First Draft vs. Second Draft as an example in my Royal Coffee story · 4:41pm Jun 15th, 2017
One of the eternal questions we face is "How do I write good emotional stories?"
One of the eternal problems with that question is that everybody handles the problem in a different way. For example, my notes on The One Who Got Away were barely a page long before I started writing.
Below, I've got an example of First Draft/Second Draft from my story in progress, Her Royal Morning Coffee. Caution: It's a little racy.
Wait a second, that warning was supposed to keep you from clicking and reading further... Oh, heck. I forgot what kind of people follow me. Oh, well. (You dirty-minded people)
First, I don't draft like most authors. Bookplayer is the one who comes to mind first from one of her blog posts that detailed one of her outlines, but AlicornPriest's Writers Workshop blog posts has a good series of posts on all the Lego pieces that go together into a working structure. If building a house is a good analog, I would be the guy with a half-dozen post-it notes and some scribbled notes on the back of a napkin showing up on the job site.
Anyway. My first draft of Chapter 13's intro:
Returns from fashion show with rarity, checks shop, goes home to go to bed before tomorrow’s work. Bed is occupied by luna. Considers the size, it is a princess sized bed after all for his long legs, but seems to have a capacity of *one* princess, and Celestia would drape over the edges and why is he *thinking* that. Goes downstairs instead, sets his alarm clock, curls up on the couch. Blinks. Alarm rings. slept like a stone. Luna standing there, not smiling. Thou smells of other mares. Dry: fashion show. Hundreds of them. Luna (feral grin, nose buried in his mane, tickles, rough voice about how much it makes her desire him, to cover him in her scent to warn all others that he is *owned* by the Night. Fairly sure if it were not for the couch, she would have taken him right there, recovers, pushes him to the bathroom to take a shower “Lest we do something highly inappropriate at work this morn.”
See? My English 101 teacher would give me an F for certain. No indents, no 1. 1) A. a) divisions, etc... But I used that to create the below, which is only Second Draft because there are still some tragic flaws in there to fix.
Her Royal Morning Coffee
Share a Cup Today
~ ~ ☕ ~ ~
By the time the train pulled into the Ponyville station, it was fairly late in the evening, and the dusty streets were empty of any incriminating witnesses to Dry Roast’s ignoble pace to the Carousel Boutique while towing the somewhat smaller or larger ‘Rarity’ collection, depending on perspective. There should have been fewer clothes in the boxes due to the last-minute bridal sales, some of which had been dramatic events with prospective brides clamping their jaws down on opposite ends of some fragile piece of lace and glaring at their opposite numbers. Still, from their weight suspended in his field at least, Dry Roast suspected a little last-minute shopping had gone on behind his back to fill any empty space in the luggage and then some.
He managed to get the whole collection into the boutique main floor before Rarity hustled him out of the building with her eyes half-shut and murmuring something about ‘an urgent appointment with Princess Luna.’ It made Dry take a few moments to drop by the coffee shop to ensure it was still standing, then head for home and his own delayed slumber. There were no lights on in his house, meaning Check was working late or already sleeping, so Dry checked the mail, quietly slipped upstairs to put his saddlebags down in his bedroom, and considered his bed.
His occupied bed.
Considering Dry Roast had been talked into purchasing a princess-sized bed to fit his lanky frame when he had first moved to town, there was normally quite a bit of space left over beneath the sheets every night. True to the advertising, the bed seemed to have a comfortable occupancy limit of one princess (Lunar variety), and even Celestia would have been able to fit without draping over the edges.
Why did I just get done thinking that?
Luna looked comfortable, extremely so, and Dry Roast could not help but think of her actions the same way as years ago when the family cat used to rub up against everything in their house in order to establish her scent as ownership. His bed was probably going to have Luna’s enticing lilac and jasmine aroma around it until laundry day, or more if alicorn scents had the same persistence as the rest of alicorn powers. Rather than look for a small section of unused bed to curl up on until the dawn, he picked up one of his alarm clocks and went downstairs to curl up on the couch.
