Okay, I’m 11,823 words into the first draft of my manuscript and I’m having the same doubts I have with every book. The characters have too many flaws to be likable and there is not enough conflict. It happens every time I start a new book. My writing process is to plot--which I do with a group of three other trusted published writers. We met in a writing class for unpublished writers a long time ago, and we all clicked. 

The first book I wrote was done without plotting--what we call the ‘pantster‘ method, i.e. by-the-seat-of-the-pants, but it took me five years to write that book and I wanted to be more prolific than that, so I took up plotting.

I try to write straight through a rough draft, on the theory that you can’t revise what you haven’t written. 

I can only hope that, like my last eight books, I’ll take a look at this first draft and think ‘Hey--it’s not nearly as bad as I thought’. 

Then I start to rewrite. I like to rewrite. It is so much less painful  :-)