202: How I Stay Organized as an Author

 

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How I Stay Organized as an Author

 

Hi friend, welcome back to Your Big Creative Life podcast. Thank you for being here and for listening. It's a crazy week for me this week with editing. I have so much editing to do. Occasionally I get a week like this. It doesn't happen often, but occasionally it does because my coaching clients have... flexibility with when they submit pages to me and when I do the manuscript evaluation. I have a six-month coaching program where people send me pages as they're writing and then I do a full round of editing. And they kind of like get priority in a sense that like they don't have a set date of like, oh, well, you have to send me your pages on October 10th and that's your date. Like it's more fixed for editing clients, but with coaching clients, it's more, it fluctuates. And so I just happened to have multiple coaching clients send me pages this week, which is great and lovely and I'm happy to do it, but it means I have a lot and I have to plan out my work week very carefully.

And I also took some time off. My husband and I went up to the North Carolina mountains for a couple days, which was amazing. It was our first trip together without my daughter. And we got an Airbnb outside of Boone, North Carolina, which, and it was like, the leaves were just starting to change. It was gorgeous. It was amazing. And she stayed with my mother-in-law for a couple days. And it was great. But I'm like, I've been away from her twice now. In September, I was away from her twice. And it's just like, okay, I'm good for a while. Like it was hard. But anyways, it was really nice to take that time away, but it means I'm kind of playing catch up a bit too. So anyways, but I want to get a podcast episode out because I don't want to fall too behind. I try to be a couple of weeks ahead with my podcast episodes and that way it's like less stressful for me and I don't panic.

So, but I did want to talk about this because I've had it on my list for a while to talk about this in a podcast episode, but it just keeps getting pushed because I have other things to talk about that feel more important. But and I suppose the reason for that this episode is not going to be like a deep dive into the perfect, detailed, complicated organizational system that you should use or presenting all kinds of different options. I'm just going to talk you all through my tips on staying organized when I write because I'm like a type B writer, okay? I'm not a type A person where I have files and everything's color-coded and I just like really get into all of that because that's not, I haven't found it necessary first of all, but then second of all, that's just not my style with how I stay organized. I haven't found it necessary. So I'll just be sharing what I do. And if you want more deep dive, a more like thorough deep dive into some particular strategy, I'm sure that there's content out there that goes into that.

But yeah, I just want to share my experience from writing three books, starting a fourth, and I write in Microsoft Word now, I did write one book mostly in Google Docs, but now I'm a Word girl. Everything I write in Word. When I dictate stuff, so sometimes I will dictate, and I'll talk into my phone. What I do is either dictate directly into Microsoft Word or I will compose an e-mail to myself on the Gmail app, dictate into it, just talk, and then I'll copy and paste that into Microsoft Word. So that's what I write. I don't use Scrivener. I know that Scrivener has a ton of bells and whistles and features that make organizations Organizing your thoughts and your research and your world-building, Scrivener makes all of that possible, and I've heard wonderful things about it. I have a ton of clients that use it and love it, but again, I just haven't really... found it necessary, I guess, to use Scrivener. And so I can't speak to that. But again, just like with, if you want a deep dive on something, I'm sure there's tons of content out there that goes into Scrivener. Scrivener is also; you have to pay for it. And I'm not sure how, I can't remember how much it is. And you do have to pay for Microsoft Word as well, but it's much more affordable. And yeah, I just, it works for me. So that's the context that I need to give. Microsoft Word is my main go-to. And I've written three books. I think that's it. Okay.

So, #1, what I do to stay organized to keep everything, keep track of everything. Number one, everything lives in the cloud so I can work on it everywhere. Hopefully this is kind of common sense, but I just want to mention it because you want to have a backup of everything that you do. And also, if you're somewhere else, you're away from your computer, you get a lightning bolt of inspiration about something, of course you can just take notes about it on your notes app, but I like being able to open up my document wherever I am. This is something I did when I was, before I had Word on my phone, when I was working on my second book, I had the Google Drive app, and so I had Google Docs, and I would just open up my Google Doc of my manuscript when I was like, somewhere and I wanted to write, I could open it up my phone and type that way. This was before I tried dictating. So, like if I were, I don't know, waiting in line somewhere and I had some time to kill and I felt like I wanted to work on my book, I could just open it up on my phone and type that way.

So, I didn't have to be at my computer because it's not like the document was saved on my computer. And it's also good, again, just to have a backup of absolutely everything. All of my stuff lives in the cloud, client work, like editing documents, my own writing, the podcast stuff. Everything lives there, so that there's a backup in case something happens with my computer or whatever device that I'm on. I think it's just a good practice, so everything lives in the cloud. That's tip number one. Number 2, I have one... outline or I put outline slash notes doc where everything lives. I have my manuscript, right? This is the actual book as I'm writing it that I contribute to. And then I also have a notes document, which is where all, it's a brain dump document. All of my Research, if I've done any research and I need to write something, I need to compile something, I need to get some facts together, it all goes in that document. Any outlining that I've done, I'm not a big outliner, but I do plan out some things. I'll usually write a couple things down in bullet points or just write a few sentences, just kind of stream of consciousness about my plan for the book or the main character. That all goes in there.

