Every writer I’ve ever met, including myself, seems to be a little schizophrenic. In the same moment we love our work and the way we see our stories unfold, but at the same time we are disgusted that our work isn’t better. If you weren’t confused before you started writing, you’d soon get that way.

Learning to be objective about our work is important, but incredibly difficult to do. If you love every word you write, think all your characters are amazing, and that your plot line is breathtakingly unique and surprising, well, first, you’re wrong, and second, you’ll never improve if you think your work is already perfect.

Another thing to be careful about is rushing to judgement. Reading what you have just written five minutes ago is seldom helpful. Yes, you may notice some typos or obvious mistakes like calling your character by the wrong name, but the essence of the piece will be exactly as you expect it to be. Therefore, the first rule of being objective about your work is…

Don’t be in a hurry

When you have completed a chapter or a scene, it’s human nature to want to re-read it at once and move on. Yes, as I said, you may find some minor errors, but a lot of the stylistic problems and clumsiness that plagues all first drafts will probably escape your critical eye. That’s why most writers leave a minimum of six weeks before they read what they have written. Some will wait three months. The intent is to let the story go ‘cold’. Set it aside, forget about it, and come back to it after several weeks have passed. Only then will you see more clearly how well your story stands up. You may be pleasantly surprised — or not — but at least you’ll have a clearer idea of how your work is going.

Ask yourself some questions

Select a random page of roughly 1000 words and see how many adjectives and adverbs it contains. There is no perfect number, but if you are running well into double-digits, then you need to evaluate how many you really need.

How many passive sentences are there? MS Word can analyze this for you. Again, a couple of such sentences may work — more if they are part of the pattern of speech of one of the characters — but ideally you need to use them as little as possible.

What do your sentence lengths look like? Ideally, they should vary throughout the page. If they seem fairly uniform, for instance: “I went to the shop. I bought some bread. I made toast. I called my mother…” well, you get the drift, they will make you cringe, and make your reader stop reading. Sentences need to be dynamic. Change the rhythm, break up the way they flow, and, while you’re at it, change the way the sentences look on the page. You don’t want hard blocks of text that all look identical. Occasionally, drop a short sentence on its own into a paragraph, so it will draw the eye.

Like this.

Are you showing us what is happening, or just telling? That’s not to say that there is no place for some telling, but don’t overdo it. Keep your exposition to a minimum.

Have you repeated the same word too many times in the same block of writing? If your character always walks quickly, then you may want to turn ‘walk’ into a more urgent verb. Hurried, or rushed, for instance.

Does the piece of writing accomplish what you intended? Does it make the heroine more complex, for instance? Does the hero come across as a bit wet? Are any characters redundant?

Be honest in your appraisal and ruthless in your editing. But… hold on to your first draft. When you have finished your novel or short story, you may find some parts of it that work well, albeit in another part of the work, or even in another story altogether.

Get a second opinion

Yes, time to extol the virtues of the Beta reader again. Having someone with a good understanding of literature, a critical eye, and impeccable honesty is worth their weight in gold. Entrust them with your work. Take their opinion seriously, and listen carefully to what they tell you. You may not agree with all of it, but don’t dismiss them out of hand. Even if you don’t make all the changes they suggest, you may find as you go on that those recommendations are more sound than you originally thought.

Take good care of your Betas. A thank you note, a steak dinner, or a nice bottle of wine, will always be appreciated. After all, with their help, you’ll become the writer you always wanted to be.

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