Recently, a writer on social media asked: When you work on a second draft, you do edit the first draft or write a new document?
I explained my own process: I always save a new file, but I build on what's already there, moving through several full passes: red-pen read-through, a developmental self-edit, a dialog pass, fleshing out each character arc, and finally responding to editorial and reader feedback.
But the question stuck with me. How much of final draft is actually the same as my first?
This morning, I used Diffchecker to find out. I compared Draft One to my (almost finished) Draft Three. I started with 116,914 words, deleted 71,005 word, added 54,940 words, and ended with 100,849 words. That means about 45,000 words remained untouched, roughly 39%.
In other words, more than half of the final manuscript is new writing.
I’m curious how this compares to other authors’ experiences. Do your later drafts feel like refinements, or do they become something closer to a rebuild?
