Someone asked, Can a person with no prior experience as an author write a good first draft of a novel in two weeks or less? What are some tips for maintaining high quality while writing at such a fast pace? Here’s my answer:
Anything is possible, I suppose, as the world is certainly accelerating. But let me ask you how long it took you to learn walk as an infant ? For most of us that skill took about twelve or eighteen months or so. Writing is a skill that usually takes a long time to perfect.
How many pages do you think you will need to write per day to finish a novel-length work in two weeks? To complete an 80,000 word (280 page) novel in two weeks would require writing about 20 pages a day every single day for 14 days. I’d have to smoke something to do that, and I don’t smoke. Many bestselling authors shoot for five or ten pages per day for about five days a week, and often another 30-50 percent of the time goes into final edits.
The creative process usually takes a long time to refine. Some writers are able to dump a first draft in just weeks, but that may mean they are far from finished with a polished work. As for tips, I suggest you put the draft away for thirty days and read it again to see where the work needs a good deal of refining.
Perhaps you can speed up the process using Artificial Intelligence, but that’s not really human storytelling, nor–in my opinion– will it ever be. As a human, I’d rather take the time to let my story evolve, to discover nuances and connections and meanings. There is something magical in that experience.
Keep writing.
