I'm Typing as Fast as I Can

 

Terry here, with the question of the week: 

Handwritten or typed? Some writers, even today, will hand write a first draft. Some have 3d grade penmanship from the atrophy our handwriting has suffered. Do you still handwrite any part of your writing process or are you all type, all the time? 

 When I worked full-time in the tech world, I’d sneak out into my car every day at lunch and write. Handwrite, on yellow pads. Snippets of stories. Beginnings of books. Anything that struck my fancy. I know now what I was doing was learning my craft. By hand. 

 Eventually I settled down and wrote a few books. By hand. I’d transcribe them to the computer, which was a great way to do a first edit. Moving from handwriting to print made me see things in a different way. 

 I don’t remember how or why I transitioned to writing my first drafts on the computer, but now I wouldn’t think of writing a first draft by hand. Maybe not for the reason you’d think. In 2016 I had shoulder surgery that went bad. The radial nerve in my right arm (dominant hand) was damaged and for months I couldn’t use the hand at all. It was totally limp and unusable. In fact, I wrote my fifth book, The Necessary Murder of Nonie Blake entirely typing with my left hand. There’s no way I could have handwritten it with my left hand. Thankfully, I’m a good typist and my left hand did the job. And by the way, the book won a critic’s award—for which I credit my left hand. 

As for that 3rd grade penmanship, when my right hand gets tired, I write almost illegibly. And my left hand, as good as it was at typing, has never really done well with handwriting. 

But even if my right hand hadn’t suffered trauma, I would not have continued writing first drafts by hand. I type fast, and my typing keeps up with my brain. 

There was some claim several years ago that writing directly to a computer made writing “too easy” and that writers didn’t take the time to think things through before they typed thei first drafts. But honestly, I never thought things through (is this a confession?) in first draft. I always just plowed ahead. It’s in the editing process that I look critically at what I’ve written. 

I’m honestly often surprised at how well my brain has organized my thinking while I’m pounding out words. For example, in my next book, The Curious Poisoning of Jewel Barnes, which comes out December 2, I began to panic at 70,000 words. I had no idea what had actually happened. I didn’t know who poisoned Jewel Barnes or why. Yeah, cutting it pretty close. 

But somehow, in the panic stage, I realized what had to have happened. Not only that, but I also realized that my little brain had been busy organizing the story behind my back (or inside my head, or whatever) so that it all fit together. Sure, there were edits to be done, but the storyline was there. 

 I’m curious to know if others write by hand. Not me, baby!