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Workshop on Revising Your First Draft.

The Path to Publication   –   From First Draft to Self-Published Novel

The Writing Journey Workshop on Revision

Ready to create the second draft of your 2013 NaNo novel? Already started or still working on 2012? Mark your calendar. At the next Writing Journey meeting (Saturday February 8, from 11:30 AM-3 PM in the Lunch Room, Naperville Municipal Center, 400 S. Eagle Street, Naperville; as with other Journey meetings, bring your own lunch) Roger Lubeck is conducting a Workshop on Revising Your First Draft.

Going from first draft to a finished, publishable, novel takes a series of steps. It is a process of writing, revision, and editing. This workshop will examine the process of revising a first draft. Through presentation and hands-on activities, the workshop will explore character, scene, and dialogue development and revisions, using a story wall for plot adjustments, and the ARRR process of revision: Add, remove, replace, and rearrange.

In the workshop, participants will revise aspects of one of their unfinished novels. To facilitate these activities each attendee is asked to bring a copy of his/her novel, or copies of pages taken from his/her most recent (first) draft for the following workshop assignments:

Assignments:

  1.  Character. Bring a copy of the description of the main character (Protagonist) taken directly from the most recent draft (text only no bullet points). This should include the first time the character is described in the novel and page number. You can include later descriptions (pages) if they help. You can print the page and highlight text if you like.
  2. Location. Bring a copy of the description of a location or scene that is important to the story. The description is to be taken directly from the most recent draft (text only no bullet points). This should include the first time the location or scene is described in the novel. You can print the page and highlight if you like.
  3. Dialogue. Bring a sample of dialogue between the Main Character and another Main or Secondary character. The sample should be half a page or more with what you consider either your best scene of dialogue or a conversation that needs work.