If I'm doing any character work where I do a character profile on my main character, let's say, and I really want to dive into their backstory, their personality, their strengths or weaknesses, that all goes in the document. I don't have it divided up any fancy way, but I will just have research in one section. I'll scroll down a couple pages, then my characters will be there. scroll down a couple pages and my plot outline will be there. Like it's all just in the same document so that I don't have to go searching for things. I just know it's going to be in that document somewhere. And the document's not very long. I know that for people who do speculative fiction, if you're writing sci-fi, if you're writing fantasy, if you're writing horror, and you have some kind of world building in the sense that you are creating an imaginary world, maybe a magic system, I know that there's more that you have to do in terms of that. But I think, even if I were writing fantasy, I would probably just still do it this way and have like a master document that just has everything in it. Because I find that easiest, honestly. I can get overwhelmed with like tons of files, tons of different sections. Like it just is easier for my brain to have it all here. And maybe that is a sign that I'm just type B and I'm not type A. I don't know. But that works for me to have that.

I've worked with some writers where they, every chapter, particularly if they're big outliners, every chapter is its own document. So, they will have a Word doc or a Google doc, whatever they're writing in, that's chapter one. Then they will create a separate file, chapter two, separate file, chapter three, et cetera. This works well for people who have done a ton of outlining and know exactly what they want to happen in every single chapter. And I've also heard from clients where Not having the full book in the document is easier for them to just get the draft out because they're not going back to look at what they've previously written. They can only go back a couple of pages maybe to the beginning of the chapter. So, it can help from a mindset perspective if you're just like wanting to move forward. You don't want to go back and get distracted with editing everything you've already written. That can work well. But for me, I just move forward in the document. I don't go back. But there's something about seeing the word count increase as I'm writing in that master document, the master manuscript, I mean, I find that motivating.

So, I like just having everything in one document. And for me, in my process, I also don't divide up by chapters as I'm writing. I just write. I don't have any chapter breakdowns. It's just all one big document. Then as I'm going through and editing, I might make a note about where a potential chapter might be, but I basically don't break it up until I'm like, almost done with editing. Because for me, things might shift and change quite a bit in editing. And if I make a distinction of like, okay, chapter one ends here, chapter two ends here, three ends here, those things might get switched anyway. So, I just have found it better to create one big document and then go split it up into chapters later. Okay, so I mentioned I have the one outline slash notes doc where everything lives, but I also have a notes app on my phone. And I have, the standard notes app that comes on your phone. And I have an app, like a note with ideas or... notes about my book. I know that I could access my master, like my outline idea doc on my phone, but for whatever reason, it's just easier to open up my notes app and jot down an idea. So, if I'm like not working on my book, I'm not thinking about my book, I'm in the shower, I'm driving, I'm doing whatever, but I get an idea for something, I will put it into my notes app. I'll just make a little bullet point to myself about it. Or if I'm thinking about something and I realize, oh, wait a second. I need to go fix this plot hole that I just thought of. I will make a note to myself in the notes app. And then I can go reference that when I am back working on the actual book.

For whatever reason, it's just easier. Actually, I think it's because I have so many things in my notes app. I have a grocery list. I have content ideas. I've got like just all kinds of things in my notes app. So, I'm used to going to it. It's easy to access on my phone, and that way I can just put my ideas down there. So, I do have that. Okay, another thing I do is I make comments about stuff to check or research or fix later on a separate Word doc with my notes, that notes outlining doc that I mentioned. There are two ways to do this, and I've actually done it both ways. Because I don't go back to edit as I'm writing, I just move forward and get the draft out. I will sometimes encounter issues where I'm like, oh, I need to fact check this or I need to research this a little bit more. I will insert a comment and put some asterisks in it to know, like, just come back later to this. Or I have that outlining and brainstorming document open. I will put a little bullet point at the top and say, like, research this thing.

For example, with one of my books, I was writing about a crime that happened in Georgia, and I needed to know what would the typical length of sentencing be for this person who committed this type of crime in this year. And I didn't want to stop my momentum to go fact check that. And it didn't really totally matter. Like if it was three years versus 10 years, it wouldn't make that much difference in the story. So, I just needed to figure that out, but I didn't want to stop writing to go research that. And so, I put a little note to myself to go look at that later. So then when I'm editing, I can go do that kind of stuff. When I'm writing, I want to take advantage of that time writing. I want to take advantage of the sprint. I want to take advantage of that time and that momentum and just work on getting down as many words as I possibly can while I'm writing. And if I were to stop, go to Google, look at some different sources of Georgia statutes on this thing, like that would derail me. So, and it, if it's a big thing that really impacts the plot, like in that same book, I had to research this particular, like a roofie, basically, if someone got roofie, like what would that look like? Because that did impact the timing.

