Editing Tips for Overwriters | When Your Book Is Too Long 

I'll be here waiting patiently for the underwriter one.

I'm an underwriter, but I aspire to be an overwriter so much. It's a lot easier to me to cut and trim than it is to have to go back and add details and scenes. I can't wait for the underwriter tips!

this hurts me not as a writer but as a reader cause i honestly love scenes that exist just to have fun with interesting characters or have friends throwing jokes at each other or long passages that are there just because they are beautiful... when i write i do end up cutting most of this stuff but when i am reading certain books or fanfics i actually enjoy filler, especially if i really vibe with the author's style and/or love the characters a whole lot

Oh God, over 100k is too long?!? I'm already over 150k and not done...😌. Definitely gonna need this video after I've finished the first draft. Thank you so much for these tips!

Ugh for me it’s balcony scenes🤦🏻‍♀️ I want everyone important conversation to happen at sunset on a balcony.

I absolutely loooove hearing your input Alexa, I always feel weird when people mention word count, I hate short books and if it's less than 320 pages I usually won't give it much thought. Maybe that's my problem. Many of my favorites are between 420-600 pages (even if they are just mass-market paperbacks, it still tricks my brain into thinking it's getting more bang for my buck). This love for long stories and hefty books has most definitely crossed over into my own style of writing and how I envision the final product. In my first book's draft, I made it 98k words. At the time I thought it was a decent draft, but then I realized no one would give it a second glance with my genre choice, so I removed large chunks of the book that I deemed "unimportant to story progression".Yeah, it was now fit for publishing house standards... but I HATED IT. I started to despise what I was making... so I kept maybe all of 30k words, from the original...and rewrote the entire thing. Long story short, throughout that adventure and heartbreak, I learned so much about myself as a writer, what I was good at, what I am bad at, what I enjoyed, and what I can improve. There is a long road ahead of me, but I'm so proud of what I've accomplished since 2018 (I do everything myself,: art, drafting, formatting. My Graphic Design degree has given me tools to make this adventure much more economical, the only downside is its time consuming because it's all on me). I've decided to go the self-publishing route because for me it's a labor of passion and love, not something I plan on making money doing. I want my final product to be something I'm proud of, not something I'm told to do because of trends.

My first YA contemporary: 112k words. My beta readers: Why u do this to us? 😢 Learned my lesson. Current project is a tight 75k.

Yayy for this! Chronic overwriter here. I'll trim 30k+ from my first drafts, alack. I once underwrote a novel, and had nothing more to add. That was my "the story is what the story is" moment. But I'm the queen of cutting text!! Because yes, I'm also the queen of repetition - my characters will feel the same emotion three times in a row, lol. PS I love dinner scenes too!!

I just read a book and got lost because there were sooooooo many characters. Its making it hard for me to finish the book because there is too much going on.

Me: Oh I'm not an overwriter at all, but I'll enjoy Alexa's content as always. Me, twenty minutes later: OHH, maybe I AM an overwriter in different ways. mmmm. As always, great lessons!

I was worried when writing my first novel that it would be too short. It ended up over 200K words. I've managed to cut it down to 130K, maybe.

Fourth! I am a huge fan! I have all of your books and I can't wait for the ivies! You are such an inspiration and I love the advice you give!

I’m writing a draft for the first book in a four part sci-fi series and it’s currently 258,234 words…I’m definitely an over writer so this really helped me out a lot! Tysm!

Some of this stuff that you end up cutting can be tidied up and used for bonus content for mailing list sign-ups. Characters that get cut, may fit better in a different project. So don't just press delete, save these gems as they may come in useful at a later date.

I’m so guilty. Those damn subplots lol. Love your videos :)

Can’t wait for underwriting tips Alexa!

I underwrote my first draft, but the second is now expanding faster than I thought. Pretty sure this will be a fantasy novel that doesn't get published, but it's teaching me everything I needed to learn. :-)

Thank you so much for this! I'm an overwriter and I'm starting to get into the nitty gritty of revising where I need to polish off some of my word count! Thank you so much for this, Alexa!

You aren’t the only one person write about dinner. I agree. It is good way to socialize with other people. O

A tip that I find always works for me. If I feel bored editing a certain scene and I can’t wait to get through, it probably could be cut or repurposed elsewhere. I find that the scenes that hit the right way tend to be more enjoyable to work on.

While I'm drafting I just get the feeling like I'm not getting the point across or it just "needs more"...and it never does

Yes! Whenever I'm editing a novel, setup filler is one of the most common issues I run into. Thanks for the video!

