Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-35243524-20180407190917/@comment-28428152-20180409003531

I'll have to agree with them. The plot is rushed, the characters have no depth, and the writing is also obviously very rushed. Writing takes time, and I can tell that you probably spent very little time with this before asking for review. For example, in my story The Journal of Sullivan Jones, I have a total editing time of more than 2 days according to MSW. It's also about 20 pages, but I'm guessing that with good plot development, good character development, and appropriate detail, this could easily be a 10-15 page story at the least. The one I'm currently working on is now at 30 pages and shows over 8 days of editing time, but I think I left it open overnight a few times.

A good outline for how to go about the writing process:

1.) Planning. Make an outline of your plot. Write out any themes you want to have within the story. Decide who your characters are, add backgrounds, flesh out their personalities, their quirks. Add depth to them. Figure out how you want them to be changed by the end (character arc). And do all the research that you can think to do and make notes. Any additional research can easily done in any of the steps before Step 6.

2.) Rough Draft. Just write, don't worry about grammar, don't worry about plot holes or anything. As ideas and flaws come to you, just make a list of everything you want to add, change, or remove.

3.) Plot Edit. Go back to those notes you made during the first step and apply them.

4.) Peer Review. This is when you send it off to your friends or the Writer's Workshop to get some additional insights. Polish up your writing a bit, but don't be super anal. Just make the writing enjoyable to read, make sure your sentences flow and that they make sense. DOn't worry about grammar/spelling/punctuation yet.

5.) Line Editing. Well, first apply any changes that you might want to make based off of your peer reviews. Then go back and polish up the story even more. FIx every grammar/spelling/punctuation error you can find, make the formatting pleasing to the eye, and make sure that the writing is even more pleasant to read than it was after you were done prepping it for Peer Review. Then proofread at least twice, if not three times (the longer your story, the more you'll want to repeat the proffreading process).

6.) Post your story and let everyone eat it up. Or send to a publisher. Or both.