And so, I looked that up before I started writing that, before I got to that part in the book, just to kind of wrap my head around like, okay, what would the timeline be? of these events that unfolded after. What would the police response be? What would be this person be doing, et cetera. So that was stuff that I had to research and I couldn't just put an asterisk because it was important to the story. But if it's something small, I just mark it and move on to do later. The last tip I have is I keep a separate document called cuts. It's literally labeled the title of the book and cuts of stuff that I remove from my draft. If in editing, And I do this in editing because I'm not, again, on the first draft, I'm just getting the story out. I'm not going back to cut things out of the book. But when I'm editing, if I delete something that's longer than like 2 sentences or three sentences maybe, kind of depends what it is and how good the writing is, I will copy it and paste it into this document that is just deleted stuff. because I know there is a chance that I might actually want to add that back in or keep some of it or move it to a different place in the manuscript. And yes, I could go back to a different version of Word and look at it, but I find it so much easier to just put it in a separate document. I think for my peace of mind.

It’s better to see it physically on the page being pasted on there. And I know like I have a backup of that thing I'm removing in case I want to add it back in later. Yeah, so I just call that cuts. I have like everything saved on my drive and I have like a folder for the book. And then in the folder for the book, I have the manuscript, I have my outline, my notes doc, and then I have a cuts doc. And once I start editing, I will save different versions of the book. But it's just, it's one of those things again for peace of mind where I like just being able to cut it, copy it and paste it in. Because you never know. You never know when you're going to add something back in. You never know when you're going to be able to repurpose something, or I don't know, it just feels like a loss if it's completely gone forever. And of course, you can, the other option too is to keep track changes on.

 So, when you're in Word, you can turn something called track changes on, which basically lets you edit the document, but you still get to see what things. Looked like originally in the original version of the document, so if you remove something, if you add a couple of new sentences into a particular point, it will show up in red or blue or some other color font, and if it's something you've deleted, it will strike it through, so you can see. I, for whatever reason, if I'm just working on a book myself and like drafting it and editing it, I don't use track changes. I only use track changes when I have sent a version of a book to my agent, and she gives me notes. Then I will, if I go back to make changes based on her suggestions, then I will turn track changes on so that she can see what changes I'm making. But if it's just for me, I don't do track changes. Yeah, but that's another option you could do if you want to be able to see what you've removed. So yeah, that's basically it.

In terms of my organizational strategy, again, I think this is something really simple for me because I just have not found it necessary to do something complicated. One other thing I want to share just from my experience as an editor and a book coach working with clients is some writers can't, new writers especially, because you're doing this for the first time. can use this idea of being organized, like organizing all their research and their outlining in their notes, they can use that as a way to procrastinate on the actual writing part because it feels so urgent that they figure, they have to figure all of this out first. before they can start writing. And they've got to color code things, and they've got to get really detailed notes, and they've got to create all these different files, and they've got to buy Scrivener, and they've got to do all these things to keep themselves organized before they can start writing. And there's an, and I'm not saying that everyone who has that detailed of an organizational system is doing it to procrastinate. That's not true at all. Some people just need to do all of that and it's wonderful for them. And that's a great part of their process. But there are some people who use this to kind of like prolong it because they don't actually want to start writing.

It's kind of similar to… I've shared about this on the podcast before, but when I started writing, I think before I started writing a book, I wanted to just gather information. I thought that if I watched enough videos, took enough writing classes, did enough whatever, that I would just like absorb all the information and sit down and write a book and it would be perfect. And I almost like used all this information gathering and this learning as a way to prolong the process because I was scared of writing. And it's like, yes, all that information gathering is great. Listen to podcasts like this one. Hi. Create or watch content about writing, take writing classes, read books about the craft of writing. That's all great. But you have to be honest with yourself about when it's time to actually, I have something in my eye, when it's time to transition into writing. You know, like you can't put that off forever. And I think some writers have a tendency to do that with organizational strategies. So do a gut check.

You don't need to have anything super detailed and thorough. And if you're writing your first book, you might try and approach on the first book that you don't keep with the second, third, 4th, et cetera. Like you might just kind of need to discover your process as you go. So it doesn't need to be set in stone. It's not something you have to completely figure out on book one. I do things differently now than I did on my first book. Of course, every writer does, most likely. So remember that too. Okay, I hope this is helpful. You can kind of keep yourself organized and on track, but not like stress about it and try to like achieve perfection when it comes to that. There's so many different ways to stay organized so you can troubleshoot or try to have a trial and error, I guess, and figure out what works for you. All right, well, I think you... I'm having trouble today. I've had so much coffee. Thank you for listening and I will see you next week. Thank you so much for listening.

Katie Wolf