I'm a serious over-writer. My W.I.P., a romantic suspense, is 150,000 words and counting. My issues are a) An obsession with realism. Things take time to happen, I can't pretend they don't, but good grief, it's making the story drag! b) My perceived need to set up situations in this novel (No. 2 in a series) that will be developed in the subsequent books. c) Too many subplots. Again, it's part of my compulsion to make things "realistic." d) Feeling like my possible readers want answers to all sorts of questions, or will pick holes if I don't cover all the bases. e) Feeling I need to listen to the writing gurus who say I have to throw obstacle after obstacle at my MCs. Doing that takes time. And f) Self-indulgence. Do I really have to go into so much detail about my couple's wedding halfway through the book? But it's so much fun! The first-in-series I indie-published at 145,000. I had 4 plot threads going there and so far none of my readers has complained of the length. But the word count of this sequel has long since passed ridiculous and rocketed into disaster.

I've cut about 40k from my current book. lool. I realize this is in itself a short book. :P And I'm not done cutting. I feel like I'm doing a kinda good job cutting it down, though it'll still be too long in the end. But at least I've done my part in trying. XD

Hi, I'm an overwriter. One technique I have used is to not look at your MS for a solid chunk of time. Like a month or more. Then just read through it, all at once. Some distance will make a lot of this stuff jump out at you. And it works for your reading experience the same way as a beta reader. If you find yourself getting bored, skimming, or rushing through a part to get to the next thing that's awesome, those are all places that can be condensed or cut. Repetition tends to be obvious too.

I have an easier time losing lines if I copy/paste them into a separate doc named 'Darlings.' They're not lost, they can make their comeback in another work! Or just stay in my heart lol. Either way: hurts less.

Hi 👋 I love your chanel. It's helped me so much!

Some of my stumbling blocks are too-lifelike dialogue (so, I mean, um) and the chronological thing, writing all the moments. For the first, I do that meticulous line edit. I once took a manuscript from 97 to 92k mostly cutting dialogue and internal monologue. For the second, I try to remember your “arrive late and leave early” rule... in revision if not in drafting.

Thanks for your tips! An overwriter here. Your tips on dinner parties / meals and discovery writing resonated with me. Also, good point that a passage does something for me as a writer, but may not be needed to move the plot forward.

This is right on time! Thank You!

I've been trying to edit down my novel for months. This video gave me so much perspective and practical tips!

One of the absolute most helpful videos you've done! Thank you as always!

This was so helpful! I just finished the first draft of my first novel and I'm technically right in the upper end of my genre's target word count, but your advice to create an outline by going scene-by-scene and writing out what each one does for the story just helped me pick out sooooo many problems! I think I did indeed overwrite afterall. Oof, and also THANK YOU!

You uploaded this just as I was stressing about overwriting!! Haha Thanks Alexa 😊

Great video, as always. I agree that it can be overwhelming when you think you need all of the scenes you've written.

Thank you Alexa! I especially like that you feel our pain with this! I'm currently editing my first novel and have a pending scene I have to cut, even though I love it and can send parts elsewhere. It's hard because that is how the story went, life is full of repetition, but as a reader I completely get how it isn't strictly needed and the point is gotten across elsewhere. It helps to remember that the first draft is for me, the second and beyond is for the reader.

definitively waiting for the underwriter episode - finished my nanowrimo book today and need to expand it

It helps immensely to know you're struggling with the same things. Until now I didn't find any advice that actually centered around the mistakes I was making, so thanks for the help. Also, I'm also a fellow FF writer, so you also helped me a lot with the tips surrounding that topic💜

Thank you so much for the tips! These made me realise why my rough draft is so long and gave me some great ideas for fixing it. Overwriting is such a big problem for me. I have a bloated manuscript waiting on my laptop that honestly needs to lose 200 pages. My biggest problem is that I'll get an idea for a scene and I just add it in whether or not it does anything for the story besides amuse me. So I have to condense and combine and cut A LOT of scenes when I finally start to tackle this beast.

I love this one. I know I'm overwriting certain things, for me it's tea by the fire which often includes eating as well. Because I write slow, and only have a certain amount of time to do it, my daily output is low. Then for me, it seems like such a long time ago, that they had tea by the fire, I forget and do it again. If you were reading the story, it wouldn't have been that long ago at all. Lol. I'm not too worried about it yet. It will get taken care of in the subsequent drafts, and yes I'll be using these tips to help me fix these things. I think I've stressed the fact that she wants to go home past it's breaking point. And she's scared, and weird things are happening, and...

yesss I needed this so badly 🙏

This is so helpful! My YA romance books are literally around 150k (almost 600 pages) and even though I’m self-publishing, I don’t want to debut with a book over 500 pages. I need this so much!

perfect timing thank you

Can't wait for your underwriter one! If my first draft keeps going like it is, it'll be under 40k for a young adult. But I still imagine I'll use some tips from this video too

THANK YOU SO MUCH

I feel that dinner scene comment. At least I tried to vary it in my most recent one; four dinners, two breakfasts, two lunches. And only one dinner and one breakfast in the same place. Yay?

