I recently finished the first draft of my next book, "Ghost in the Game". It is by far the longest book I have ever written, clocking it at over 240,000 words (or somewhere between 600 and 800 pages in paperback form).
Besides the many hours spent thinking about it -- both before beginning and during the writing of it -- there are the hours of actually sitting in a chair and typing. As I write approximately one thousand words an hour when composing, actually typing the 240k words took me somewhere around 240 hours.
In itself, that's like working six 40-hour work weeks. As I don't write for eight hours per day, well, it took me considerably longer than six weeks.
Anyway, impressive though that may sound, the 240 hours plus all the thinking time is just the beginning. Having completed my story, I then read through the book making sure that it made sense to me, that I didn't go off on any wild tangents -- a complaint that certain people make of "pantsers" or "discovery writers" whether founded or unfounded. [But more on that in a later post]. Simply reading through the book and making corrections here or there where I saw them -- typos, etc -- took me two days of full-time reading, or about another 15 to 20 hours (I wasn't counting). I feel that my work stands up to my typical standards, whether others think that sufficient or not. In other words, I'm pretty happy with what I've written.
My next run-through added some description in various places, because I tend to write light on description over all and especially in the first draft. There's another 20 hrs gone.
Next, I try to remove certain weak verbs where possible (the "to be" verb being the one that gets my main attention). Now, I wrote this book in Scrivener, but need it in WORD in order to upload it, so I exported it to WORD at this point, which didn't turn out as well as hoped, and going in and doing some basic reformatting took hours. Replacing the weak verbs even more hours. We're looking upwards of 30 hrs to get it in WORD and ready for the first proofing.
I use an on-line proofer for my next step, but that entails breaking the novel down into manageable chunks of 8,000 to 15,000 words -- basically 22 parts. Then I send each part through the grammar checker, which has its own problems. Each chunk will generate some 100 to 300 questions (or suggestions) by the grammar checker, a great many of which don't apply. But I still have to go through them one by one. Each of the twenty-two parts takes an hour or more to go through. I'm in the middle of that, right now. So, we can add another 20 or more hours of work to the total.
See what fun this is?
Once I've gone through all 22 parts and made the corrections, I then have to re-assemble them into a single WORD file. That doesn't take too long, maybe an hour or so.
Then, because of problems that WORD files sometimes have when uploading them to Amazon and especially to Smashwords, I have to strip all formatting from the file by copying it and saving it to a simple text editor, saving that file, then doing a copy and paste back into a new WORD file, where I then get to work formatting.
Formatting includes paragraph formatting (indentation, etc) which takes a couple of minutes, then formatting the chapter headers and centering them, centering the section dividers ( * * *), renewing any bold, underlined, or italicized text, inserting new page markers at the end of each chapter, etc. That means another complete read-through taking another 20 hrs.
After this, because it is easier to see mistakes on printed paper than on a computer monitor, I print the file and read through it again -- but because when you start reading a text you often get lost in the story and forget that you are actually proofing (or at least I do) I do it page by page from last page back to first page, marking it up with a pen, then transferring the corrections from the marked up pages back to the WORD file. We're talking 30 - 40 hrs or more for a 240k manuscript.
After that, I need to read through it once more (during which time I also look for mistakes that can get introduced into the file by correcting mistakes or changing wording). Another 20 hours.
Only at this point do I send it off to my proofer -- because I can't be counted on to catch all the errors -- and my proofer always finds more. But, by this time, besides time thinking about the book, I've spent at least 400 hrs on the Manuscript. Why not send it to the proofer earlier? You want to send as clean a copy as you can. That makes the proofer's work easier and won't tire them out or make them want to refuse your next offering.
When I get it back from my proofer, I have to make the corrections -- another few hours, then read it through one final time -- often aloud -- as a last check. Another 20 or more hours.
Only then do I add the final bits -- the front matter and end matter (table of contents, copyright pages, where to find my other books, Author's note, etc) and then upload it for publishing.
Including the hours I've spent thinking about it (outlining in my head, if you like), by the time you have your copy of "Ghost in the Game" in your hands (on your screen), I'll have put about 600 hours of my time and effort into it. That's like 15 full-time weeks of work at 8 hrs per day 5 days per week.
Most of my novels are nowhere near 240k, most being between 80k and 120k. But even the 80k novels take up about 400 hrs of work when all is said and done.
If I put this book up for sale at $3.99 per copy on Amazon or Smashwords (most of my books are $2.99), I'll need to sell over 2500 copies to make what would be minimum wage in my province of residence. Only three of my books have done this -- and the majority of those sales occurred in the "golden years" between 2011 and 2014. My best selling more recent book sold 700 copies -- and has been out for 8 years. If this one sells 700 copies, I'll be happy, but it will mean that I'll have worked for less than $4 (CDN) per hour. If it only sells 500, then I'm looking at less that $3.00 (CDN) per hour. (Remember, I have expenses, too. Cover, proofing, paper, toner, etc. I don't advertise, so I don't have advertising expenses.) Amazon's latest algorithm changes have made it more and more difficult for non-advertisers to get their books in front of eyes -- and thus sales. 500 sales of this book in the next several years seems optimistic.
Other writers are in the same boat. Some may spend more time writing, editing, and proofing, some may spend less time. But each book is a major investment in time and energy for an author -- and often money as well. Most authors make much less than minimum wage for their works.
Just something to consider the next time you pick up a book -- by any author.
Next: I always want to improve my writing, so I've taken various courses, attended various writers' conferences, and lately, virtual summits. One thing that usually comes up is: "Plotters vs Pantsers". I'll be discussing that in upcoming posts. Stay tuned.
