Let it marinade for a while

Dansak

Dansak

Really Really Experienced
CHYOA Backer
You've written a great a chapter, it took blood, sweat and tears to produce this master piece and now your finger is hovering over the publish button. But don't push it! Well, not yet anyway, let it marinade for a while.

The first time I ever did this it was agony, I just wanted to publish it and move on. But, as the advice I'd read online told me, I waited...and waited. Around three or four days later I went back and had another look.

My first thought was, 'how the hell did I miss that really obvious typo?'. My second thought was, 'Okay, that bit needs changing'.

In fact, I changed quite a lot. I let it marinade again for a few days and changed still more stuff when
I went back to it. It works because when the stuff you've written is fresh in your mind you tend to skip through it, your mind knows it so well that you don't focus on the details. So, the longer you leave it the better, so that you forget a lot of it and it becomes fresh again when you read it. And that's when you spot the all important errors that need fixing.

I get the urge to publish straight away, but trust me here, let it marinade for while and then re edit it, you'll be amazed at what you missed the first time round.
 
There is a balance to be struck between publish-as-you-go and polish-to-a-shine, though, especially if you also want to be receptive to reader feedback. If you're already halfway through writing chapter 20 by the time you publish chapter 17 then it'll probably be hard to incorporate any suggestions readers leave on that chapter, because you're already several scenes further along in the story, and probably have a sense (if not a full outline) for several more.

I always start the my writing sessions with an editing pass of what I wrote yesterday. You catch a bunch of mistakes (big and small) and simultaneously get your head back into the story, allowing you to more easily resume from where you left off. That's also when I usually declare yesterday's stuff as publishable.
 
To build off of TheLowKing, at some point, you're going to have to publish your chapter, or you'll be stuck in the eternal editing/rewriting loop.

I used to give my chapter blocks 2 rounds of 1- week marinates before I made myself publish them, or else they would stay stuck in draft-hell, and I would never be able to advance the story.
 
TheLowKing said:
There is a balance to be struck between publish-as-you-go and polish-to-a-shine, though, especially if you also want to be recep. tive to reader feedback. If you're already halfway through writing chapter 20 by the time you publish chapter 17 then it'll probably be hard to incorporate any suggestions readers leave on that chapter, because you're already several scenes further along in the story, and probably have a sense (if not a full outline) for several more.

I always start the my writing sessions with an editing pass of what I wrote yesterday. You catch a bunch of mistakes (big and small) and simultaneously get your head back into the story, allowing you to more easily resume from where you left off. That's also when I usually declare yesterday's stuff as publishable.
Click to expand...

I do much the same thing and re-read/edit my previous sessions work before moving on to write the next bit. I tend to write about two to five chapters in advance of what I am publishing. So, by the time I come to publish a chapter, it's had one or two edits and a good marinade period for a final edit when I publish. Although recently I am experimenting with writing a whole story before publishing, it's tough to resist publishing but I really want to try and move away from the collection of never ending and unfinished works I have and produce more stories with an actual ending.

Re the inclusion of reader feedback. For me, that causes issues. I've listened to feedback several times before, made the changes only to find out the feedback was from a minority and I'd upset the majority. Now I generally just write for myself and hope that it lands well. Having said that, I do take feedback into consideration when writing a new story. For example, I got feedback that some readers don't like their male protagonist sharing his harem with other males. So the next story I wrote had that worked into it.
 
That's about the balance I've settled on too: 1 chapter in progress, 1 chapter finished first draft, 1 chapter edited and ready to go, 1 chapter published, and depending on how much progress I'm making I adjust my publishing schedule accordingly.

Reader feedback is definitely very hit or miss. Most of the time I reject it (it's my story after all :P), but occasionally there's something in there that'll make me go "ooo, I might use that!"
 
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