My Thoughts on Finishing Another First Draft

This past week, I finished the first draft of my current work-in-progress. I began this book in August 2025, just after publishing A Life of Joy. That novel was the last in a seven-book series centered on the same families. By then, I knew most of my characters well—I had spent more than fifteen years with many of them.

This new novel features an entirely new cast of characters, so my first task was simply getting to know them. Now I’ve lived with them for almost a year. There are four female protagonists who alternate point of view throughout the story. All four have become real people to me. I like them all, even when they are being unlikeable. (They all get whiny at times.)

Getting to know these women has been especially interesting because they are based on real historical figures. (The real people are all long deceased.) I don’t know if I have captured their real personalities. I don’t know what they said to one another, whether their relationships were strained or easy, or whether they felt hopeful, lonely, resentful, or content during the events they experienced. I had to imagine all of that.

Although I have tried to make reasonable guesses grounded in history, I have to accept that accuracy in those details is impossible. This is a novel, and these women are ultimately my characters. Many of the events in my work-in-progress are historical, but the interior lives of the characters are fiction. Still, I have tried to create believable women whom modern readers will relate to.

Writing this first draft also felt different from my previous novels because I wrote it in first person. Writing in first person makes it easier to stay in a single character’s head. But with four POV characters, I also have to work at giving each woman a distinct voice. By the time I reached the end of the manuscript, I felt I had landed on those voices. But now, as I reread my earlier chapters, I realize I have work to do at the beginning of the book to sharpen and differentiate the four women.

And, as with any first draft, there are plot holes, weak scenes, and historical details that need correction or expansion. First drafts are messy. They are supposed to be messy. Their purpose is simply to get the story onto the page.

Earlier in my writing life, I believed successful authors somehow knew exactly what to say from the beginning, and that the editing process was for minor tweaks and misspellings. Now I know that multiple drafts are necessary to shape the story itself. Only after multiple drafts does the story become what it is meant to be.

So, finishing a first draft is both an ending and a beginning. It always leaves me with mixed feelings—exhilaration, relief, gratitude, and a little sadness. And fear. Because finishing the first draft means it is time to begin the second.

The pure creative phase is over. I no longer face a blank page. Now, I must shape my rough pages into something compelling enough to make readers keep reading. Editing is the real work, and I’m always afraid I might not be able to get it done adequately.

Completing a first draft feels like the pioneer travelers I write about, who reach the top of a mountain only to discover another range still waiting beyond it. Most days, the emigrants on the Oregon Trail could barely see the stretch they would travel that day. They moved forward anyway.

And I must move forward as well.

I am celebrating this week—not because the novel is finished, but because the story is now on the page. In the months ahead, I will strengthen scenes, tighten plot threads, and clarify character arcs. But for now, I am simply grateful to have reached this first milestone.

What project milestones have you been happy to reach in your life?