Share Your Draft Notes

[gloomyMoron]

To have draft notes, one must draft. I tend to be a "pantser" in that I will write pretty much the whole ~whatever I'm working on~ just from the thoughts and rough outline in my head. The hard part is actually writing. Blank pages be scary, yo. Also: Distactions, distactions [sic] everywhere.

 

[anthrodisiac]

To have draft notes, one must draft. I tend to be a "pantser" in that I will write pretty much the whole ~whatever I'm working on~ just from the thoughts and rough outline in my head. The hard part is actually writing. Blank pages be scary, yo. Also: Distactions, distactions [sic] everywhere.

I don't outline at all, I'm a pantser who will, on very rare occasion, put some forethought into what they write. These are all notes I have in my drafts — rough, second, third. I like to leave notes rather than get stuck on things so I can keep it moving along. I leave Future Me tasks to do later when I'm editing, basically. Most of them come when I'm in the rough draft stage, though if I get stuck editing and I really don't know how I'm feeling and want to let it sit before making a decision, I'll also add a note to go check on it on the next pass.

 

[TheLobster]

...I mean...
TODO: figure out if you want nipples

Yes.
The answer is yes.

 

[sirhugs]

...I mean...
TODO: figure out if you want nipples

well, do you?

 

[sirhugs]

I don't outline at all, I'm a pantser who will, on very rare occasion, put some forethought into what they write. These are all notes I have in my drafts — rough, second, third. I like to leave notes rather than get stuck on things so I can keep it moving along. I leave Future Me tasks to do later when I'm editing, basically. Most of them come when I'm in the rough draft stage, though if I get stuck editing and I really don't know how I'm feeling and want to let it sit before making a decision, I'll also add a note to go check on it on the next pass.

you do third drafts?
who ARE you?

 

[TheLobster]

you do third drafts?
who ARE you?

He’s been allegedly hanging around here since the Mesozoic Era, so I guess he does have time for indulgences like third drafts.

 

[sirhugs]

He’s been allegedly hanging around here since the Mesozoic Era, so I guess he does have time for indulgences like third drafts.

I thought that was just why their stories are so LONG
(they prefer not to be gendered)

 

[FromManyOne]

...I mean...
TODO: figure out if you want nipples

I actually have this note in my about-to-be-finished novella:

Male humans have nipples because they share those genes with female counterparts. Male minotaurs do not have female counterparts.

 

[gloomyMoron]

I actually have this note in my about-to-be-finished novella:

Did you know that bulls have small teats/nipples on or just in front of their scrotum? I think that fact would be interesting enough to warrant your Minotaurs having nipples on their own.

N-no, I'm not trying to make cow-girls a thing.

 

[FromManyOne]

Did you know that bulls have small teats/nipples on or just in front of their scrotum? I think that fact would be interesting enough to warrant your Minotaurs having nipples on their own.

I was consciously trying to make the minotaur very strange and nonhuman. His eyes are on the sides of his head, for instance. He can't lie on his side because the horns dig into the ground. (He looks sort of like a Texas longhorn.) His voice is super-nasal for a human (but very deep).

 

[TropicalTwist]

Hey, I finally have one and I made it just now too:

have a stupidly dramatic scene: he dies when he cums in the midst of visions of wheat and a reaper? hood falls back and reveals it is his partner?

 

[gloomyMoron]

Hey, I finally have one and I made it just now too:

In the immortal words of Australian alternative rock band TISM, "I reckon it's worth it." Or, as Lonely Island and Akon would say: "Doesn't matter; had sex."

 

[anthrodisiac]

you do third drafts?
who ARE you?

Three drafts for me is like bare minimum. I'm usually somewhere around 5 or 6 on average, though I've gotten up to 14. Sometimes these fucking things do not want to cooperate

 

[ClintonBrooks]

Here's one I have in my current WIP

write with all five senses.

I don't do this...not that I haven't wanted to...just because I haven't considered it before. I'm still not using all five all the time, but I am using more than one now.

