The fourth step in the novel writing process: Revise and Refine

Now that you have evaluated your manuscript draft and have taken a plethora of notes to help you improve your story, it’s time to enter the next phase of the novel writing process. “Revise and refine” is an umbrella phrase that encompasses a handful of tasks that could be – and often are – divided into their own individual steps of the writing process. However, concepts like “revise, edit, and proofread” (among others) are commonly confused or conflated and are sometimes even used interchangeably as if they are all the same task. Because of this, I prefer to present these concepts together in one step so I can compare these tasks which, while all individual and important steps in the writing process, serve different purposes and involve different techniques.

Here are a few key differences between these three central concepts that I have included in the “Revise and Refine” step of the novel writing process:

1. Revise: Revising involves making broad changes to your writing, such as restructuring your story, clarifying your ideas, and improving the overall flow and coherence of your work. This stage typically involves reading through your entire manuscript and making changes to the content, structure, and style of your writing. It may also involve adding new material or cutting out unnecessary parts of the text.
2. Edit: Editing involves making more detailed changes to your writing, such as improving sentence structure, word choice, and grammar. This step of the writing process may involve correcting spelling and punctuation errors, ensuring consistency in tone and style, and tightening up your writing to make it more concise and effective. It typically involves multiple rounds of reading and making changes to the text.
3. Proofread: Proofreading involves carefully checking your writing for errors in spelling, grammar, and punctuation, as well as formatting and layout issues. This step is focused on catching any remaining mistakes that may have been missed during the editing process. Proofreading is typically done after the writing has been revised and edited and is often the final step before either submitting the manuscript to agents (for traditional publishing) or publishing the work independently.

The key differences between revising, editing, and proofreading lie in the level of detail and scope of changes involved in each level of revising and refining. Thus, the revise and refine step of the writing process begins by first looking at the manuscript as a whole before narrowing the focus to individual chapters, paragraphs, and sentences.

Remember that writing a novel is a process, and it can take time and effort to create a polished and engaging final draft. By following these steps, you can turn your rough draft into a complete and compelling novel manuscript that is fit for publishing and marketing to the general public.

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Now that Jack has been forced to reflect on everything he has to lose, he resolves to do better. He’s determined to spend more time at home with his family and repair the relationships that have suffered over the years while he’s been so focused on work. But as Callie’s behavior becomes increasingly bizarre, Jack realizes he has a lot more room to improve than he realized – and it might be too late to save his daughter after all.

For fans of We Need to Talk About Kevin, The Push, and Baby Teeth.