A teacher assigns fifteen algebra problems as homework; it’s due the next school day. An accounting supervisor assigns an expense report reconciliation; it’s due before the end-of-month close. A parent assigns dinner dishes that must be done before a teen meets friends for a movie. Deadlines. There’s no escaping them. Some have more leeway than others. Like the dishes. Some are written in stone. Like those in publishing contracts.
When an author goes to contract, one of the first things s/he will have to decide is when s/he can reasonably deliver the sold manuscript. A first book is usually complete save for revisions, but a publisher will often make an offer for a second book, one which may be only a gleam in the author’s eye. Over the last fifteen years, I’ve signed many blind contracts — meaning I have a deadline to deliver a full manuscript on which I haven’t yet written a word. Yes, it happens. All the time. It’s the publisher making an investment.
How then does an author decide on delivery dates? What factors into that calculation? Unless an editor requests an author take part in a project that’s already scheduled, a holiday anthology, for example, which would require a story be turned in by a pre-determined date, most deadlines are up to the author to set. Sort of. I add that caveat because in genre fiction, once an author is seated in a publishing program, there are expectations of what s/he will produce. That investment, remember?
A category author writing for any of the Harlequin or Silhouette lines can usually count on at least two slots a year. Yes, some write more, some write less, but two makes for a good median. It’s the same with single title imprints. Editors will schedule an author’s releases every six to nine to twelve months, depending on how many established authors are writing for the house, the genres they represent, and the schedule’s needs.
In a perfect world, here’s how I would figure the delivery date on a 100K word manuscript. I can pretty easily write 1000 good words a day, so . . . 100 days x 1000 = 100,000 words. Because I write every day, and because I don’t draft but write finished product, I essentially need one hundred days to complete a single title length genre novel. What’s not figured into that calculation is the pre-planning of the book. The character development, the plotting, the research. Even coming up with the story premise. Usually, those are the things I jot notes on while writing my contracted work.
Let’s say I’ve done all that pre-planning. I know what I’m going to write about, have done enough character development, plotting, and research to get me started. Yes, more will be needed. The character development is fairly organic, falling into place as I write.
And 1000 words a day leaves a lot of time for working out plot twists and doing additional research. So, do I count off one hundred days on the calendar and give that date to my agent to offer my editor for my contract?
No. Way.
First of all, those one hundred days? Something is going to happen that will keep me from writing on a least one of them. Most likely more. Doctors appointments, car repairs, family functions. Some known. Some unexpected. I can stay up late to get the words done, but I don’t like doing that. I like to sleep. I can’t write when I’m not rested. Instead, I’m going to add at least two weeks to my 100 days — two weeks I may not need, but will provide a cushion if I do. (And if you’re on a regular publishing schedule and will have to deal with a previous book’s edits and proofs, build in that time, too.)
Then I’m going to add two more. Ideally, I’d add four, but I’ll stick with two. These days are important. And they don’t start until the book is done.
That’s right. These are the days I’m not going to touch the manuscript. I’m not going to open the file and futz with it. I’m not going to read a single page. I’m not even going to think about it. I’m going to set it aside and let it breathe and move on to another book. Once those two weeks have passed, I’ll come back to the story and read it again with a fresh eye and from the distance I’ve created. And because this is a perfect world, I’ve already added on another week to fix all the things I’m going to find that are wrong. Because I will find many things wrong. I know this because every time I read galleys before the book goes to press, I find repetition, overused words, awkward sentence structure, cliches, dialogue that doesn’t ring true.
(We’re up to 100 days and five weeks for those of you who’ve lost count.)
But I can’t afford to take five weeks on top of one hundred days, you say. My answer? You can’t afford not to. Remember, we’re building a perfect world scenario here. And in a perfect world, authors would take the time to let their stories breathe. They would not lose sleep to rush toward a deadline. They would not take vacation days to rush toward a deadline. They would not feed their family pizza or mac ‘n cheese for two weeks as they rush toward a deadline. In a perfect world, there would be no rushing toward deadlines.
I’ve heard authors say that no amount of time is going to change what they’ve wirtten. That their books are what they are. Because I see things in every one of my books that breathing room would have improved, I disagree. No, I don’t know their process. I’m not in their heads. But I think the biggest sin an author can commit is to rush a story, genre or not.
Now, losing sleep and taking vacation and eating pizza because the muse is demanding and the story has to get out is fine. Do that, then put the book away for two to four weeks. Come back. Polish and fix and tweak until it shines. But slamming through to the end and turning it in does no one any favors. Not the author, the editor, the readers, and especially not the book.
The feeling of writing “The End” is euphoric, but writing “The End” and knowing with just one more week, things could be made better is a bucket of cold water in euphoria’s face. No author wants to face massive revisions because s/he cut things too close to deadline and dropped a plot thread that impacts dozens of scenes. No author wants to face getting dinged by a reviewer because an approaching deadline had him/her taking a shortcut in characterization. And no author wants to lose a reader because in rushing toward the end, s/he relied on a cliche instead of an original plot device.
I wish that years ago I’d been advised to build breathing room into my contract delivery dates, and not just extra emergency time, but time to let the finished manuscript age. And really, I don’t even like to think of it as “building in” because that makes it sound disposable. As if it’s a luxury, an opt-in rather than a creative necessity. A lot of genre fiction takes a bad rap as being pulp, quickly and thoughtlessly churned out, and I can’t help but wonder if giving our work time to breathe wouldn’t be an effective counter to that complaint.
I haven’t always done so in the past, but in any future contracts I’m fortunate to sign, I’ll be including plenty of breathing room. I’m pretty sure the difference will show in my work – even if I have to eat a lot of Ramen to carry me those extra weeks between checks.
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