Boy, do I over write! Excellent video, particularly liked the bit that focused on scene function

Guilty as charged, I wanted a creative outlet for my anxious brain during lockdown and have discovered I actually enjoy that creative writing helps me. I'm writing an LOTR fanfic on Watt pad as an exercise, to explore my writing strengths and weaknesses (plus as a mum with two teens and a preschooler, I need to escape into Middle Earth sometimes) but my story has kind of run away from me because I have written far too much. Your video has given me food for thought and the courage to make some big edits. I really enjoy your no nonsense common sense videos, they have been really useful as I've been stumbling about the Mirkwood. Ever time I learn something new I go back and look at what I've written and try to make it better. Look forward to watching more of your lovely Videos. :)

You are a gem!

Scrivener says I'm 186,000 words into my story. I might have to start doing this before the first draft is even done. 😁

My repetitive scene problem is campfire talks (mostly because my story takes place in a massive forest 😅)

@alexadonne, Alexa, Thank you very much, wow. Lol you n me we love those dinner scenes 😂 (5 and counting in this first draft haha) Thank you for the tips on how to carve out the masterpiece, it doesn’t feel so discouraging and overwhelming now. I really appreciate your input! 🤗🙌

I am not even an overwriter but I’ve had a horrible day and I feel like I need so much help on my story that this video feels like a godsend

thank you for this amazing list!! amazing content and amazing makeup look. (had to add that) :) Hugs

Love the random “Amedeus” quotes.

Oh yes, I have found that I repeat myself a lot! Descriptions, information, scene settings... arrgh. XD I have definitely gone through my manuscript, line by line, paragraph by paragraph and cutting, trimming, shortening. One word here, 5 words there, etc. but it adds up. Every other chapter or three I find that I've cut another 1000 words. :)

From what you're saying, I definitely need that underwriting vid. Very interesting.

This is great Alexa, thank you so much! My problem is that I'm a naturally lucaicious person in general, and I think it comes through in my writing. I was nearing 150,000 words when I had to re-think my story's structure. My word count goal is 90,000 after revisions and edits. But I know I'll have over 100k when I finish my draft. Reflection is my biggest problem! And I think my sentence structure and dialogue tags don't help. I need to go through and fix all of my passive voice.

I went from underwriting on one draft to suddenly having WAYYYYYY to much. I had 120k on my book and had to cut down SO FREAKING MUCH. haha

The longer a story gets, the more I feel like I need to remind the reader of this or that. Of course, the reminders make the story even longer, so it becomes a vicious circle.

Dinner scenes make up a thorough 75% of "Downton Abbey"...the rest is making and waiting for the food.

I'm also eagerly awaiting one of these for underwriters however I know full well I am guilty of a lot of these too.

I had to get rid of an entire POV Character 😥 And I just realised I have several scenes of couples chatting under the stars😬

What should we do when your book kept evolving? ...like the same book and characters but the plot and subplot are changing continuously 😶😶 This overwhelming

To add on to the beating emotional beats to death, if you find you have more than two scenes of someone crying, pick the two that need to be there and axe the rest.

Excellent advice and realities I fully agree with the necessity of having every scene move the plot forward. At the same time, imagine all the lost stories we would have like "The Count of Monte Cristo which will never exist simply due to word count limits and publishing being objectively tied to following trends...it is so exhausting and disappointing and to me, it shows me why we are stagnating to the only type of stories being produced instead of enabling a story to be published in its full glory and vision

I had a kill your darlings "hack" if you have to cut a scene/line that you love, copy and paste it to a "maybe use later" document. That way if you do find a place it fits better then it's there and if there really isn't a place for it you'll be able to see that and it won't hurt to not use it.

Completely unrelated, but who did your cover for "The Ivies"? LOVE IT!

7th! I love your channel.

😳 ^ ...that moment an indie asks you to check out his 180k-word book.... Excuse me....180,000?!!! What?! 🤔

Hi Alexa! Love your videos. I have a question. I'm on the 'cutting draft' of a high middle-grade novel trying to cut 12, 000 works (DOH!) Do you think it is important in middle-grade novels to keep the chapters generally about the same length?

I’m not sure if you have done this already but would you be able to do a video about how to write different types of dialogue? I write a lot of action dialogue but it’s getting muddled. It’s difficult for me to break this habit because I want to explain how the character says it and show an action. Any help or guidance would be awesome. Love your videos

These are great tips but this is also why I love fanfiction. If an author wants to put an extra 100,000 words of flesh on their story or character development no one is stopping them and when it's good it's so good.

