TLDR: I am planning my drafting timeline and need advice. Do you have anything to share about when I should reach out to beta readers and the condition my draft should be in?
I want to preface, I’m still barely through my first draft but I want to start planning for the inevitable later. I’m a very detail oriented person and need to know everything about everything.
I‘ve heard that it’s better to not send your first draft to beta readers immediately but that you should send a draft to them before you start querying. I’m wondering which draft that should be.
This is what I’m planning to do. Any and all advice is appreciated!
Tentative Drafting Timeline
- complete first draft and take a few months break from the project. during these few months, I hope to play with my characters, plot, and map
- go through the story and flag what I don’t like and want to remove (does this qualify as developmental 1??) and take another break (idk if I should take another break tho…)
- look for repetition and weird flowery prose that can be reduced
- send to beta readers and have them flag where they get bored and confused, arcs and characters that aren’t working, plot holes, lack or influx of world building
- take in their edits and have them read that draft
- submit for querying
Advice could be directed at: does this plan feel standard? Too long? Too short? Am I focusing on the right things or am I missing anything? How many beta readers should I send my work to? I expect to finish my first draft by the end of this year and will spend most of next year and maybe a little bit into 2028 editing. I do plan on querying hopefully in 2028. If you notice anything about my plan you’d like to comment on and/or question, let me know please!
I appreciate this so much!!!