I'm only being a little facetious.)

2. I've heard a few authors say that it was great to get that first published novel out there, but it was much harder to write the second published novel. I would think that the learning curve on the first one would make it a little less difficult to turn out a better second one. Where am I going wrong? (I do realize the first published novel is usually not the first written novel. But still . . .)

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I think writing one does make the second one much easier where skill is concerned. I think it's fear that makes the second novel so difficult. It's "Am I a one-shot novelist?" It's the, "Jeeze, didn't I just do this? How am I supposed to do it again?" It's the "This one must be better than the first."

Where skill was concerned, my second novel was far easier to write than my first. But it was also a hundred times scarier, and I had so much less confidence that it was frightening.

I stilll often get this when I sit down to write a novel. Never as much as with that second novel, but the feelings are still there when I start chapter one.

That first novel was a piece of cake. Nothing to it. No fear, no doubts. I was too damned ignorant of the writing world to have any doubts. I thought you wrote something, you sent it in, they bought it. Wasn't that how it was supposed to work? I assumed it would work this way, and it did.

When it was time to write the second novel, I knew better. I knew how tough it was, I knew I'd set a standard for myself, I knew second novels were supposedly jinxed, on and on. I tried to write too well; I tried to make that second novel a masterpiece. Yeah, right.

I finally got it done, and it sold, but it was not as agood as the first novel, and I've never been so glad to have an experience behind me in my life. With the third novel I was back to "normal," not as confident as I was with the first novel, but infinitely more so than I was with the second.

There's always a minute of doubt when I sit down to start a new novel, but it now goes away once I actually begin writing.

This is a dismal occupation. Stay away if you can.

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Aww, Jim. That simply won't work. It's publish, or death.

Now, off to write...!

The more you know the more you realize how little you know. What you try next is more ambitious. You've grown, your abilities have grown, and the size of the demons you face have also grown.

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Amen!

My current WIP is SO MUCH more ambitious than my first; it's daunting.

I am bullheaded. I am going to get my first novel published. I can't put it away and start on something else. I have to finish it first, I don't care how long it takes, I am determined and tenacious. I don't expect it to be a bestseller, but I believe, with all the hard work and input I've had over the last year and a half, it will be salable. When I have ten queries out, I will start freelancing, but not before. Call it a one track mind or stubborn, or just call it Taurus.

James D. Macdonald said:

This is a dismal occupation. Stay away if you can.

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It has occurred to me on more than one occasion that writing is the only thing I'm really qualified to do.

James D. Macdonald said:

The more you know the more you realize how little you know. What you try next is more ambitious. You've grown, your abilities have grown, and the size of the demons you face have also grown.

And there's the never-ending fear that you're a flash in the pan, that you only had one good book in you, or that your editor will realize that you were just faking it the first time around.

This is a dismal occupation. Stay away if you can.

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Ok, Uncle Jim, what do you do when you can't get past the flash in the pan fear, and your demons have grown to unmanagable proportions? Seek therapy and medication? This has gone so far that I'm unable to write anything new (at least since January); I have a morbid fear of the blank page anymore, no matter what format (be it computer or longhand).

Any advice for a hopeful yet floundering would-be?

WVWG