Repetition of scenery. this is kinda what I've been doing in my story. What am doing is I go through the scene with one character hit a certain spot then hit the

Actually, I think I'm tending to overcompensate. The first draft of one of my projects is grossly underwritten, and now I'm starting to (probably) overwrite in my second draft. It's a Horror Novel, and I'm currently torn between including a history of the fictional city it takes place in to establish a time line that reveals a pattern of people mysteriously going missing and striking most if not all of that history because it comes off as an info dump.

I’ve definitely come to realise how much of an overwriter I am during this nanowrimo. I haven’t had a single chapter that’s less than 7k words yet! oops!

I'm an underwriter and here I am watching this video 👀

Ha. If only I had this problem

I tend to find that overwriting is best since all of your material is there. It just needs to be condensed and refined. Underwriting is more of a struggle, at least for me, because it means that something is missing. Sometimes that something is big and requires more thought to fill in the gap(s).

Overwriter. I've got rid of half or the surplus 12 000 words so far, and have identified a chapter and several scenes that will have to go. Can I fix it?

I'm less than halfway through my dystopian steampunk story, and I'm up to 85,000 words so far. This is the tough love I need. Hurts, though.

SECOND

Underwriter one will be appreciated!!!

Honest question from an underwriter: does "cutting" necessarily mean "deleting"? When you need to cut things that you know are good, what do you do with it? Can it be repurposed for another project, told from another POV in a sequel, anything like that?

"the longest i've ever done is 110k words" *laughs in first draft 204k words* i've been editing for the last year and a bit, and it's down to 178k for draft 3. i've tried, i've tried, i've tried...... . it's a long road ahead. and the word count seems to drop by minuscule amounts because i'm also having to flesh things out i left unresolved. i know it needs to be shorter. but i just love meaty books so much.

My first book of my adult epic fantasy is due to finish up at 200k. O.O Luckily i can split the book into two different plots, since there are two parts in it, but we'll see, we'll see xD

So, genuine curiosity question: Is there something that makes the Harry Potter books exempt from typically trying to keep books under 100K? Because the majority of them are way over 100K words (OTP is 257K...). Is it the genre? The time which they were written? Is it the fact that they each take place over a whole year and they have to be long? Genuinely very curious about this. Also, great video! Lots of great tips that I'll definitely use!

My first draft is pushing 90k words, and that's with a lot of placeholders. It's likely going to reach 110k. My plan is to divide the book into 5 to 8 volumes and wrap mini-story arcs into each of them, while still building up to the completion of the overall story arc. I am writing an erotic BDSM fiction focused around dominance and submission..

My CPs have said my masterpiece is miving way too slowly... but then suggest adding more "breathers" (narration) to let the readers rest. Does that sound like it's time for me to cut and trim some scenes?

I tried to write a short story. It turned out too short for a novel but a very long short story. I've always loved short stories. I prefer stories you can read in about an hour or two. I tried to read it out loud which of course at least tripled reading time. Almost 3 hours. I honestly don't know how to label this story. It's a very complicated story. I could easily stretch it out but I don't like unnecessary stuff and I really wanted a short story.

My first book was 180k words

alexa could you please stop reading my thoughts! 😂😂😂

7:15 Airplane noise

FIRST

Is it okay to have 2000 words per chapter?

Would have loved to have like a tip on breaking off a way to chunky book into 2 or something. Happened to me years ago and i just noticed that i am 3/4 through my current outline and am already on 200.000 words (not english, my native language has a more "complex" i guess, its books are usually longer compared to english so it would be about idk 150.000 in english probably) Anyhow 150.000 with the last chapters still to go is too much and i'll probably land on 200.000 words (english) by the end - i in theory i could perfectly cut it in two but omg it would ruin the structure xD My first half is fine but would be without much pay off i feel like, its a lot of build up and progress but yea, not much to stand alone. And the second half would be so much payoff but without buildup, if the reader doesnt remember a lot of stuff it would fall flat i suppose? Would feel rushed probably too, urgh its just so frustrating... And to top it all off, in the series each book is from another characters perspective - if i cut this in half i have 2 from one characters. This is just the worst. What do i do? i'm in shock rn xD

I'm outlining my story, there are five pov's that have different stories that mix sometimes till they go to the final climax together. I think is it going to be súper long, how can you keep the word count around 100k if you have five characters that have their own arch? I think I trapped myself into a corner x_x

Came from the underwriter video. I’m 5000K over 😭

*sobs dramatically and sadly in overwriter*

Underwriter squad!