The Birth and Life of a Novel

A lot of people are asking me, so what's next? Now that you've finished your novel, what's the next step?

A lot of people want to read it, which is so lovely and supportive, but also... premature.

So I'm going to share this little analogy to help explain the life and birth of a novel (there are lot's of exceptions, but this is true most of the time). If a novel is a child, then this is how it is made.

I said that I finished writing and shared "newborn" photos of my brand new manuscript. Said that I have been writing this particular novel for 3 years, 2 months and 5 days. Well, that is the length of gestation for this novel.

I started building the world of this novel 9 years ago. This was planning and preparing for the baby.

I read and researched and travelled and conspired and over the course of time, the world of this novel was conceived.

I wrote and wrote. 3 years, 2 months and 5 days of writing. This was pregnancy.

I finished the final page and rejoyced. That was birth.

Now is it time for my novel to go out into the world and find a job? My newborn? You tell me, parents of adult children, how much work went into that baby before birth versus how much work from birth to independence?

So what is next?

Infant-hood. That novel needs a complete rewrite from a blank page. This is the second draft.

Toddler-hood. The third draft.

Preschool. Substantive re-writes. Now it is ready for beta-readers. A few skilled critical readers will tear it apart and poke holes in it everywhere they can. It is ready to face the world, but only the world of a supported environment with trusted caregivers.

Kindergarten. I will polish it up and send it into the larger world, to agents, editors, publishers. Wave goodbye when it gets on the school bus and hope for the best. It will probably come back. And then I will send it off again. During this process, I will write more books and raise them up and send them to school as well.

Once it is accepted into the hallowed halls of publishing, the process of professional editing begins. It is groomed and torn apart and possibly re-written again. And then we will decide it is ready, cap and gown it, and push it out into the world. It will need it's hand held for years of promotion still, but it will have to stand for itself and be judged on it's own merit. From here, it is it's own entity seperate from my own.

Once it's here, you can read it. :)