This is my checklist for finishing a manuscript. It nests in that during any given trunking period I will be somewhere else in the checklist on a different project.
- Write the Book: Seriously, all the way to the end.
- Put it away (Usually for about 4 weeks): Also called trunking. Putting it away allows your brain to forget it. I use this time for either a new novel or to do an editing pass on another project.
- Edit Pass 1: The first edit pass is about the big stuff. I’m worried about tone, story, continuity and character voice. I’ll fix typos and misspellings if I see them, but they’re less important
- Read it through, making small alterations and noting broader changes and improvements.
- Fix continuity issues.
- Implement broader changes.
- First readers: The 2nd draft novel goes out to first readers for them to try out the story and comment on the big stuff. It also serves as my second trunking period.
- Collect comments from my first readers, and let them all stew a bit.
- Ask about plot points, verifying foreshadowing and overall smoothness of plot curve(s).
- Edit Pass 2:Â Second pass starts with fixing any of the big stuff that came back from first readers.
- Fix continuity, foreshadowing, and plots. Expand tells that need to be shows, and simplify shows that are distracting and should be tells.
- Commence 7 layer treatment.
- Spell check.
- Search manuscript for “ly” and evaluate. Strengthen weaker verbs.
- Search manuscript for “was” and evaluate. Correct passive voice and strengthen any weaker verb pairs.
- Search manuscript for “were” and evaluate. Correct passive voice and strengthen any weaker verb pairs.
- Search manuscript for “said” and evaluate.
- Eliminate unnecessary speech tags.
- Strengthen character dialogue to make voices distinctive enough not to require tags.
- Replace said with action beats where dialogue requires speaker clarification and/or scene needs action to ease dialogue pacing.
- Search and remove double spaces.
- Double check chapter lengths and redistribute scenes for pacing.
- Run Grammarly in Novel mode: Grammarly has a few weaknesses, but I like the extra set of ‘eyes.’ Using the tool is tedius, but I’d rather run through it than leave mistakes in the manuscript.
- Second Readers: My beta readers get a pretty clean copy. Sometimes first and beta readers overlap, but I never ask a reader to be both – they have to volunteer for that torture.