How I Write Blog Posts

A while ago, Katie @ A Writer’s Faith explained her method for writing blog posts, and she encouraged other bloggers to do the same. Since her post-writing process is so different from mine, I thought it would be fun to share my own method and compare notes with other bloggers. (Imogen @ Gossiping with Dragons has done her own post on the subject, and it is hilarious. You should definitely check it out.) 

So here it is, a rough breakdown of how I write blog posts: 

Have Idea. As a general rule, I like to keep a handy-dandy list of topics on my computer so I can consult it every time I need to write a post. Occasionally I don’t find anything on that list that works for me in the moment. I’m not always in the mood to tackle old ideas, and if I’m not excited about writing something, I can’t expect you to be excited about reading it. Which means it’s back to the drawing board. 

Write Rough Draft. Either way, once I’ve decided what I’m going to write about, I have to take on the sleeping dragon—my least favorite step in the entire process. I don’t need to spend a lot of time writing the rough draft. I just have to get some of my thoughts down. Typically, I end up with several poorly-fleshed out paragraphs and a few random, unconnected sentences tacked on to the end, just enough to give me the necessary framework for editing. 

Time: All in all, this step generally takes about fifteen to twenty minutes. 

Freak Out/Reevaluate/Break. After finishing my rough draft and realizing how awful it truly is, I have a minor panic attack. At this point, I’m scared that I’ve ruined the post idea entirely and that I’ll have to come up with something new. Approximately one fourth of my first drafts never make it past this point because this is the stage where I determine how sound my post idea is, how much I have to work with, and where I see the piece going. If I’m sufficiently unhappy with it, I set it aside (with the idea that I might come back to it in the future) and start the process with a different topic. But, if I’m happy, I take a break from the rough draft to let it settle in my mind. 

Edits // Round One. After taking a good long break (if I can manage it, schedule-wise), my confidence starts to return. Sometimes I skim my rough draft before beginning edits (just to remind myself of what I’m working with), but usually I don’t even do that. From thereon in, my revision process for blog posts is almost identical to my revision process for novels. So at this stage, I rewrite the entire post—line for line, word for word—implementing all the changes I can think of along the way. During this stage, the post ends up lengthening by about 60%, which makes it way too long, so I make a mental note to worry about that later. As I rewrite everything, I flesh out my thoughts, organize them semi-strategically, and focus on saying what I want to say. I enjoy this stage of revisions the most because, during this part, my brain starts to feel like it’s actually working. This stage is also fun because, while I avoid coffee when I’m drafting a post (it only heightens my anxiety), I make sure to drink at least one cup while revising (since it helps me get in the zone and stay in the zone). 

Time: This step usually takes about one to two hours. 

Break. Even if I’m scrambling to write and edit a post on the day it’s supposed to go up (like I did with this one and this one), I make sure to take at least a thirty minute break between drafts. Ideally, I like to let each draft sit overnight, but that’s not always possible. 

Have Small Panic Attack. At this point, my deadline is getting close, and I realize I’ve procrastinated too much. I need to start working if I’m going to get my post up. 

Edits // Round Two. Here's where I get nitpicky. My post is structurally okay, but now I need to trim it down to a more readable length. I evaluate every paragraph, sentence, and word, and try to determine what’s necessary and what isn’t. About 50% of the time, I find it easier to rewrite the entire post (again), line by line, word by word (like I did with the post you’re reading right now). Because I write everything in Scrivener (I used Word before I switched to Mac), if I want something bolded or linked or italicized or you name it, I need to make a note about that in the document itself. Otherwise I’ll forget when it comes time to format everything. And I need to make sure my memos stand out so I don’t miss them and publish my post with notes like [INSERT LINK HERE] still in it. That would be awkward. 

Time: Overall, this step takes about an hour. 

Break. Once I’m confident the post is tight enough, I take another break. 

Edits // Round Three. For this phase, I read through the entire post, keeping an eye out for typos, missing words, awkward or confusing sentences, grammatical errors, messed up punctuation, repeated words, and more. This is also the stage where I forget literally everything I know about grammar and punctuation. 

Time: All told, this part take about thirty minutes. 

Break, Again. I just love taking breaks, okay. Breaks are like my favorite thing ever, along with books and pizza and Twenty One Pilots. 

