What do you think?
Rate this book
The Ten Day Novelist #2
The Ten Day Draft: A Writer's Guide to Finishing A Novel in Ten Days
It's time to begin your next great adventure.
It's time to write a novel!
Through this simple ten day challenge, The Ten Day Draft will help you break through the mental barriers that are preventing you from writing a novel. Along the way, it'll guide you step-by-step through every stage of your first draft, so you'll never have to wonder—what comes next?
You’ll learn to:
•Manage your mindset and avoid the crippling burnout many writers face.
•Use story structure to guide and strengthen your writing process.
•Keep your ideas fresh, even after writing thousands of words.
•Craft a compelling story using a system you can repeat for future novels.
•Bring it all together in a final first draft just waiting to be sent into the world!
Each day of this outlining challenge comes with easy to follow prompts and intuitive goals, simplifying the writing process. By the end, The Ten Day Draft will have proven that yes, you CAN write a novel!
It's time to write a novel!
Through this simple ten day challenge, The Ten Day Draft will help you break through the mental barriers that are preventing you from writing a novel. Along the way, it'll guide you step-by-step through every stage of your first draft, so you'll never have to wonder—what comes next?
You’ll learn to:
•Manage your mindset and avoid the crippling burnout many writers face.
•Use story structure to guide and strengthen your writing process.
•Keep your ideas fresh, even after writing thousands of words.
•Craft a compelling story using a system you can repeat for future novels.
•Bring it all together in a final first draft just waiting to be sent into the world!
Each day of this outlining challenge comes with easy to follow prompts and intuitive goals, simplifying the writing process. By the end, The Ten Day Draft will have proven that yes, you CAN write a novel!
- GenresWritingNonfictionEbooks
161 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 29, 2019
235 people are currently reading
129 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
February 16, 2020
'There's no point in beating around the bush - having a well-built outline is essential for this challenge.'
The first thing you need to know is that this book assumes you have a familiarity with story structure in general and a plan for your novel (or as close to one as possible). You can either create one using the author's previous book - The Ten Day Outline: A Writer's Guide to Planning a Novel in Ten Days, or by whichever other method(s) work for you. But you won't get much out of this book if you don't come prepared with some kind of idea for a plot. Logical, really.
The Ten Day Draft guides you through just that - ten days of actually getting shit done! Gasp! But seriously, it's a well thought out, step-by-step guide that will challenge you to put your big boy/girl pants on, quit making excuses and just fucking do it*. It even breaks you in gently too, with a 'day zero' dedicated to getting yourself organised physically, mentally and also in making sure you do actually have some kind of story plan to work with.
There's a chapter for every day of the challenge, telling you exactly what you need to get done along with plenty of helpful tips to get you there. Most days involve working further along/into the story structure, and you'll be chipping away at your novel before you know it. A bullet-point list at the end of each chapter summarises that day's goals, and you'll also be told how many scenes (approx) you should have so far along with the (approx) wordcount, and also at what point of their journey your protagonist should be at.
I've read plenty of books on writing and I approach new ones with a squinty, suspicious look (especially if I can't borrow it via KU), but I like this one. I like it a lot. I honestly can't see how someone could fail to get a first draft done if they knuckled down and completed this challenge. It doesn't even have to be ten consecutive days, though -arguably- consecutive might be better for keeping up momentum.
Personally, I would recommend that you read the entire book first so you get an overall view of what you'll be doing, then print out/write down the daily summaries. Or grab a hard copy if you can (I will be, eventually) as they're much easier to flick back and forth through and you can use sticky index tabs to mark important bits.
I'll be trying this myself soon. Will update this review with my results.
*I'd like to point out that Mr Jorstad is more understanding and much nicer about it than me. He doesn't swear. I have a potty mouth and low tolerance :D.
The first thing you need to know is that this book assumes you have a familiarity with story structure in general and a plan for your novel (or as close to one as possible). You can either create one using the author's previous book - The Ten Day Outline: A Writer's Guide to Planning a Novel in Ten Days, or by whichever other method(s) work for you. But you won't get much out of this book if you don't come prepared with some kind of idea for a plot. Logical, really.
The Ten Day Draft guides you through just that - ten days of actually getting shit done! Gasp! But seriously, it's a well thought out, step-by-step guide that will challenge you to put your big boy/girl pants on, quit making excuses and just fucking do it*. It even breaks you in gently too, with a 'day zero' dedicated to getting yourself organised physically, mentally and also in making sure you do actually have some kind of story plan to work with.
There's a chapter for every day of the challenge, telling you exactly what you need to get done along with plenty of helpful tips to get you there. Most days involve working further along/into the story structure, and you'll be chipping away at your novel before you know it. A bullet-point list at the end of each chapter summarises that day's goals, and you'll also be told how many scenes (approx) you should have so far along with the (approx) wordcount, and also at what point of their journey your protagonist should be at.
I've read plenty of books on writing and I approach new ones with a squinty, suspicious look (especially if I can't borrow it via KU), but I like this one. I like it a lot. I honestly can't see how someone could fail to get a first draft done if they knuckled down and completed this challenge. It doesn't even have to be ten consecutive days, though -arguably- consecutive might be better for keeping up momentum.
