Tackling the Top 6 Pitfalls of a Manuscript to Craft a Great Novel
You finally put that last word on the page and are ready to say your story is written. Well done. Writing a first draft is quite an accomplishment. Celebrate that win. Give yourself and your story a little time to breathe. However, before you send that lovely story into the world, you need to take off the writer’s hat and put on your editor’s hat. Editing your story is where the magic of your book really starts. Creating a remarkable novel is an adventure filled with twists and turns, a few bumps, and even some pitfalls. Whether you are a newbie or a seasoned writer, avoiding these common mistakes can make a huge difference in your story. If your story has one or all of these mistakes in it, don’t feel bad. I’ve got some tips to help you overcome these challenges to make your story better.
The story starts too early or too late
This mistake is all about context. Either you are giving too much or too little.
An example of giving too much context is spending the first three chapters just giving the back story of your main character. It’s great that you know your character through and through but you lost your reader. They want to get into the meat of the story, the conflict of the here and now. What you are doing is like having an on-ramp to the highway that is too long and the reader wonders if they will ever actually get on.
On the other side, you are jumping into the middle of the action with no context. Your reader gets confused and has no idea what is going on. They wonder why they should even care. This is like having no ramp onto the highway. Your reader must somehow jump into traffic without any warning and hope they don’t crash.
How to fix it:
If your story starts too early, the best thing to do is cut the beginning up to the point of the day when everything changes. The stuff you cut can be added as backstory later in the story. Use it to develop your character.
If your story starts too late, take the first scene and back it up so there is some context. Let the reader see how the action begins instead of sitting them right in the middle of it. Introduce your reader to the protagonist and the situation they find themselves. Give them a reason to care about the protagonist and the action is about to happen.
2. No conflict
Every story needs a conflict. I mean, why are we even reading this story if everything is hunky dory and life is great? Stories are about a person changing because of conflict. If your protagonist doesn’t want something then there is no conflict. If nothing is standing in their way or they get what they want too easily, there is no conflict. Readers want to see your protagonist go through hard things externally and internally to overcome the odds and come out changed and victorious. Give them that.
How to fix it:
Go back to your main character. Ask yourself, “What does my main character want? This is the most important question you can ask of your character. What is standing in their way from getting what they want?”
3. No narrative drive
This problem happens when random things happen to the protagonist. There is no cause and effect. In the real world, something happens to us. Then we must make a decision. Then we must take action. Whatever decision and action we take there are positive or negative consequences (often there are both) which we then have to make decisions and take more action. When you don’t have this cause and effect trajectory in your story, the logic in the story falls apart and character development falls flat because the character does not seem to take an active role in the story. Your readers will struggle to engage with the plot and characters and may lose interest in the book altogether.
How to fix it.
Do an outline of your scenes. Does one scene lead to another? Do the actions and decisions of your characters drive one scene to the next? Take a good look at your outline. Decide where you need to edit, add, or delete scenes so that there is a logical drive to your story.
4. Nothing at stake
The stakes of a story are crucial. It provides a sense of urgency, tension, and emotional investment. What happens if your protagonist does not get what they want? The stakes get your reader to care about the predicament your character is in.
You also need to look at whether there are real consequences to the decisions and actions that your protagonist makes. Stakes push characters to make difficult choices, take risks, and evolve as a person through the story.
How to fix it:
Go back to your character id. Make sure you know their desires and motivations. Next, take your outline go through each scene, and write why the decisions made or action taken is important to your main character emotionally. Make sure the emotion is on the page. Think through each action and decision of your main character. Make sure that the consequences of those actions provide a sense of urgency and raise the stakes.
5. No resolution
The problem with this mistake is your ending falls flat. You don’t give the reader the emotional payoff you have been promising throughout the whole book. The external problem may have been solved like they catch the murderer, but the internal transformation for the protagonist isn’t on the page. An example of this is why it was so important to the protagonist to catch the murderer.
How to fix it:
Go back to your main character and define their arc of change. Answer these questions.
What is the transformation your character goes through?
Where should they end up externally and internally?
Make sure your ending shows that transformation.
6. Random Elements
This mistake is subplots and secondary characters that take away from your story rather than add to it. Please do not take this as me saying, “You can’t have subplots and secondary characters!” No. What I am saying is don’t have subplots and secondary characters who take away from the story.
Random elements also include big info dumps and descriptions that should be transformed into a scene instead of just boring the reader. For example, the reader does not need long descriptions of the weather unless it is a vital part of the story.
How to fix it:
This is painful advice but cut out the unneeded subplots, characters, info dumps, and descriptions.
Ok, I feel like this can be a lot to take in and even a little intimidating as you look at your manuscript and start to edit. Don’t stress. Editing is a process. You are digging through your novel looking for those diamonds. I’m helping you clear away the dirt so you can find them. I’m going to spend the next several blog posts going deeper into each of these problem areas to help you recognize if your story is struggling because of any of these mistakes. If you do have any of these pitfalls or all of them in your novel, that’s okay. It is better to edit a crappy first draft than to have nothing at all. This is where you get to improve your writing and yourself as a writer. Have fun going back in discovering more about your story.
If you found any of these insights helpful, I’d love to hear from you. Send me an e-mail at elyse.j.seal@gmail.com with your questions about overcoming any of these pitfalls. I’d love to talk to you about your book.
