What is zero drafting? (And should I try it?)

Chelsea

5 years ago

When you set out to write a book, typically the first words you put on the page are considered your first draft. Makes sense, right? But there’s actually another way to begin writing your book: zero drafting.

“Zero drafting” is the verb used to describe writing a “zero draft.” You might be asking: what the heck is a zero draft? How can you have a draft before your first one? First drafts tend to have all the elements of a planned story, even if you end up going back to rewrite or drastically revise later. A zero draft somewhere in between a lengthy outline and your first draft.

Zero drafts are significantly shorter than your book will end up being. Leigh Bardugo has shared that for Crooked Kingdom, the final book is around 100,000 words, but she first wrote a zero draft of about 30,000-40,000 words. But it is more of a story than simply writing a detailed outline. Author C.G. Drews writes outlines that can be up to 20,000 words long, but they’re still not a cohesive story. Not that a zero draft is all that cohesive, but it’s written with scenes, breaks, transitions, and dialogue, as opposed to bullet points and disparate chunks of text in an outline.

The idea with a zero draft is that you’re putting the barest of bones onto the page—just sketching out the ideas of plot and character and how it all fits together. Then, once you have it out of your brain and onto the page, you can go back and begin knitting all the pieces together, deciding what works and what doesn’t and how the pieces you keep form a cohesive book.

Now the question remains: should you try zero drafting?

You might want to try zero drafting if you…

…like revising better than drafting

Think about your process as a writer, whether it’s with other novel-length works or even how you wrote papers for school if this is your first time writing a book. Which part did you enjoy more: the initial drafting of it or the editing afterward? It varies from writer to writer, and of course in each phase there are going to be times when you hate it regardless. But generally, writers tend to like one part of the process a little more than the other, or at least feel more suited to one part. If you like drafting better, then don’t feel the need to rush it with a zero draft. You only get to do that full, no-holds-barred initial drafting once for a project, and even though the transition from a zero draft to a first draft involves a lot of writing, it’s still more revising than the free flow writing.

That means if you love revising and editing and figuring out how to make your character arcs and plot points more cohesive, then a zero draft might be the perfect fit for you. If you struggle to get the words on the page, but love polishing them once they’re there, writing a zero draft might be a good way to give yourself a starting point that you can then spend the rest of your process revising and adding to.

…are more of a pantser

In the writing world, we often divide ourselves into two camps: Plotters, who have an outline and a plan for the books before they ever start writing, and pantsers, who write by the seat of their pants. In reality, we’re all more of a mix of these two styles, but for now, consider which side you lean toward. If you tend to be a pantser who gets halfway through the book and then realizes you have no idea where you’re going and that the first half of your book won’t work, you may want to consider zero drafting. Rather than putting a huge amount of time and effort into writing a first draft that may then have to change drastically, writing a zero draft allows you to still discover the story through writing rather than planning, but also means you haven’t put as much time into your piece if you end up rewriting or cutting large chunks of it. It also gives you a little more flexibility as you figure out the elements of your story. You can write whatever you discover in the zero draft, and then as you turn it into a first draft you can go through the work of fitting it all together.

…are scared to start

Sometimes, even a first draft feels to scary to start. Sure, everyone says you should write a shitty first draft, but surely it still needs to be pretty good, right? The answer is no, but, if you can’t get your writer brain to believe that, see if writing a zero draft feels more doable. It’s much shorter and it is truly supposed to be chunky and disconnected and a little wild, because it’s waiting for you to edit it.

Even if none of these apply to you or you think you have your process down pat, it never hurts to try something new. You may be surprised by the freedom a zero draft gives you, or you may find that it’s definitely not your thing. And it may not work for one project but be perfect for another one. No matter what, being willing to try new strategies will help keep you from getting stuck on your writing project.