From a romantasy book I am working on in my spare time.

Make sure Renee has Agency throughout the story. She wants this…it doesn’t just happen to her!

From the same romantasy...

Harry confronts Theil when he's first sent to Earth.

"Where are my (two swords, need a name for them. Not Lucy and Mary, but the overall thing that they are called. Like Bowie knives.)

Make them 13" long from the handle. Sure, swords can be longer, but these give speed, flexibility and agility.

Research "fighting with two knives" and "fighting with two swords" on YouTube and internet.

So I pictured what I want for the story, but didn't have a name for them at the time. I've since "made up" a word (Sabada) as I work on a language. But I will have the MC fighting with them at some point, and I haven't written a sword fight before and want to do it with some sense of reality.

 

[anthrodisiac]

Aww, Past Anthy was so nice, even if she half-assed buttering me up:

TODO: Future Anthy, I trust thy judgement, for thou art something something compliment.

 

[TheLobster]

Aww, Past Anthy was so nice, even if she half-assed buttering me up:

I might be misremembering Shakespeare, but wasn't "I thou thee!" supposed to be an insult?

 

[anthrodisiac]

I might be misremembering Shakespeare, but wasn't "I thou thee!" supposed to be an insult?

That fucking bitch! She knows I'm not boned up on Shakespeare... Sneaky cow.

 

[anthrodisiac]

Normally I just include the note and not the thing attached to it, but I'm making an exception.

(TODO: Okay, you need to calm down, dork. Future Anthy, Current Anthy is having too much fun being unhinged. Please keep her in check, because me, who is also Current Anthy, has no desire to be sage about what batshit nonsense to keep.)

In his haste to disrobe and get warm, he’d tousled his hair into an approximation of the nest of a pigeon on crack, heroin, alcohol, LSD, and barbiturates, with a dose of brain hemorrhaging for good measure — which is to say, not that different from a regular pigeon’s nest.

 

[txblush]

@anthrodisiac Draft Notes! WTH are those! Sorry, anthro, I'm not trying to derail your thread.

But after I jotted down everything I could think of on my current WIP series. I was looking for a thread to post it in. I wrote my notes on a Word document it's 814 words.

Edit: Heading over to the Feedback Thread.

 

[txblush]

@NuclearFairy Believe me, I know it's shocking but I'm a stream-of-consciousness writer and I'm learning how to change that one day at a time after a four-year hiatus from Lit.

 

[NuclearFairy]

@NuclearFairy Believe me, I know it's shocking but I'm a stream-of-consciousness writer and I'm learning how to change that one day at a time after a four-year hiatus from Lit.

You could just call the stream-of-consciousness the first draft?

 

[txblush]

You could just call the stream-of-consciousness the first draft?

I could. But I had edited it to the best of my ability when I wrote the original story and multiple versions with issues. That I didn't know how to fix. I learn something new about myself as a writer and this community is my favorite place to roam in the AH Forum, binge-reading threads that pique my interest and educate me too.

 

[Seurat]

Taking a quick look at some of my most recent works in progress, I see:

"Does Syracuse have parks?"

"Make a list of famous movie cars that have names."

"How fast does a stock golf cart travel?"

"How would a vampire react to a woman on her period?"

"Is there a canonical list of tropes for Loving Wives? If not, you might have to make one."

 

[anthrodisiac]

It's good that Current Anthy is realizing that breaking into asides this often is detrimental to the pace and flow of the story:

TODO: c’mon, birb, not everything has to be an aside joke, it’s getting to be a bit much. Keep it tighter, for Mommy… No, I don’t know who Mommy is either, but if she reads this, you’ll have wished you’d kept it tight for her

Edit: Apparently not enough to stop herself though:

TODO: what did I just say?

 

[sirhugs]

It's good that Current Anthy is realizing that breaking into asides this often is detrimental to the pace and flow of the story:


Edit: Apparently not enough to stop herself though:

Methinks that Current Anthy ought to give Future Anthy more credit for not being totally stupid.