Formatting. At long last, it’s time to copy and paste my post into the Blogger dashboard (or whatever it’s called). This is my second favorite step in the whole process. (Also, you might be wondering why I don’t just write the post directly in Blogger. It would make sense. But I have this minor phobia of accidentally publishing my unfinished work, so I take measures to keep that from happening. Capiche?) 

Here’s where I add pictures and check spacing and try to make sure everything looks at least halfway decent. After I’m happy with the formatting, I put it in preview mode and read the post in that window. Usually, in this pass, I notice a handful of smaller typos and punctuation issues that didn’t show up well in Scrivener, although sometimes I end up reworking large sections. For instance, in Monday’s post, I ended up deleting three entire paragraphs because I realized they just weren’t working for me. (Seriously, if you want to catch errors and problem spots you’ve grown blind to, changing the formatting helps a lot.) Once I’ve input these changes, I put the whole thing in preview mode again and do one more read-through, mostly to make sure I didn’t introduce any new errors when I was making my last round of edits. Then I muster my feeble courage, breathe a small prayer, and press the publish button. 

Time: Depending on how much formatting and editing needs to be done, this stage can take anywhere from one to three hours. 

Have Minor Meltdown. Okay, I don’t really have a meltdown, don’t worry. But I do immediately check my blog one more time, just to see that the post went up without a problem and that I didn’t miss some glaring formatting error (about 10% of the time I do actually find something that needs fixing). Then, I share my post on Twitter (if I remember to) and on my Facebook (if I feel the post is extra special). 

Wait. And then I wait and try not to check too often for comments. 

Conclusion. If I fudge the numbers a little (since I don’t keep track of my actual times and since not every post is the same), I would say the entire process takes about four to seven hours from start to finish, not counting breaks. Obviously individual posts will require different treatment on a case-by-case basis, but this list is just to give you a general idea of what I do. 

Now it's your turn, my little coffee beans. If you’re a blogger, what is your blogging method? How long does it usually take you to write and edit a post? And, since I feel like throwing in a random question, what are some of your hobbies (aside from blogging and reading)?

Beautiful Books #3 // The Editing Process

 Okay, so I’ve never participated in any linkups before, and I’m a little late in joining this set, as you can tell from the fact that this one is Beautiful Books #3, not #1 or #2. Oh well. I’m here now. So there.

In case you’re wondering, the Beautiful Books/Beautiful People linkups are hosted by Paper Fury and Sky @ Further Up and Further In, and their questions are always so cool. It was only a matter of time before I broke.

On a scale of 1 (worst) to 10 (best), how did the book turn out? Did anything defy your expectations?

Objectively speaking, my seven NaNo novels turned out to be spectacularly awful, but since I already expected them to be horrible, I haven’t suffered any disappointment on that count. Outsiders would probably give all seven rough drafts a one or a two, at best. Personally, I would give them anywhere from five to seven because, while I know they’re terrible and I know I’ll cringe while I’m rereading them in preparation for edits, I also know they have plenty of potential, and that’s really all I look for in a rough draft.

 

Comparative title time: what published books, movies, or TV shows are like your book? (Ex: Inkheart meets X-Men.)

This is a tricky one, since I don’t like writing novels that remind me of other stories. I’m not going to try to think up comp titles for all seven books, since that could take some time. But I guess one of my historical novels could be described as Beauty and the Beast meets Rapunzel (it’s a fairytale set during the time of the first Black Death outbreak in Europe.) And though I haven’t read the play yet myself, I’ve been told my satire on writing could possibly appeal to fans of SIX CHARACTERS IN SEARCH OF AN AUTHOR.

Do you enjoy working with deadlines and pressure (aka NaNoWriMo)? Or do you prefer to write-as-you’re-inspired?

I need deadlines, and I need pressure. If I know that I have all the time in the world, I won’t get nearly as much writing done. So NaNoWriMo and other short-term goals definitely help with that. There’s a reason why my younger write-as-you’re-inspired self never got anywhere.

How do you go about editing? Give us an insight into your editing process.

Instead of just dealing with different issues separately through lots of individual drafts, like most writers tend to do (from what I’ve seen), I rewrite my entire first draft, word for word, making all the necessary changes that I know are needed. Then, once that draft has cooled and received feedback, I handle all the tweaks and changes required, but again, all in one go. And I get more feedback and keep tweaking until I’m confident the book is officially finished.

