How do I know when my book is ready?

I have a theory that the answer to this question is: you won’t, ever. But that’s a bit of a bummer to read, and I do think there’s more to explore on this topic. It’s understandably hard to answer, because for something to be ‘good enough’ there has to be some form of finish line. A point where you can categorically say that there is nothing left to change. It is, for want of a better word, perfect.

But we know that there’s no such thing. A book is never ‘finished’. Take a week, a month, a year away from your draft and I can guarantee you will find things to add or cut or correct, despite how perfect you thought it was back then, despite how many times you’ve read through it. Perhaps you were too close to the story to see its flaws, or perhaps you’ve grown as a writer and can now see a stronger, more interesting plot. Either way, the work is never done.

Of course, if you intend to share your stories with the world, you will have to reach a point where you consider them ready – whether that be to send to beta readers, to an editor, or out to agents – so how do convince yourself your book is good enough?

First, take it as far as you can

I like to think there are two steps to knowing when a book is ready, and the first step is to take the book as far as you can without outside input. By this I mean that you should hit a point where you think, ‘There is nothing more I can do with this story without sending it to other people’. It’s about hitting your current knowledge limit – and that limit will grow the more you learn about writing, editing and storytelling.

For instance, you might have managed to get a full draft written and you’re feeling happy with the story overall, but you’re not confident in its core elements to take it any further, so that’s when it’s ‘ready’ to send to beta readers. Even before then, you might only be able to manage a rough outline with some slightly fleshed out scenes here and there – that might be ‘ready’ to send to a critique partner.

Unfortunately, there’s no tangible marker for when you’ve reached this point. It’s not a matter of doing X rounds of edits or sending it to Y number of betas. It’s really more of a gut feeling. An internal understanding that there’s nothing more you could feasibly do at that point. And, to add salt to the wound, this point can change from book to book. Some stories will fall out of you like liquid gold, and it’s really just the fine-tuning that you need help with. But then your next idea is a stubborn mule, reluctant to reveal much of itself beyond some characters, a few conversations and a handful of possible plot threads. For that one, you might need some outside help earlier just to get the creative juices flowing.

Next, accept that perfection is a myth

The second step is to accept that there will always be changes you can make. There will always be typos – yes, even after it’s been read by dozens of people along the way. There will always be plot points you could have done differently, character arcs you could have explored further. But there’s a big difference between the above work – seeking feedback to make sure the story functions – and nit-picking or fine-tuning something to make it better.

If you plan to go down the traditional route, fortunately you will have external deadlines that give you a cut off. You will have a date set by someone else, after which you have to simply cut ties with the story and accept it as it is. If you intend to self-publish, this is a little trickier, because you have to set that date for yourself, which can be hard because you’ll have to convince yourself there’s not time for one more read-through. On the flip side, being self-published does mean you can go back and make changes even after publication – although you won’t want too many versions of your story out in the world, so you do have to draw the line somewhere.

Finally, be cautious about feedback

It’s easy to believe that getting the seal of approval from an outside voice is a solid way to determine whether your book is good enough, and this can be helpful to some degree. If your own self-doubt is all that’s holding you back, having a beta reader or an editor tell you they think your story is ready for the world can be the boost you need.

But if you believe that, it’s also easy to believe that the inverse is true – if you’re being rejected by agents, then surely it means your book isn’t ready. In some cases, this might be true. Sometimes your current skill level doesn’t match up to what agents are looking for, which means you just have to keep learning and growing.

However, other times it just doesn’t hit the right agent’s inbox at the right time. That doesn’t mean the story isn’t good enough, it just means the timing was off, and that’s out of your control. You don’t need to go back and do another round of revisions – you just need to find different agents to query or set the manuscript aside for now.

The Sisyphean nature of writing a book

For those unfamiliar with the story of Sisyphus, the very basic premise is that, as punishment for cheating death, he was forced to push a boulder up a hill, only for it to roll back down near the top. He is cursed to repeat this forever – always getting the boulder close to the finish line, but never quite succeeding.

In many ways, this is a lot like writing a book. First you think you’re close to being done, only to realise you’re just ‘done’ writing the first draft. The boulder rolls back down and now the mountain is revisions. Then you finish those but – oops! – down the boulder goes again, because now it’s line edits, copy-edits, proofreading. After all this, you think you’re finally about to crest the peak when, you guessed it, the boulder rolls all the way down again and the mountain becomes sending out queries, going on submission to publishers.

The whole process feels like nearly reaching the finish line and then seeing you’ve just hit the first mile marker on a marathon. So are we doomed as Sisyphus was? Are we cursed to have a book that is never ‘ready’? This leads me back to where I started (pun intended) – you won’t ever know when your book is good enough, not in any concrete way. There isn’t a loading bar at the bottom of the page that reaches 100% when the story is officially ready. You just have to trust your gut, seek help when you’re unsure of where you’re heading, and remember the old saying, ‘don’t let perfect be the enemy of good’.