“10 Commandments From a Hollywood Producer”
May 29, 2014
“Backheifen” in the Last Waveson
June 1, 2014

Second Draft Begins

uber

Today I am attempting a second draft of my Young Adult novel, The Last Waveson: Grafting. After spending a week at the Blue Ridge Mountain Christian Writer’s Conference, I have lots of new ideas. Thanks to wonderful classes by Zena Dell Lowe, Steve Laube, and DiAnn Mills.

I have a few other new ideas thanks to random information I have been learning from my new favorite time waster–Uber facts. I have learned all kinds of neat foreign words that we don’t have in English. My new favorite is Backpfeifengezicht. It literally means, “a face that needs to be punched or slapped”. This idea is going into my book today. I have the perfect spot for it.

I am currently at 71,000 words. I am going to put a villain scene in the book and add some other cool ideas to push the words to closer to 100,000. I hope to be done in a few days.

I am excited to attempt to improve on my book, but hopefully I don’t mess it up. Is this a common worry?

Anyone have any great wisdom or advice for the second draft?

Cyle Young
Cyle Young
Cyle a binge writer, pastor, and cinnamon roll savant. He spends his day devising how to make the world a better place through the Gospel of Jesus and creating fantastic adventure for his fantasy characters in The Last Waveson novels. He is co-creator of All Out Sports and an avid indoorsman. :) He likes air conditioning more than fleas, ticks, or wasps.

2 Comments

  1. Gretchen says:

    I also had the pleasure of learning from the same people at the conference and love how as you add 30,000 ish words on your 2nd draft after absorbing what you learned, I am now attempting to delete at least 30,000 if not 70,000 words from my book which ended up so long I tried to make it into a trilogy and am now going to try and make it a single book again, (of non LOTR length)!
    In an effort to not “mess it up” I plan to highlight the chapters and sections that I am deleting so they will be very easy to find if I cut too much. I have also been using text to speech to listen to my entire story which has resulted in two things. One, I’m able to get through the whole story without feeling compelled to ‘fix’ as I read. Two, I now have an awesome twist at the end of the book that will really surprise and engage the readers and I’m excited to weave it in!

    • Cyleyoung says:

      I think I would rather add 30,000 than cut 70,000. I wish you the best. I am excited to hear you have added a twist. You can always use the stuff you cut for a novella.