 I use this editing process across the board, even for blog posts. It frees me up to write awful rough drafts—as horrifying as they need to be for me to get them out—because I know that I’m going to rewrite and reevaluate every single word anyway. So there’s really no need to bother writing something polished and beautiful on the first round. It won’t save me time. Anyway, the more work during the second draft, the better because the only time I truly feel like myself is when I’m in the midst of those extensive rewrites. At no other time does my head feel as clear and my thoughts as orderly and in control. Yes, you may go ahead and judge me now.

 

What aspect of your story needs the most work?

Does “everything” count as an aspect? *cue crazed laughter*

My plots need a whole lot of tightening and reordering since I hardcore pantsed my novels this month which does not make for a cohesive plot. But hey, that’s what editing is for. My dialogue needs some major fixing as well. And in rough drafts, I do all telling and no showing, so editing is when I need to think of more creative approaches to convey information without just telling it to the reader. Basically, with my NaNo novels, I just pulled together all the building materials I felt I was going to need and piled them up, and now I need to take all those materials and all the tools in my mind and I need to build something presentable. I seriously cannot tell you how much I love this process, as crazy difficult as it can be at times.

What aspect of your story did you love the most?

Despite the incalculable faults in all seven novels, I think that I succeeded in conveying at least a seed of the emotions that I wanted to capture (well, okay, so that’s what I tell myself). And if I have the beginnings of something, I can take it from there.

I actually wrote a large portion of character internal reflection in order to figure out how my babies tick, which means I have a rough map of all their motivations and conflicting issues and fatal flaws. Translation: Christmas came early.

Give us a brief rundown on your main characters and how you think they turned out. Do you think they’ll need changes in edits?

They began life as large piles of goopy clay, and I will have to give them shape and hone them during edits. Since I wrote more than one novel, I have a healthy handful of main characters and I’m only going to list the major ones here.

November (Ember for short) can’t stop destroying herself with the one last tiny seed of hope she has left. Miranda knows what she has to do but doesn’t have the strength and the confidence to do it. Edison has allowed his bitterness and his exhaustion to ruin his last year alive. Jaqueline is so grief-stricken she can’t even see well enough to stop the people around her from dying. Eve’s arrogance is ruining her. Rachel actively sabotages herself and her career. Aiden mistakes apathy for patience. Will is controlled by his fear and by his anger. Maebel won’t even let herself be free now that her controlling husband of sixty years is dead. Cambria is sweet, but she is too naïve and silly to protect herself from those who are eager to take advantage of her. Marianne can’t fight her irrational rage. Roderic is foolish enough to destroy everything just to save the woman he loves. And, last but not least, Lara has allowed her obsession with an unsolvable mystery to consume her.

While much of their respective core natures have been somewhat established, I still need to work at making them properly unique and three-dimensional and compelling and all that fun stuff. Also, I love how their most defining features, at this point, are their fatal flaws. *laughs maniacally* In edits, though, I will be sure to give them positive qualities to balance out their vulnerabilities.

What are your plans for this novel once you finish editing? More edits? Finding beta readers? Querying? Self-publishing? Hiding it in a dark hole forever?

Mad editing and then querying.

Share a favorite snippet!

This snippet is actually the very first paragraph I wrote during NaNoWriMo, and no, I haven’t edited it any, so it still needs a lot of work:

“She could see him. In the corner of her eye, she could see him, and he was so close there were still times she thought she would be able to reach out and touch him. Times when she spoke to him and was certain he would respond. Times when she forgot he was just a hallucination.”

What are you writing goals and plans for 2016?

In 2016, I plan to finish editing at least two rough drafts, maybe three. I have a few novels from last November that I haven’t touched yet, and I have the seven I wrote last month, so I’ve decided two of the ones I want to prioritize, but I’m not sure which other one I will add to my plate. At some point, if I’m feeling brave enough, I may have you vote to help me decide, but until then…

(Yeah, I was just too lazy to finish that last sentence, but if you want to think that I was doing that for dramatic effect, then by all means, do so.)

Other goals include writing 800,000 words next November if I can possibly manage that without killing myself. And I want to see if I can get some small freelance writing jobs on the side. In other words, it’s going to be busy year.

 

What about you, my little coffee beans? What are your plans for 2016, writing or otherwise? What is your editing process? If you participated in NaNoWriMo, how would you rate your work?