Traditional wisdom is that it takes a lot of time and energy to write a book. That’s generally true. However, that counts the entire process. It takes a long time to revise, edit and hone a
book until you feel you’re ready to let it go. That doesn’t mean you can’t write a first draft quickly. Some purists will protest that haste will decrease the quality of a writer’s work in favour of quantity. Sure. I have a different take on that objection. Assume your first draft is going to suck anyway. Since you’re best writing is rewriting, it’s best to have something to revise. For many writers, if they didn’t write the first draft in haste, they might not have anything to revise at all. You can’t edit a blank page.
So here’s my contrarian view on why fast writing can be a very good thing:
1. You maintain your enthusiasm for the project because you get the first draft done quickly. Marathon writing takes endurance. A sprint can be advantageous, especially if you haven’t completed a manuscript in the past and you’re developing those muscles.
2. When you write in haste, you can see the whole project’s development at once. You’re less likely to drop threads when you get the first draft done in a short time. If you’ve read Under the Dome by Stephen King—a huge and heavy book of great length which, in general, I enjoyed—maybe you noticed that he seemed to have a supernatural element on the protagonist’s side that is never explained and soon forgotten. It took him three years or so to write it. That might be why something’s amiss.
3. Increased productivity primes your art pump. If you produce a lot, you tend to produce more the rest of the time, too. It’s the literary equivalent of, if you want the job done, give it to a busy person. Artists need to get into the habit of production and treat their work as a business and a craft (instead of something that can only produced when the planets align and you have a handy vial of unicorn blood to consecrate your art-making ceremony.)
4. Increased production equals more money in the long run. That’s not mercenary. That’s math. If you can produce four books (and sell them) in the time it takes someone else to write one, you’re ahead (unless the other guy is William Styron, but he’d be ahead in any case…and he’s dead.)
5. You may not sell everything you write. In fact, if you’ve got an agent, an editor and a publisher between you and the market, there’s an excellent chance someone will stand up at some point and say, this isn’t ready for your customers. (They may or may not be right about that. When Robert Munsch‘s publisher told him the world wasn’t ready for Love You Forever, he took that controversial children’s book elsewhere. And had a hit.)
My point is, if you spend ten years writing a book and it does not sell, you will be sad. If you have other books to sell, the one disappointment won’t sting so much. You know how every second Star Trek movie was great and the others suck? It evens out when you have more out there.
If I sound like I’m blaming, shaming and pointing fingers, I apologize. I have been guilty of acting like a dilettante about my fiction. I’ve had to gather unicorn blood before I could summon the muse. That’s changed recently as I’ve reevaluated. I’m motivated now to go into heavy production and get to work on the revisions for my books and, as Seth Godin puts it, “Ship!” (Also, see the post below on Lessons Received from An Evening with Kevin Smith for the whys and wherefores. )
My book production won’t happen overnight. But it will happen faster than it was happening. Boo-ya!
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Filed under: NanNoWriMo, writing tips, NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month, seth godin, Stephen King, William Styron, write fast, writers, writing fast
C h a z z W r i t e s . c o m 
Hey Chazz, I can’t agree with you more. When I wrote my first book My Camino I asked the publisher if we could get it on the market by the following year because it was a holy year on the Camino. It’s a big deal to the Catholics…not much meaning to me but I knew I could sell more books. He said he needed the manuscript in 2 months to do that. I wrote 1000 words a day for 60 days and came up with 54,000 words. Of course it had to be edited and that took several more months but I learned it was possible to set writing goals. Last year I wrote a manuscript about a woman travelling to India with NaNoWriMo and had an incredible creative experience writing 1700 words a day. This winter I’ll do the next draft/s of that book called Gandhidam Express. I write best when it’s cold outside.
Thanks for all the fabulous writing tips.
Sue
Hey Sue!
Thanks for writing (and reading, of course.) Short deadlines can be a challenge but it sounds like you rose to the occasion. What’s fascinating to me is how the paradigm is changing. Traditional publsihers typically have a long lead before a book makes it into print. That is changing.
Dave Eggers got so frustrated with the lag between writing and printing that he started up McSweeney’s (typical lag time there is only 6 months.) With crowdsourcing, getting into prnt could be much, much faster. Traditional publishers could find efficiencies and streamline their logistical process, but it’s more likely their budget year that holds them up most. I Am Not a Serial Killer has finally been released to some acclaim in the States, but it’s been available in Europe for some time. (More than a year, as I recall.)
The more people go DIY, not only will books be available faster, if you sell it from your website, it will be available longer. I have a link somewhere about a website that’s tracking lost book sales due to electronic unavailbility. I’ll post that link tomorrow along with some more links about pub industry challenges. Interesting changes ahead, and they appear to be coming at us faster.
How’s the sale of your fantastic book coming? Are they pounding on your door? They should be!
I love DIY and have decided to keep the rights to my books, sell online and find a good distributor for the hard copies. When the feature film adaptation of My Camino comes out in 2 years, I will be ready to hit the ground running.
Book sales are strong. Last week my car was broken into on Spadina Av and someone stole my big black suitcase full of books, DVD’s of a Camino doc I did and a bunch of my storytelling CD’s. It also had a ton of stones and bookmarks as I give them away at book events. Can you imagine the look on their face when they opened it up to find it full of spiritual books!!! I trust someone out there needed to get the message about the Camino and this was the only way. In the meantime I lost about $2K retail value in product. Ouch.
Hey Sue! Sorry to hear about your merchandise being stolen. As The International Man of Mystery used to say, “Ouch, baby. Very Ouch!”
I’m getting more an dmore fascnated with DIY the more I explore the technological possibilties. Many see as the threat to the status quo. I think there are many opportunities as we become our own publishers. It’s not for everybody, every author or every book, but avenues are opening and they are opening more each day.
As much as I like to spend time revising my things, I am absolutely with you on this. Fast-writing is wonderful, and NaNoWriMo helps a lot on actually getting around to doing it, and you really do stay in the loop, so to speak, and keep up with your own imaginary world. If you are writing a first draft that needs revision anyway, why not write it quickly if you can?