Too many words, too little words – how to fix manuscript for publication

As a first-time writer, you may experience two extremes: your current word count either exceeds the general word range significantly (too many words), or it’s significantly less than the general word range (too little words). What could be the reason? Most importantly, how do we fix it?

Too many words

Isn’t this every first-time author’s dream – to have too many words on their first draft? When you find yourself writing non-stop and you’re on over 160 000 words or exceeding 300 A4 pages for a book that is supposed to be a memoir, stop right there. 1 or all 3 of the following may apply to you:

• There’s clutter: you have unnecessarily long sentences that can be cut short. For example: “At the present moment” can just be “Now” or “Today”. “We are currently experiencing precipitation” can simply be “It is raining”. There are other word clusters you might have on your manuscript, such as “I might add”, “It should be pointed out that”, “It is interesting to note”. If your manuscript has too many words, you don’t need any of that.

• There’s repetition: it’s highly likely that you repeated ideas or the same message more than once, either verbatim or in different ways.

• There’s irrelevant information: you may have been digressing and ended up adding information that may not be relevant to the purpose or scope of your book.

How do we rectify this?

1. Clutter: review your manuscript and identify the clutter. Prune it all out.
2. Repetition: review your manuscript and see where you may have repeated yourself. Remove the repetition.
3. Irrelevant information: consider the scope/purpose of your book and ask yourself for each paragraph: “is this information relevant for my book?”

Too little words

You’ve been working on your first draft. You’ve exhausted all your thoughts. You’ve written as much as you could. But you find yourself short. You’ve written what’s supposed to be a memoir. The generally accepted word range for memoirs is about 50 000 to 80 000 words. Your word count is currently 23 456 words. Why is that? Most importantly, how do you fix this?

Chances are you may have rushed through the manuscript and didn’t give yourself time to explore on other topics/thoughts; you may have forgotten other relevant events and people.

What is the solution?

1. Our minds may not necessarily recall everything while we’re writing. Revert back to your manuscript, reading each paragraph, and see if your mind can recollect relevant events or people that you can add to your story, events and people that may have played a significant role.
2. Research: there may be relevant topics you’d like to expand on, topics that may have been a study or an opinion piece, topics with statistics. Perhaps you noticed something on the socials relevant to what you’re writing about – whether it’s a trend or an interesting debate/discussion in the comments section. Look into that. Google. Find out what scholars have said about it. Look for books on the said topics. I don’t encourage plagiarism, but reading and gaining that knowledge may help you delve deeper into your own thoughts, provoking discussion points in your book, ultimately increasing your word count.

If you feel that you can’t implement these suggestions by yourself or need guidance specifically for your book, not to worry. We do provide consultation services. Simply email us: admin@mpilopublishing.co.za.

Blogger:

Simthandile Mhlambiso – Founder and Managing Director of Mpilo Publishing (Pty) Ltd; Member of Professional Editors ‘ Guild (PEG), Branch Secretary of PEG Committee – Western Cape.