It’s a common misconception of new authors that the first draft is the first draft. It’s not.
OK, I know that’s counter-intuitive, but believing that the first iteration of your manuscript is a draft ready to go to the editor can lead to disappointment and frustration. I’ve noticed particularly with my book coaching clients that their expectations here are misguided.
I’ve been outlining a system in these episodes that will help you get your ideas down in manuscript form. However, when you are happily following your fat outline and writing your chapters, you will more than likely miss out things. When you are writing about a topic that is within your area of expertise, you will make assumptions on the part of the reader that are not valid.
As I review chapters with my coaching clients, one of my most common questions and comments is, “What does this mean? The reader needs detail to understand your point. Maybe you could put a story in here to illustrate.”
So when an author reaches the end of this process, the full manuscript is often much shorter than he or she expected. That’s when many fall into a blue funk. “But Helen, it’s only going to be 100 pages!” they say. My next job is to talk the client “off the ledge”!
The fact is, when you get that first version of the manuscript down, you need to go back to the beginning and do some serious self-editing. (Or if you are working with a coach, he or she will help you with this phase of the process.) You need to look for points that may be clear to you but need some expansion for the reader. I’ll be talking in a later episode about how to use story in your book even if it’s non-fiction, and at this point you should look for places to add stories. You may even find you need a whole extra chapter to expand on your material. Your coach can help you find these places so that you can do the revision work.
If you are publishing traditionally, this is most certainly not the first draft you send to your editor or publisher. If you do, it will likely be sent back with some terse words instructing you to do some self-editing and then send it back again.
The point I want to make here, though, is that you shouldn’t expect that first iteration to be your polished first draft ready for editing, and you shouldn’t feel despondent when it’s not. It’s all just part of the process. Accept that, and work on improving your manuscript until you have a first draft that truly is ready for a professional editor to work on. Nobody said it was easy — if they did, they lied!