~ ~ ☕ ~ ~
The sound of Dry Roast’s morning alarm was quite short and cut off, much as if somepony were standing right by his couch and turned it off the moment it rang. He was fairly sure what he was going to see when he opened his eyes, but he did anyway.
Princess Luna was standing by the couch in the dim lighting of his living room, giving Dry a very serious look, without even the smallest hint of a smile. His eyes flickered to one side to check the time, which was just a few minutes before dawn, then his gaze was inevitably drawn back to the stoic princess and those stern teal eyes. She moved closer, much closer, and her voice was cool and firm.
“Thou smells of mare.”
She continued to move closer, not settling for a reasonable distance until her nose was buried in his tangled mane and she sniffed, then inhaled a deep, deep breath. “Many mares,” she clarified with her nose still in his mane and all Dry could see was Luna’s soft dark coat coat covering her warm neck, which was likewise almost pressed solid against his nose.
“Fashion show,” he clarified as Luna’s weight on the couch pressed down on him. “There were hundreds of—” Dry edited out the words ‘Brides’ and replaced it with a much less dangerous word “—mares there.”
“You cannot believe how much this makes me desire you,” she breathed into one ear with a rough voice and the tickle of her teeth on the small edge hairs. More of her weight was added to his chest and the couch groaned under the stress of their bodies. “It makes me want to cover you with my own scent as a warning to lesser mares, so all might know you are owned by the Night,” she finished with a small nip at the tip of his ear.
Luna drew her head back and looked him in the eyes again with little twinkles of mischief dancing in those entrancing dark eyes. “But, I am told in this modern age, we no longer are permitted to imprison stallions to satiate our desires, but should entice them into a mutual relationship over a respectable period of time until an appropriate social occasion occurs.”
She kissed him, long and hard, then drew back and licked her lips with a sly smile. “Otherwise, I would take you right here on this couch.”
“I don’t think it’s stressed for that.” Dry gave a quiet cough to clear his dry throat. “We’d break something.”
“Indeed.” Luna fairly bounced off the couch and hoisted Dry Roast to his hooves. “Now, it is quite close to Dawn. Go take your shower and wash some of that scent off, lest we do something highly inappropriate this morn.” She flicked the tip of her tail at his rump to encourage his speed into the bathroom, leaving his mind with the image of Luna watching his path away while licking her lips, much like a starving pony might look at a ripe apple.
~ ~ ☕ ~ ~
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Ooh, I can tell I am going to love this story.
Similar to what I do, just without the line breaks and bullet points. Do you also have to collate a bunch of notebooks, calendar pages, envelopes, and other handy scraps of paper to get all of your ideas together?
That's a pretty good second draft. Only question I have is HOW did you get there from that mess in your first draft?! That's a real question, by the way, because I'm genuinely astonished. My first drafts are crap too, but they at least resemble a real draft instead of an outline with scoliosis.
Lol what are these "drafts" things, I just write random words down on paper and then press the big green submit button.
Oddly, I don't draft. That probably says something damning.
That first one was a draft? I would call that brief notes and your "second draft" a first draft. XD
Thank you for the insight into your writing process. Curiously, your process is similar to mine, though I suspect you are more disciplined. I also use a phrase or sentence in my first draft that is later to be expanded into one or more paragraphs. I have the tendency to completely ignore my first draft notes, write out the chapter, then go back and check if there are any points that I've forgotten that are worth incorporating.
You answered the question "How do I write good stories?" Can you expand more on "How do I write good emotional stories?"
I wouldn't call that first draft a "draft," but an outline that notes specific points you want to put in the story.
I do a general outline myself, then I write from there. I don't really do "first, second, third" drafts myself, though I have had to do some minor edits from time to time.
The first draft reads more like what I would call an outline rather than a draft.
But holy hell that jump in coherence.
Quick question; Is this fragment of "Her Royal Morning Coffee" just a bit to show how you write, or is this a glimpse into a story you're writing?
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I'm on chapter 14 and proceeding :)