When Is A Story ‘Done’?

This month, I’m interviewing editors of short story collections – both in anthology and magazine format – about the process of selecting and publishing short stories. Those interviews will feature here shortly. In the meantime, I wanted to ask you about your writing process. In particular… when do you feel a story is ‘done’? How do you decide when it’s time to send your writing out into the world?

For me, there are two main stages:

1. knowing when a story is ready to send out to beta-readers
2. knowing when a story is ready to send out to publishers

Stage One

When do you decide it’s time to let go?

The first stage comes after I’ve:

• finished the story (obviously)
• put it aside for a while (at least a month), gotten on with other things
• re-read and edited it, deleting everything I can (usually 10% – 15%)
• if it’s for an anthology or competition, checked the word count (I’m always over), then deleted again until I’m under
• read it aloud to myself
• printed it out and read it in a different part of the house
• read it aloud to someone
• put it aside again, this time for a few days
• edited again, until I can’t see any flaws in the story – yet know there must be some (because there always are)

That’s when I know it’s time to enlist the help of a beta-reader (or few).

Beta-Reading

A friend asked me recently how I decide whom to trust with my writing. I thought that was an interesting question because, without knowing it, that’s exactly what we do when we ask someone to beta-read for us. It can’t be just anyone! We have to trust them.

For me, a good beta-reader is someone who:

• writes or reads in a similar genre to my story
• if they write, writes in a way I like
• can use Word’s reviewing tools
• lets me help them in return

Oh, and of course they must be available! There’s no use sending your writing to someone who can’t get to it for months. I’m lucky enough to have beta-readers who can generally get any story I send them back to me within a week or so. I do the same for them, just because it lessens the agony of waiting. We agonise enough when we send our work to publishers, editors and agents (oh soooo much!!). But between us writers, we can cut out some of that worry!

Stage Two

It’s exciting when I get my beta-read back. Because I trust my writery friends, I can’t wait to see what plot holes they’ve picked up, what typos they’ve found and what they didn’t understand at all. I know they’ll rip my story into fine shreds for me – because that’s what I do for them – and I’m excited to receive the information that’s going to build me a better, stronger story.

So, beta-read in hand, I:

• read through all the comments
• immediately change anything easy to fix, without reading the story through from its beginning
• brainstorm the harder changes, fix them, again without reading the story through from its beginning
• if it’s for an anthology or competition, check the word count again (I’m always over)
• finally I read through from the beginning, deleting everything I can
• put it aside again, this time for a few days
• print it out and read it in a different part of the house
• edit again, until my eyes are bleeding

Sometimes, although I’ve already had the help of several beta-readers, I’ll repeat the entire process again – especially when I’ve created a highly imaginative world, or I’ve a nagging doubt I simply can’t identify.

How do I know when to stop the beta-reading process?

I guess when the suggestions I get back from my beta-readers are relatively fine points, points that should be changed (because they’ve been spotted) but which in all likelihood wouldn’t have caused an editor to reject the story had those points been left. Sometimes I get to that stage after the first round of beta-reading, sometimes later. Either way, when the suggestions are that minor, it’s time to let go.

Letting Go!

I still wait an extra day or so, in case I wake in the middle of the night with inspiration or doubt, but that’s more or less the end.

Now, looking back over this post, my process sounds somewhat laborious. I wasn’t always so particular about refining my work before sending it out – but, do you know what, that was back when I didn’t get published or win any competitions!

Different processes work for different writers and this is the way that works best for me. Yes, it can be hard work… but then isn’t anything that’s worthwhile? What do you think – is your process similar, or very very different? Please let me know in the comments below!