Personally, I would recommend that you read the entire book first so you get an overall view of what you'll be doing, then print out/write down the daily summaries. Or grab a hard copy if you can (I will be, eventually) as they're much easier to flick back and forth through and you can use sticky index tabs to mark important bits.
I'll be trying this myself soon. Will update this review with my results.
*I'd like to point out that Mr Jorstad is more understanding and much nicer about it than me. He doesn't swear. I have a potty mouth and low tolerance :D.
July 23, 2020
tl;dr: this book is very helpful... but is the least impactful of the series.
Now that you know what you're getting yourself into, let's break down why this book isn't as good as the rest of the series, but also why you should get it anyway.
For a lot of people who read The Ten Day Outline, Jorstad's first book in the series, this book is going to repeat information, sometimes down to the very same examples. As in, I'd say about 20% of this book is note-for-note repeats of his Outline edition. At this point, most of what you're doing is... writing. Which, makes sense. You've hit the writing point after the outlining point and you need to get it on the page.
But for me, a lot of the inherent value in this book came from two things: first, I am a completionist. If I like the beginning of a series, I'll buy the laggy middle, even if I don't find it as important or helpful. Second, my to-do list oriented mind really liked his day-by-day breakdown of "by this day, you should be around here in your novel." Did I finish my draft in 10 days? No. It took me around 30, because I'm a single parent with a life that sometimes gets in the middle of my writing career. But did it speed up my drafting? Heck yeah, it did. In addition to the daily encouragement that says "you should be here," I liked his advice to break your book down in scenes, not chapters. Previously, I'd go to write a chapter, stare at the blank page, and think "that's so much." For this, I looked at each scene as an individual unit, and when I sat down to write, all I needed to tackle was the one upcoming scene. That tip singlehandedly helped break a lot of the writers block I faced.
This book is not for:
-Writers who don't use the three-act structure
-Writers who expect this book to contain drastically new material compared to The Ten Day Outline
This book is for:
-Writers who like a solid to-do list each day
-Participants in NaNoWriMo or similar challenges, who are aiming to write a full draft in a limited amount of time and need to know a tangible process toward doing that
Now that you know what you're getting yourself into, let's break down why this book isn't as good as the rest of the series, but also why you should get it anyway.
For a lot of people who read The Ten Day Outline, Jorstad's first book in the series, this book is going to repeat information, sometimes down to the very same examples. As in, I'd say about 20% of this book is note-for-note repeats of his Outline edition. At this point, most of what you're doing is... writing. Which, makes sense. You've hit the writing point after the outlining point and you need to get it on the page.
But for me, a lot of the inherent value in this book came from two things: first, I am a completionist. If I like the beginning of a series, I'll buy the laggy middle, even if I don't find it as important or helpful. Second, my to-do list oriented mind really liked his day-by-day breakdown of "by this day, you should be around here in your novel." Did I finish my draft in 10 days? No. It took me around 30, because I'm a single parent with a life that sometimes gets in the middle of my writing career. But did it speed up my drafting? Heck yeah, it did. In addition to the daily encouragement that says "you should be here," I liked his advice to break your book down in scenes, not chapters. Previously, I'd go to write a chapter, stare at the blank page, and think "that's so much." For this, I looked at each scene as an individual unit, and when I sat down to write, all I needed to tackle was the one upcoming scene. That tip singlehandedly helped break a lot of the writers block I faced.
This book is not for:
-Writers who don't use the three-act structure
-Writers who expect this book to contain drastically new material compared to The Ten Day Outline
This book is for:
-Writers who like a solid to-do list each day
-Participants in NaNoWriMo or similar challenges, who are aiming to write a full draft in a limited amount of time and need to know a tangible process toward doing that
April 30, 2020
There are several books that do deep dives into the how, whys, and wherefores of writing a novel. The Ten Day Draft, by Lewis Jorstad, stands out from the rest by being accessible. Jorstad takes the beginning writer on a ten step guided tour for the beginning novelist eager to tell the story inside them. He covers all the bases of premise, conflict, structure, character, scene, and chapter. He knows when a writer is likely to feel overwhelmed and talks them through it. His method is flexible (ten days, a month, ten weeks) and refreshingly open-ended. The Ten Day Draft is the one book a beginning novelist needs.
November 16, 2020
Great book. I'm not following this one as closely as I did the 10 Day Draft, but it is a very good refresher of the draft. These books have made writing a novel possible. I have had zero writers block because I keep following the plan set up in the draft. Very easy to follow book. Very to the point. The four novels he uses as examples are familiar and help to hit home his points. I love how Jorstad recaps the goals from each day at the end of each chapter and at the end of the book - very easy to revisit later.
September 11, 2020
Loved it!
November 19, 2020
Very informative. I wish had had read before attempting to write it would have saved me a lot of wasted time.
April 23, 2021
Great tips and guidance to keep things on track.
August 3, 2022
Good advice for beginners
Lots of good advice here, especially for the novice novelist. Expect a lot of repetition if you’ve read the previous book, the ten day outline.
Lots of good advice here, especially for the novice novelist. Expect a lot of repetition if you’ve read the previous book, the ten day outline.
April 14, 2024
Looks like a self-published hack book, but actually bears solid advice with a positive, encouraging attitude.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews