Writer Sanctum
Writer's Haven => Writer's Workshop [Public] => Topic started by: idontknowyet on September 29, 2019, 01:51:05 AM
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In school my teachers always said your first guess is usually your best guess. I followed that advice all the way through college and for the most part it was accurate.
Recently I have been transcribing my notebooks into my typed portions. I've been using this time to do a pseudo first edit. I find that anything I change I turn around a go back to the original version. It's usually the best one.
Note: I'm not talking about grammar and typos got a billion of those.
Does editing and rewriting really help your book?
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I used to think yes, now I say 'sometimes'.
I've published heavily-edited novels and some which were almost 'write and forget'. Taking the first book in each of my series, 5 novels in all, the average review rating across all of them is about the same.
An example of the sort of editing I will still tackle:
I was writing chapter 34, and I realised things had come to a halt.
My main character rescued people in chapter 25 who were more capable and senior to her. Therefore, after that point she stopped being the lone wolf saving everyone, and became a small cog in a big machine. So, I went back and cancelled that rescue, instead having her free a handful of useless dweebs while all the others were spirited away by the enemy. There was just one guy she could rely on.
I had to modify chapters 26+, removing the senior officers and altering the scenes where they'd been giving orders or standing around looking senior and official. (Their lines mostly went to that one guy, with changes. Hate wasting my verbiage.)
During my previous novel I scratched a couple of chapters because I'd gone the wrong way. I guess you could call that editing too, although it was more like a branching path in the plot.
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When someone else does the editing, yes.
A couple of times I was saved from bland scenes and once from a confusing ending by my editor (two different people). Most recently, I sent off Book 1 while I worked on Book 2. I wasn't that happy overall with Book 1 and #2 was coming out the same way. My editor pointed out the problem and I made the change about a quarter of the way through #2.
Book 1 will need a rewrite to line up with the changes to #2 and I'll have to go through the beginning of #2.
Saved by The Editor!!!
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When someone else does the editing, yes.
A couple of times I was saved from bland scenes and once from a confusing ending by my editor (two different people). Most recently, I sent off Book 1 while I worked on Book 2. I wasn't that happy overall with Book 1 and #2 was coming out the same way. My editor pointed out the problem and I made the change about a quarter of the way through #2.
Book 1 will need a rewrite to line up with the changes to #2 and I'll have to go through the beginning of #2.
Saved by The Editor!!!
That was cool that she/he could make such a difference.
I'm really new to this so I don't always get the way people work, but why write a book you don't like? I mean I can barely get down a sentence I don't like I usually end up erasing/deleting it and coming back to it when my mind sorts out the problem.
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A good editor helps. It is easy for a writer to change things in their own work just to change them rather than for a good reason. I know. I used to spend a lot of time doing that. An experienced outside eye can spot plot problems or sentence structure problems that, just like typos, we don't see.
I am 75% through a novel that I'm not sure whether I like or not. It has good parts but I am honestly not sure I love it. But I am a writer so... 🤷
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I think it depends on the individual writer and what his or her process is.
In my experience, very few people produce their best work in just one draft. (The exception would be people who edit as they draft. Sometimes, that works. But I think it still counts as editing.)
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I compulsively edit as I go, but I do find sometimes that I'm just moving words in the hopes of hitting on something 'better', and often put them back later. Sometimes the results are simply that I'm ruining my original voice and not improving anything. Especially when I was first getting started, I did this lot. I think really effective editing tends to be more of cutting out dull or unnecessary words or sentences, catching echoes, (like when I use the same unusual word in the same paragraph), making things more clear, or more impactful. For a long time I felt that I was just changing things randomly. I don't think it's always bad to do this because sometimes it gives you new ideas. But now I try to identify why I'm making a change. What is the purpose behind it?
I also found this book really helpful.
https://www.amazon.com/Self-Editing-Fiction-Writers-Second-Yourself/dp/0060545690 (https://www.amazon.com/Self-Editing-Fiction-Writers-Second-Yourself/dp/0060545690)
Have you read On Writing by Stephen King? The end of the book has a good basic primer on editing, including a sample edit of a part of one of his books.
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I re-edited my first book after I'd written quite a few others. I took a lot of small stuff out, moved some things around, and shifted a different scene into the end. It was a better book for that.
I frequency go back and alter scenes as my thinking develops.
On the other hand, many scenes exist as first written and never change.
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When someone else does the editing, yes.
A couple of times I was saved from bland scenes and once from a confusing ending by my editor (two different people). Most recently, I sent off Book 1 while I worked on Book 2. I wasn't that happy overall with Book 1 and #2 was coming out the same way. My editor pointed out the problem and I made the change about a quarter of the way through #2.
Book 1 will need a rewrite to line up with the changes to #2 and I'll have to go through the beginning of #2.
Saved by The Editor!!!
That was cool that she/he could make such a difference.
I'm really new to this so I don't always get the way people work, but why write a book you don't like? I mean I can barely get down a sentence I don't like I usually end up erasing/deleting it and coming back to it when my mind sorts out the problem.
JKR said she'd like to rewrite the Harry Potter books. Even wildly successful authors second guess themselves because they (and we) are too close to the material. That's why we need fresh eyes on what we write.
In my case, all I knew was that something was off. I just didn't know what.
I can go through and correct punctuation, let Word point out spelling and grammatical errors (it's not always right), and take out 4,753 occurrences of the word just, but that's not good enough.
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I compulsively edit as I go, but I do find sometimes that I'm just moving words in the hopes of hitting on something 'better', and often put them back later. Sometimes the results are simply that I'm ruining my original voice and not improving anything. Especially when I was first getting started, I did this lot. I think really effective editing tends to be more of cutting out dull or unnecessary words or sentences, catching echoes, (like when I use the same unusual word in the same paragraph), making things more clear, or more impactful. For a long time I felt that I was just changing things randomly. I don't think it's always bad to do this because sometimes it gives you new ideas. But now I try to identify why I'm making a change. What is the purpose behind it?
I also found this book really helpful.
https://www.amazon.com/Self-Editing-Fiction-Writers-Second-Yourself/dp/0060545690 (https://www.amazon.com/Self-Editing-Fiction-Writers-Second-Yourself/dp/0060545690)
Have you read On Writing by Stephen King? The end of the book has a good basic primer on editing, including a sample edit of a part of one of his books.
I haven't taken a class or read anything about writing since my first bout of college. My main goal then was to get it done with an A and get out. Absolutely no information retention to be seen. Though I did enjoy the lively debates in English 2.
I am not saying my writing is amazing, cause basically I am guessing it's going to stink.
My poor editor is going to cry and ask for her mommy when she see's my book.
I've just been noticing trends in my writing. I've read posts from prolific writers that say for the most part they don't go back and do massive rewrites. They write, proofread and publish. It seems effective for them. I am sure they have way more writing education/experience than I do. It just seems like maybe over thinking words doesn't always help us tell our stories.
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Does editing and rewriting really help your book?
I think so, though I've never done a major structural revision. Just things like adding a little foreboding here, putting in more history to enhance a pending plot twist.
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Unequivocally - YES!
Anyone who says their first draft is their best work is being, at best, disingenuous. If they were THAT amazing without even thinking about it, imagine how much better it would be if they put some effort in?
Whatever you want to call it: editing, rewriting, fixing, cycling, adjusting, moving stuff around - it will always produce a better book, with the caveat that you need to be careful not to edit the soul or voice out of the narrative.
I think it was King who said to go back and identify themes...and reinforce them. It gives us time to build on metaphors, establish mood and set up situations, especially emotional ones, which will payoff later in the book. I'm looking at you Hodor. It also gives us a broader perspective to improve pacing, beats and narrative rhythm. It's not about changing a lot, a single word can make all the difference on the page.
An outside editor can obviously help with grammar and such, but they can also offer advice that will elevate the narrative, focus and tighten it, make it a better version of itself - just make sure they're on the same page as you, otherwise there’s a good chance they’ll screw it up.
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I have to go back and augment parts (sometimes large parts) of my stories after a period of sober second thought because I find it strengthens the overall effort. Helps me steer the ship in the direction I'd originally intended as I tend to drift off-course during first passage. Granted, this is a fairly subjective thing. I can only speak for myself.
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I have two books that IMO were really strengthened by major revisions because of outside output. However, I also know that deep down I already knew those sections needed exactly what I ended up doing. I just needed a kick in the butt to make me do it. Another book ended up shorter than I liked, and it was a beta reader who suggested what ended up being a great subplot, which is a revision of sorts, yes?
However, the first book I wrote (second I published) would get a lot of editing even just from me rewriting it now, as I've learned a lot about showing vs. telling, controlling POV, deepening POV, etc. Yet it's the one of my books that evokes the strongest positive reactions from readers. The characters and story just resonate the most. It will be 10 years since I published it this coming spring, and it still gets the most reviews of my books, still sells the best of backlist, etc. I'm afraid to touch it. My writerly ambition is to write another than affects as many people as strongly and as positively. That book does make me often debate with myself over the value of outside opinions.
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I submitted a partial of my first romance to seven RWA chapter contests, revising after each one based on the comments by the multiple judges of each contest. The last three times I entered it, it placed among the winners. I still had to edit the rest of the story myself, but I'd gotten a boatload of good advice and could take the consensus as the right path to pursue. It's still my bestselling romance.
My very first story, which was not a romance, went straight to several agents and editors and was heavily revised with each submission. I think the opening chapter suffered a lot from it. It may read more logically but I think some of the spirited quality of my heroine got crushed.
I could rewrite either of these much better today, but I'm not going to.
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"A film is made in the editing." - Sergei Eisenstein, the greatest of Russian filmmakers. So, too, a book.
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I see myself as a journeyman author - solid 4 star novels, entertaining but nothing extraordinary or culturally significant.
I'm happy with that, and I make a living from my work.
Having outlined my position, I'm not anti-editing by any means, and in fact I worked with an editor on four of my novels. That experience taught me a lot, and I've used that knowledge ever since. I would recommend that all authors go through the same experience with at least one of their novels.
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In addition to the above... (should have edited my post, hah.)
My fourth novel was a mess. It ended up at 140,000 words, I couldn't decide what to include and what to leave out, and I spent the entire time writing it wondering what my editor was going to say to this or that.
I was using the editor as a crutch, throwing everything into the novel so she could sort it out afterwards. I second-guessed myself, kept trying to come up with bigger and better twists, and hated the entire writing process. When I did hand the MS in my editor was really disappointed with the whole thing, and I felt like a crushing failure.
Eventually I rewrote the novel, almost from scratch, and it ended up at 90k. It was also the only novel of mine to be shortlisted for two major genre awards, so ... there you go. Disproving my own points in a very obvious way.
But... nominations or not, I vowed never to go through that process again. I managed to get out of the publishing contract and I've been indie ever since. I edit as I go, and as long as the plot is consistent and the story makes sense, I'm good.
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Really enjoying this thread, and lots of interesting comments from more experienced writers above.
I'm finding that my process is evolving as I go - currently working on edits for what will be my seventh published novel.
For me, one of the huge benefits of editing / rewriting myself is that I quite often find that, having written the first draft, I then come up with better, bolder ideas in the revision process - so although my first ideas are fine, by digging in a bit more, I come up with a more interesting twist or take on the scene. We writers do love to torture our characters ... grint
I also really value external input - although it does have to be from the right people. At the moment I have a super beta reader (more like a mini developmental edit) and she calls me out on inconsistencies and where things don't hang together, which I appreciate - working through her comments just now.
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I compulsively edit as I go, but I do find sometimes that I'm just moving words in the hopes of hitting on something 'better', and often put them back later. Sometimes the results are simply that I'm ruining my original voice and not improving anything. Especially when I was first getting started, I did this lot. I think really effective editing tends to be more of cutting out dull or unnecessary words or sentences, catching echoes, (like when I use the same unusual word in the same paragraph), making things more clear, or more impactful. For a long time I felt that I was just changing things randomly. I don't think it's always bad to do this because sometimes it gives you new ideas. But now I try to identify why I'm making a change. What is the purpose behind it?
I also found this book really helpful.
https://www.amazon.com/Self-Editing-Fiction-Writers-Second-Yourself/dp/0060545690 (https://www.amazon.com/Self-Editing-Fiction-Writers-Second-Yourself/dp/0060545690)
Have you read On Writing by Stephen King? The end of the book has a good basic primer on editing, including a sample edit of a part of one of his books.
I haven't taken a class or read anything about writing since my first bout of college. My main goal then was to get it done with an A and get out. Absolutely no information retention to be seen. Though I did enjoy the lively debates in English 2.
I am not saying my writing is amazing, cause basically I am guessing it's going to stink.
My poor editor is going to cry and ask for her mommy when she see's my book.
I've just been noticing trends in my writing. I've read posts from prolific writers that say for the most part they don't go back and do massive rewrites. They write, proofread and publish. It seems effective for them. I am sure they have way more writing education/experience than I do. It just seems like maybe over thinking words doesn't always help us tell our stories.
There is another extreme that doesn't seem to turn up as much in the indie world, (not that I'm an expert on the indie world), but much more so in writer's groups and colleges. It suggests that one should constantly edit and polish one's writing, Analyze every phrase and rethink every scene, (sometimes to the point where one ends up with analysis paralysis and can't finish a book.) There have been many excellent writers who wrote this way - Ernest Hemingway and James Joyce are the notable examples I know of. I read also somewhere that Dean Koontz perfects every page before moving on. His first draft is his last because he cannot keep writing until he's finished with a page. That's pretty unusual though I think.
However, most of us fall somewhere in-between. When I was in high school I was taught 'first thought-best thought' and sometimes that's true. But my writing always needs to be cleaned up. The editing process is what makes the writing clear, interesting, thought-provoking, and less likely to make you look stupid as an author. Because we all get to look stupid when a reader catches our mistakes:) At the same time, eventually we just have to call the book done and move on, because there are some things you will understand better when writing the next book. In my not very expert opinion, I think anyone aspiring to be a writer should do what they can to learn to self-edit. If nothing else, it's a big time saver when you learn to catch your own mistakes. A professional editor can only take your book so far. The more self-editing you do, the more the editor can do for you, I think.
Self-editing is an established part of the writing process for a reason. It's a tool like any other that can be put to good use. The better you become at using it, the better a writer you become. There as a lot to be said for just getting words down on paper. Honestly, I think that's what I've learned the most from, but more tools sure come in handy.
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I hate going back over the same stuff again and again, so editing as I go, polishing each sentence as I write it, or immediately after, is the only way that works for me.
As for big picture stuff, I come up with a very basic plot outline, just a few sentences usually. Then I write the first couple of chapters to get a feel for the characters, setting and tone. Then I make notes on the next chapter and the 2-3 following it. Finally, I stick to the notes as I write those chapters.
That's enough to stay on track. I don't like to plot more than 2-3 chapters ahead because I need the flexibility and the sense of excitement and freedom I get from letting things develop organically.
(I should add that I do plot a bit further ahead the closer I get to the end of the novel. Right now I've plotted the next eight chapters of this one, including the ending.)
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Nothing wrong with first thought-best thought, but to me that means the scene in general. It's how I present that scene that may not be right the first time around.
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This is an excerpt from a review I just read. Not one of mine.
All-in-all, It's a pretty good yarn told well. But it could benefit from a good editor. You can call it nitpicking, but small errors can be a big problem when they distract the reader. Just a small sampling: hyphens where dashes should have been used, hyphens missing where they should have been, repeated, bulky use of past-perfect tense. More importantly wrong grammar in the mouth of a news editor, "Marriage wasn't what her and Randal wanted it to be." And, "I had barely lived there a year," seeming to mean she hovered between life and death? No, an editor would have made that silly sentence read, "I had lived there barely a year." Small stuff you wouldn't find in a Michael Connelly book, in other words. Writers in general need to make sure they have the help and support of a good editor -- not a copy reader but a real, honest-to-goodness editor!
FWIW
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JKR said she'd like to rewrite the Harry Potter books. Even wildly successful authors second guess themselves because they (and we) are too close to the material. That's why we need fresh eyes on what we write.
I keep wondering if Stephen King would like to go back and write an actual ending to The Mist. Hell, even the movie came up with an ending. It was heartbreaking, but at least it was ten times better than what Steve wrote.
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I hate going back over the same stuff again and again, so editing as I go, polishing each sentence as I write it, or immediately after, is the only way that works for me.
I can't remember which big name author said it, but I read an interview once where the author said they edited as they went. What they did was, wrote their allotted words on day one and then stopped. The next day, before they started writing again, they would go back and edit what they wrote the day before. Once they were satisfied with the previous work, they would pick up where they left off. They continued this each day and when they were finished, they had a manuscript that was already edited and ready to be sent to their editor. It also had the happy side-effect of putting them back into the story when they reached the point of writing the new words.
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That's enough to stay on track. I don't like to plot more than 2-3 chapters ahead because I need the flexibility and the sense of excitement and freedom I get from letting things develop organically.
I don't think you could have kept Hal under control for more than 2-3 chapters at a time, so your way is probably for the best. Grin
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Nothing wrong with first thought-best thought, but to me that means the scene in general. It's how I present that scene that may not be right the first time around.
I think the teacher who said this was referring to word choice, but I've probably forgotten the context. Stephen King actually suggests something similar. He says, don't hunt around for a fancy word. Just use the word that comes to mind. I hunt around for fancy words sometimes, because I like it that way. But sometimes I default to this reasoning to keep my sanity.
I took writing classes in college where I was basically taught the opposite. Examine every single word to see if you can find a better one. I suppose there is room for all different schools of thought, but I think most writers are better off with a little bit of both.
I am a compulsive self-editor. I stop and edit a scene 3-4 times while writing it. Then I re-read it next time I sit down to write and tweak some more before writing the next. I frequently go back and re-read and tweak things. I wouldn't necessarily call this right or anything, but it's the only way I can write.
Some things I actively look for when editing:
Making nouns more specific. Changing soda to Pepsi or tree to Oak.
Making passive verbs active where it makes sense to do so. Changing she was walking, to, she walked. Also, more colorful verbs. She picked up the keys, would become, she grabbed the keys. She strolled, hurried, paced, etc.
Cutting out bland, unnecessary descriptors, like very, or, He felt that, etc.
Sentence variety. If I've written too many short sentences or long sentences together? Boring to read. I try to mix them up.
I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language. Our mind is focused on getting down the story, the images, and all that good stuff and if you stopped to check every word you would lose what you are trying to say. You just have to write down whatever comes to mind first because you are busy working out the story. In a first draft, those types of things make perfect sense. It's afterward that we can correct those things and make the whole more readable and interesting and vivid in the reader's mind.
I spent many years believing that I had to refine and perfect my prose to make it worthwhile. A book on writing by Annie Dillard made the whole writing process sound so painful that I almost gave it up! So, I've had to think a lot about this for myself. Editing is good stuff, but it should be a servant and not a master. Like all writing advice, take what works for you and discard the rest.
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Nothing wrong with first thought-best thought, but to me that means the scene in general. It's how I present that scene that may not be right the first time around.
I think the teacher who said this was referring to word choice, but I've probably forgotten the context. Stephen King actually suggests something similar. He says, don't hunt around for a fancy word. Just use the word that comes to mind. I hunt around for fancy words sometimes, because I like it that way. But sometimes I default to this reasoning to keep my sanity.
I took writing classes in college where I was basically taught the opposite. Examine every single word to see if you can find a better one. I suppose there is room for all different schools of thought, but I think most writers are better off with a little bit of both.
I am a compulsive self-editor. I stop and edit a scene 3-4 times while writing it. Then I re-read it next time I sit down to write and tweak some more before writing the next. I frequently go back and re-read and tweak things. I wouldn't necessarily call this right or anything, but it's the only way I can write.
Some things I actively look for when editing:
Making nouns more specific. Changing soda to Pepsi or tree to Oak.
Making passive verbs active where it makes sense to do so. Changing she was walking, to, she walked. Also, more colorful verbs. She picked up the keys, would become, she grabbed the keys. She strolled, hurried, paced, etc.
Cutting out bland, unnecessary descriptors, like very, or, He felt that, etc.
Sentence variety. If I've written too many short sentences or long sentences together? Boring to read. I try to mix them up.
I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language. Our mind is focused on getting down the story, the images, and all that good stuff and if you stopped to check every word you would lose what you are trying to say. You just have to write down whatever comes to mind first because you are busy working out the story. In a first draft, those types of things make perfect sense. It's afterward that we can correct those things and make the whole more readable and interesting and vivid in the reader's mind.
I spent many years believing that I had to refine and perfect my prose to make it worthwhile. A book on writing by Annie Dillard made the whole writing process sound so painful that I almost gave it up! So, I've had to think a lot about this for myself. Editing is good stuff, but it should be a servant and not a master. Like all writing advice, take what works for you and discard the rest.
Wouldn't you be totally changing the flow of you story by making sentences have more variety? I thought that had to do with pacing. When I want a scene to feel like it's fast pace or action packed I used short sentences when I slow down the pacing I use longer descriptive sentences. Randomly changing them to have variety would muck up pacing wouldn't it?
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I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language. Our mind is focused on getting down the story, the images, and all that good stuff and if you stopped to check every word you would lose what you are trying to say. You just have to write down whatever comes to mind first because you are busy working out the story. In a first draft, those types of things make perfect sense. It's afterward that we can correct those things and make the whole more readable and interesting and vivid in the reader's mind.
One of the best cases for revising and writing more than one draft I've read in a while.
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I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language.
"We" is including everyone, every single writer ever, and one thing I've learned is that we're all different. Broad strokes including everyone aren't always accurate. "We" might love chocolate, except "we" all don't.
I think for most people, some level of editing is probably worthwhile, at least in the beginning. The trouble comes when you get a bad editor, or one who wants to change the "voice" of the book in ways that don't involve better word choices, or punctuation, or sentence structure. I've heard horror stories...
New writers should most definitely have some competent outside person or persons going through the work. They should also be learning the basics of writing so they know if the advice they get is even half right. Experience should help avoid most issues, with a good percentage of it being caught by the authors themselves.
So, to answer the question: Maybe.
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I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language. Our mind is focused on getting down the story, the images, and all that good stuff and if you stopped to check every word you would lose what you are trying to say. You just have to write down whatever comes to mind first because you are busy working out the story. In a first draft, those types of things make perfect sense. It's afterward that we can correct those things and make the whole more readable and interesting and vivid in the reader's mind.
This is interesting - I don't know if it applies to everyone, but I've recently been experimenting with dictating the first draft, and then editing with my keyboard. What I have found, over and over, is that when I'm dictating my vocabulary is much more limited than when I'm typing. Typing is slower, for me, so I can consider my word choices a little more. However, dictating is fast and to keep the flow, I just use the first, easiest, word that comes to mind. So, lots of repetition. Although dictation lets me get the first draft out of my head and onto the screen a lot faster than my clumsy typing, I now need to add an extra dimension to my editing to consider word choices, too, and have found myself reaching for a thesaurus more often.
But everyone is different, and I'm sure there are writers who can manage a far more polished first draft on dictation.
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I find that when typing too - plenty of time to edit and plan the next sentence while my fingers are bashing away on the keys. (And I mean bashing. I just realised I'm already wearing the caps off a near-new $200 keyboard.)
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Nothing wrong with first thought-best thought, but to me that means the scene in general. It's how I present that scene that may not be right the first time around.
I think the teacher who said this was referring to word choice, but I've probably forgotten the context. Stephen King actually suggests something similar. He says, don't hunt around for a fancy word. Just use the word that comes to mind. I hunt around for fancy words sometimes, because I like it that way. But sometimes I default to this reasoning to keep my sanity.
I took writing classes in college where I was basically taught the opposite. Examine every single word to see if you can find a better one. I suppose there is room for all different schools of thought, but I think most writers are better off with a little bit of both.
I am a compulsive self-editor. I stop and edit a scene 3-4 times while writing it. Then I re-read it next time I sit down to write and tweak some more before writing the next. I frequently go back and re-read and tweak things. I wouldn't necessarily call this right or anything, but it's the only way I can write.
Some things I actively look for when editing:
Making nouns more specific. Changing soda to Pepsi or tree to Oak.
Making passive verbs active where it makes sense to do so. Changing she was walking, to, she walked. Also, more colorful verbs. She picked up the keys, would become, she grabbed the keys. She strolled, hurried, paced, etc.
Cutting out bland, unnecessary descriptors, like very, or, He felt that, etc.
Sentence variety. If I've written too many short sentences or long sentences together? Boring to read. I try to mix them up.
I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language. Our mind is focused on getting down the story, the images, and all that good stuff and if you stopped to check every word you would lose what you are trying to say. You just have to write down whatever comes to mind first because you are busy working out the story. In a first draft, those types of things make perfect sense. It's afterward that we can correct those things and make the whole more readable and interesting and vivid in the reader's mind.
I spent many years believing that I had to refine and perfect my prose to make it worthwhile. A book on writing by Annie Dillard made the whole writing process sound so painful that I almost gave it up! So, I've had to think a lot about this for myself. Editing is good stuff, but it should be a servant and not a master. Like all writing advice, take what works for you and discard the rest.
Wouldn't you be totally changing the flow of you story by making sentences have more variety? I thought that had to do with pacing. When I want a scene to feel like it's fast pace or action packed I used short sentences when I slow down the pacing I use longer descriptive sentences. Randomly changing them to have variety would muck up pacing wouldn't it?
That's an interesting question. I hadn't thought about it like that. I try to do what you described also, but I also try to vary things. I descriptive passage packed with only looong sentences can be a turn-off. A tense, action-packed scene can sometimes start to sound like Dick and Jane in its simplicity. For me personally, a mix of both keeps things more interesting. If I had more time it would be fun to look up examples in books, but I haven't got the time. Still, I think if you crack open a successful novel on the first page you will find a nice mix of different length sentences, that start and end in different ways. It's just another tool you can use. It's not a law or anything.
I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language.
"We" is including everyone, every single writer ever, and one thing I've learned is that we're all different. Broad strokes including everyone aren't always accurate. "We" might love chocolate, except "we" all don't.
I think for most people, some level of editing is probably worthwhile, at least in the beginning. The trouble comes when you get a bad editor, or one who wants to change the "voice" of the book in ways that don't involve better word choices, or punctuation, or sentence structure. I've heard horror stories...
New writers should most definitely have some competent outside person or persons going through the work. They should also be learning the basics of writing so they know if the advice they get is even half right. Experience should help avoid most issues, with a good percentage of it being caught by the authors themselves.
So, to answer the question: Maybe.
Yes, I should have said "I" since it's from my own experience that got this idea. I do find that there are a lot of things I had to edit out of my first efforts that I now adjust for automatically while writing the first draft. I imagine those of you who have written numerous novels need less and less editing afterward:) That's why I think learning to self-edit actually saves time in the long run. People like Simon who have written so many books probably don't need a lot fine-tuning after the fact. I think the more one learns to self-edit, the more one can fix things the first time around instead of in later drafts. But you're absolutely right, YMMV.
And I'm not talking about professional editors at all. I assumed the OP was talking about self-editing. I'm not trying to tell anyway the right way, just talking over things that have helped me.
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I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language. Our mind is focused on getting down the story, the images, and all that good stuff and if you stopped to check every word you would lose what you are trying to say. You just have to write down whatever comes to mind first because you are busy working out the story. In a first draft, those types of things make perfect sense. It's afterward that we can correct those things and make the whole more readable and interesting and vivid in the reader's mind.
This is interesting - I don't know if it applies to everyone, but I've recently been experimenting with dictating the first draft, and then editing with my keyboard. What I have found, over and over, is that when I'm dictating my vocabulary is much more limited than when I'm typing. Typing is slower, for me, so I can consider my word choices a little more. However, dictating is fast and to keep the flow, I just use the first, easiest, word that comes to mind. So, lots of repetition. Although dictation lets me get the first draft out of my head and onto the screen a lot faster than my clumsy typing, I now need to add an extra dimension to my editing to consider word choices, too, and have found myself reaching for a thesaurus more often.
But everyone is different, and I'm sure there are writers who can manage a far more polished first draft on dictation.
I have a copy of Dragon dictation on my shelf that I used once. :( Maybe it will work for me someday, but boy is it different. From what I've read, a lot of things come out differently when speaking instead of typing.
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I think when we are just getting ideas down on paper, we default to repetitive phrasing and weak language. Our mind is focused on getting down the story, the images, and all that good stuff and if you stopped to check every word you would lose what you are trying to say. You just have to write down whatever comes to mind first because you are busy working out the story.
You know, in thinking about this further, you've not only set out a good case for why revision is important, but also READING.
I'm thinking the more well-read I am - the more exposed I am to other turns of phrase, strong verbiage, varied prose, enhanced vocabulary, etc - the better the chance that when I'm rifling through a first draft, my personal 'grab bag' of phrases and language will be that much more upgraded than if I hadn't been as well-read.
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In my case, yes. The way my process is, I like to describe it as if I was painting a picture, it's like starting out with a rough sketch (that's my first draft, after I've already outlined). Then I step back and look at the whole and go this needs to go over there, that doesn't work here, I need something over here. Then I work in revision and editing passes, fixing the composition, adding color, depth, shading, details. Places where in my first draft I skimmed over stuff that needs to be filled out. I get insights into character, story, and theme with each pass and add those. Fixing my over-long, complicated sentences and long-running paragraphs (this is how the words naturally come out of my brain, but it does not read well). And sometimes I'm not really sure of something I'm trying to get at and I have to circle the drain a few times before I can home in on exactly what I want to say. So maybe (often? sometimes?) my first ideas are my best ideas, but my first expression of them is not, even if I know what I'm trying to say, which a lot of times I don't.
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The stinky elephant in the room, of course, is that while editing will definitely help the literary merits of your book (it'll be more entertaining), that extra work won't necessarily translate into sales. So...
:shrug
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As an editor of all flavours as well as a writer I'll point out that you need, under some circumstances, to empower an editor to provide broad structural or story-related input if you want it. Yes, some forms of editing like "structural", "developmental" or as we call it, "line" editing (as you know, interpretations of these differ) are by default an invitation for the editor to criticise just about anything. But if you only ask for a copy edit, or certainly a proofread, and you'd still welcome criticism on the manuscipt as a whole, you need to make that clear.
It's not case of "you didn't pay for it". It's about assuming that such aspects of the manuscript have already been well-covered by someone — usually the author, but you can't assume that either. Editors don't want to inadvertently tread on one another's toes or criticise someone else's work (well, I don't anyway).
I guess I'm just saying that discuss with any editor what you're expecting from them.
As for that stinky elephant in the room, yes it's true. As a writer you need to satisfy yourself above anyone else. If you're comfortable publishing poor-standard writing because you decide it doesn't really matter, that's your call. It's worth asking, do you really know how bad it is? If you're happy with the mistakes you can see, how many are you missing? Two or three 2-star grumpy but considered reviews that criticise the editing quality can far outweigh a hundred generic "OMG, this book was awesome!" reviews.
Time for breakfast ...
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I hate going back over the same stuff again and again, so editing as I go, polishing each sentence as I write it, or immediately after, is the only way that works for me.
I can't remember which big name author said it, but I read an interview once where the author said they edited as they went. What they did was, wrote their allotted words on day one and then stopped. The next day, before they started writing again, they would go back and edit what they wrote the day before. Once they were satisfied with the previous work, they would pick up where they left off. They continued this each day and when they were finished, they had a manuscript that was already edited and ready to be sent to their editor. It also had the happy side-effect of putting them back into the story when they reached the point of writing the new words.
That’s Wayne Stinnett’s 5000 words per week publishing plan. I use this as well, though I still find a solid editing pass at the end is HIGHLY necessary. Mainly because I overuse passive voice and the word just WAY TOO MUCH.
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I'm a good self-editor but I still need a second or third set of eyes to make my stories better. It's rare for me to write the best thing first and when it happens, I thank God and ask for more of those cases. Aaahhhh!
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I hate going back over the same stuff again and again, so editing as I go, polishing each sentence as I write it, or immediately after, is the only way that works for me.
I can't remember which big name author said it, but I read an interview once where the author said they edited as they went. What they did was, wrote their allotted words on day one and then stopped. The next day, before they started writing again, they would go back and edit what they wrote the day before. Once they were satisfied with the previous work, they would pick up where they left off. They continued this each day and when they were finished, they had a manuscript that was already edited and ready to be sent to their editor. It also had the happy side-effect of putting them back into the story when they reached the point of writing the new words.
That’s Wayne Stinnett’s 5000 words per week publishing plan. I use this as well, though I still find a solid editing pass at the end is HIGHLY necessary. Mainly because I overuse passive voice and the word just WAY TOO MUCH.
Just is also my downfall. Also a bit. I think I get that one from my grandson because every time I ask him to do something, he says, "In a bit."
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That’s Wayne Stinnett’s 5000 words per week publishing plan. I use this as well, though I still find a solid editing pass at the end is HIGHLY necessary. Mainly because I overuse passive voice and the word just WAY TOO MUCH.
Oh yeah, definitely. I also do a final pass and usually one with the computer reading the novel to me. Can you spend too much time editing? Sure, but this would be an absolute minimum for me.
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I'm waging a personal vendetta against "but". Try avoiding that sentence structure of, "Blah, blah, blah, but he did blah blah blah..."
It's a but disease!
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turned, glanced, muttered, suddenly, looked, then ... I overuse them all, but sometimes it's a struggle to come up with a different beat in dialogue.
(My writing software has a feature to locate them, but not suggest something cool and better.)
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I'm waging a personal vendetta against "but". Try avoiding that sentence structure of, "Blah, blah, blah, but he did blah blah blah..."
It's a but disease!
Yep - I seem to use "but" every second sentence in a first draft ...
And when I was dictating, I kept finding that everything was "odd" - not strange, or unusual, or anything else, but "odd".
But, hey, that's what editing is for, right?! Grin
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The stinky elephant in the room, of course, is that while editing will definitely help the literary merits of your book (it'll be more entertaining), that extra work won't necessarily translate into sales. So...
:shrug
I would think that no one aspect of writing or publishing would make one's book a financial success. Focusing on just plot, or just voice, or just advertising would not make a successful novel either, at least I wouldn't think so. It would take a little bit of everything, wouldn't it?
(How did the word bit get in there? I guess I do that too:)
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Pro tip for over-used words:
Don't reach for the thesaurus or Find and Replace - rewrite the entire passage, meaning phrase, sentence or paragraph, as necessary. Often, if it's a crutch word, it's nested within crutch phrasing. Rewriting adds sentence variety, as well as helps break the dependence. You'll also be able to tell if the whole thought was extraneous enough to be deleted altogether.
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It would take a little bit of everything, wouldn't it?
Yep. And all of that everything works differently depending on the brand.
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Pro tip for over-used words:
Don't reach for the thesaurus or Find and Replace - rewrite the entire passage, meaning phrase, sentence or paragraph, as necessary. Often, if it's a crutch word, it's nested within crutch phrasing. Rewriting adds sentence variety, as well as helps break the dependence. You'll also be able to tell if the whole thought was extraneous enough to be deleted altogether.
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It would take a little bit of everything, wouldn't it?
Yep. And all of that everything works differently depending on the brand.
When I'm struggling to find the right word, I know the sentence/paragraph isn't working and I rewrite it.
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turned, glanced, muttered, suddenly, looked, then ... I overuse them all, but sometimes it's a struggle to come up with a different beat in dialogue.
In dialogue, I don't worry about characters overusing words. In real life, people tend to use to same small number of words, so no problem there. I always worry about my characters sounding too much alike. But, then again, I know I've read books where the author didn't use dialogue tags often enough and I end up backtracking to try to figure out which character is saying what, so I guess it's not always easy to give characters each a unique voice.
In actual prose, yeah, I use words like turned and looked far too often for my liking. Instead of look, a character might spy, spot, glance, peer, etc. but sometimes, perhaps most of the time, they are looking. And if you try to substitute words for looking, it can feel forced. And it can't be a matter of rewriting because if a character is looking at something, but not examining it or studying it, nor glaring at it, but just looking at it, there's only so many ways you can say that they are looking at something unless you go wild with purple prose and potentially throw off the pacing or mood or whatever.
And, probably, more than likely, writers are the only ones paying attention to such things because, hopefully, readers are so drawn into the story that they are not noticing that a character has been looking, looking, looking for the past half dozen paragraphs but are instead wondering and anticipating what is going to happen next.
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Agree about dialogue. It's important to stick to the character's vocabulary and way of speaking. Most of us use very few words in our day to day conversations.
As for the regular prose, yeah, sometimes characters need to look at stuff. But other times, they can be made aware without the risk of the prose turning into stage direction, especially with first person. It takes more work (time), but we can usually accomplish this without disrupting pacing. And when we just can't - say they looked. I've found that if I can remove most of my crutch words and phrases, including stage direction, then the few occurrences that remain don't matter so much.
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In school my teachers always said your first guess is usually your best guess. I followed that advice all the way through college and for the most part it was accurate.
I remember that advice. That was mostly for filling in those bubbles in multiple choice questions.
In writing that advice is TERRIBLE. With every revision your work should get better. It allows you to enhance your prose and add more layers of depth to your story. However, if you're self-publishing and trying to release regularly on a schedule it's usually recommended to just let it go. Spending weeks, perhaps months(years for some people), making the book 10% better will probably make you less money than just releasing the book as is and starting another book.
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In school my teachers always said your first guess is usually your best guess. I followed that advice all the way through college and for the most part it was accurate.
I remember that advice. That was mostly for filling in those bubbles in multiple choice questions.
In writing that advice is TERRIBLE. With every revision your work should get better.
"For sale: baby shoes, never worn."
How would you revise that to make it better? And would a second revision make it even better? A fifth? A tenth?
There's a point at which revision simply becomes revision for revision's sake and ceases making anything better.
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I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that some (by some I mean most) of our absolute best sentences are first draft ideas that we can't believe we just thought of. Reworking them is generally a really bad idea. Editing is for all of those parts in between our momentary flashes of brilliance.
grint
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Unless of course only we think it is brilliant. That happens too.
I occasionally see someone tweet a line from a novel, apparently believing it is brilliant and I go... 🙄
Telling the difference is the trick and may be where an editor can help out
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In school my teachers always said your first guess is usually your best guess. I followed that advice all the way through college and for the most part it was accurate.
I remember that advice. That was mostly for filling in those bubbles in multiple choice questions.
In writing that advice is TERRIBLE. With every revision your work should get better.
"For sale: baby shoes, never worn."
How would you revise that to make it better? And would a second revision make it even better? A fifth? A tenth?
There's a point at which revision simply becomes revision for revision's sake and ceases making anything better.
Okay, I'll bite.
In that I'm not going to make the attempt, but rather tut-tut you for skipping past the lore of that famed sentence to play "gotcha".
Apples v. Oranges (2019), but I just watched a fine video called "How Star Wars was saved in the edit" (look it up on YouTube). It began with the opening crawl: I always thought Brian DePalma was credited with writing it outright, where he actually had a hand in trimming down the BLRPH of text George Lucas originally wrote to give us the crawl we all know and love today.
Thus, while the Hemingway anecdote is snappy and memorable, it's entirely possible it started out as, "I'm writing to inquire as to the cost of running an advertisement in your esteemed publication, with a heavy heart, for I must inform you that... (etc)."
Also: The challenge set enormous constraints (write a story in six words). Ah, but *which* six? Hemingway chose his well, and maybe there is no better answer. I don't believe the goal of revision is to have each sentence be One for the Ages™. Speaking from my own experience, however, something even as "minor" as moving one word elsewhere in a paragraph can have major impacts to the rest of the story.
/sips tea
But that's none of my business...
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"For sale: baby shoes, never worn."
How would you revise that to make it better? And would a second revision make it even better? A fifth? A tenth?
There's a point at which revision simply becomes revision for revision's sake and ceases making anything better.
:icon_rolleyes:
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that some (by some I mean most) of our absolute best sentences are first draft ideas that we can't believe we just thought of. Reworking them is generally a really bad idea. Editing is for all of those parts in between our momentary flashes of brilliance.
grint
That's very true. Reworking something that you already think is brilliant is a bad idea. But I doubt too many of us have written books where every single sentence is amazing.
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I'm reading book four in a series at the moment. The major character has just been introduced to a VIP, and we're getting her initial reactions to this other person. The internal monologue goes on about how she's always wondered what the person was like, and how she'd never met her or even seen her before.
Problem is, she already met that person in book one, where there was a pivotal scene where she read the VIP's thoughts and then fainted.
(I wasn't 100% sure I was at fault so I went back to check. Definitely the same characters.)
The author thanks his editor at the end of every book, but it goes to show something will always slip through even if you hire a pro.
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I'm reading book four in a series at the moment. The major character has just been introduced to a VIP, and we're getting her initial reactions to this other person. The internal monologue goes on about how she's always wondered what the person was like, and how she'd never met her or even seen her before.
IMO this kind of thing is the author's responsibility, not any editor's. Even if the same editor worked on all 4 books, it's not reasonable to expect her to remember what went on in Book 1 when there have been many other books to edit in between. The creator, however, ought to know his own stories, skim back over them, review outlines of prior books in a series, whatever it takes to get back in the groove of that series when adding to it.
I see a lot of these kind of errors, probably because I binge read everything in a series if I find one I like, and it's never occurred to me to think oh, look what some editor missed, but it always makes me think oh, there's an author who needed to review his prior books and didn't bother.
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Yeah, I agree it's down to the author. My point was that (in my own experience too) having an editor waiting in the wings can perhaps make the author a bit more lazy. 'We'll fix it in post' in other words.
Or, as a friend of mine says when we're renovating ... 'grout will fix it'
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Problem is, she already met that person in book one, where there was a pivotal scene where she read the VIP's thoughts and then fainted.
I hope you're not talking about one of my books, where Lissette meets one of the apprentice wizards, cries out and falls into a coma. Oh wait, I haven't even written book three yet. grint
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You have to admit, it's hard enough keeping facts straight across one book, never mind 5, 8, 10 or more.
That's one reason I introduce all new characters for every novel in my longest series. Other than the 3 protagonists and one or two faves that is.
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This is an excerpt from a review I just read. Not one of mine.
More importantly wrong grammar in the mouth of a news editor, "Marriage wasn't what her and Randal wanted it to be." And, "I had barely lived there a year," seeming to mean she hovered between life and death? No, an editor would have made that silly sentence read, "I had lived there barely a year."
FWIW
Yeah.
Some writers will always need editors. Or to aim at readers who have poor grammar themselves.
As a group they have done well from self publishing because they would rarely have been considered by traditional publishers.
OTOH that doesn't read like a review from an average reader.
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I think the thread is conflating three different things.
- Construction and review in initial writing.
- Self-editing as a separate second or third phase.
- Using an external editor.
I'm always reviewing as I write. I don't try to perfect word choice, although occasionally I know what word I want and it doesn't come to mind & will then make an effort to get it. Sometimes i decide to start again from the beginning.
I do a lot of self-editing in separate phases. The aims vary. Sometimes it is simply to deal with dialogue. Sometimes it is tightening word choice or the story. Sometimes it is perfecting the sequence of different threads. Etc. I always correct and tidy when i see a problem. I find it much easier to have a single target for each phase.
I don't really need an external editor, but I find it helpful to have other people read as a final stage and I prefer to have that done by readers who are also editors and writers. I don't like to work with people I haven't met fact to face, and I know I'm lucky in being able to do that. The advantages are knowing that they will say what I don't want to hear and that I have a context for their perspective.
My feeling about first thoughts is that they're rarely best when it comes to structure but can often be for wording, especially in language led projects.
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"A film is made in the editing." - Sergei Eisenstein, the greatest of Russian filmmakers. So, too, a book.
There's very little in common between movie editing and book editing. Movie editing is the equivalent of having someone else hand you a thousand pages of text in a random order, most of which are different versions of the same scenes, and you then have to cut-and-paste sections together to make a readable story. Book editing usually at least starts with what's supposed to be a complete story and not just a thousands fragments.
Not to mention that the story in a movie is often told with the cuts, not the action. See Mamet's famous example of the old man smiling and cutting to a shot of a giggling baby to make him look like a doting grandfather, or cutting to a shot of teenager in a bikini to make him look like a dirty old man... without a single change to the acting.
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I don't have much to add, but I'll throw this out there:
Of all the things I learned from my BA in Political Science (insert sarc tags here), the most useful thing by far was the ability to write clean first drafts. How did I learn it? By putting off all of my papers until the night before they were due—sometimes, even the day they were due. No editing. No rewriting. Because I was lazy, my grade depended on getting a clean first draft every time.
I didn't graduate with a 4.0 GPA, but I did get better than 3.7—and that after getting thrown out of a K-street internship and nearly failing the Washington Seminar program my senior year.
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I don't have much to add, but I'll throw this out there:
Of all the things I learned from my BA in Political Science (insert sarc tags here), the most useful thing by far was the ability to write clean first drafts. How did I learn it? By putting off all of my papers until the night before they were due—sometimes, even the day they were due. No editing. No rewriting. Because I was lazy, my grade depended on getting a clean first draft every time.
I didn't graduate with a 4.0 GPA, but I did get better than 3.7—and that after getting thrown out of a K-street internship and nearly failing the Washington Seminar program my senior year.
I've known a fair number of paper who could do a clean draft essay. However, I've also noticed that the longer something is, the harder it is to do that. A number of my students could write clean essays drafts, even under time pressure. Many of the same students didn't do as well with term paper rough drafts. I imagine the result would have been even dicier with something as long as a novel.
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I don't have much to add, but I'll throw this out there:
Of all the things I learned from my BA in Political Science (insert sarc tags here), the most useful thing by far was the ability to write clean first drafts. How did I learn it? By putting off all of my papers until the night before they were due—sometimes, even the day they were due. No editing. No rewriting. Because I was lazy, my grade depended on getting a clean first draft every time.
I didn't graduate with a 4.0 GPA, but I did get better than 3.7—and that after getting thrown out of a K-street internship and nearly failing the Washington Seminar program my senior year.
I had a couple of jobs where I had to lay out complex issues in short, sometimes one page briefing notes, which had to be perfect in terms of grammar, spelling, etc, before they went up the chain. Absolutely perfect, and mostly under time constraints. It taught me to write well, and do it quickly. Nowadays, my first drafts are, if not quite as clean, then clean enough that I do one revision for content, then run it through my editing tools before it goes off to my editor.
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I'm really new to this so I don't always get the way people work, but why write a book you don't like? I mean I can barely get down a sentence I don't like I usually end up erasing/deleting it and coming back to it when my mind sorts out the problem.
You know how you intend your book to come across to others.
What you don't know is whether you achieved it because you'll never be not you.
A trusted first reader (whether editor, beta reader, etc regardless of the specific method) fills that gap. Changes may or may not be necessary based on whether that person's thoughts line up with your intent.
Maybe you meant for readers to hate Character X and maybe you didn't. You won't know until someone other than you tells you what they thought of Character X. And Character X can be anything from a literal character, to plot points, theme, twists, setting or whatever.
Short answer: Get some outside feedback from an unbiased source, particularly in your earlier work. It will help.
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I'm really new to this so I don't always get the way people work, but why write a book you don't like? I mean I can barely get down a sentence I don't like I usually end up erasing/deleting it and coming back to it when my mind sorts out the problem.
You know how you intend your book to come across to others.
What you don't know is whether you achieved it because you'll never be not you.
A trusted first reader (whether editor, beta reader, etc regardless of the specific method) fills that gap. Changes may or may not be necessary based on whether that person's thoughts line up with your intent.
Maybe you meant for readers to hate Character X and maybe you didn't. You won't know until someone other than you tells you what they thought of Character X. And Character X can be anything from a literal character, to plot points, theme, twists, setting or whatever.
Short answer: Get some outside feedback from an unbiased source, particularly in your earlier work. It will help.
Just had that problem with Character X as you described. My editor pointed out that there wasn't an obvious reason for her anger. Of course, I knew why she was angry, but I hadn't made it clear to the reader. Since she's the MC in the second book, I had to explain the reason for her anger a lot better. I'm working on that right now and I've found several places where I can put in little hints as to the cause.
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I have a question:
Of those who rewrite a lot, how many write their whole novel in a single Word document, or use other similar word processing software?
Of those who don't really change much after finishing the first draft, how many use novel writing software like Scrivener or yWriter? (Or use document outline features in Word.)
Just curious. Personally I can't manage a document as big as a novel in a word processor, because it's a nightmare trying to find anything. I hit 25k in my first novel back in 1994 and just gave up.
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I have a question:
Of those who rewrite a lot, how many write their whole novel in a single Word document, or use other similar word processing software?
:mhk9U91:
I write in OpenOffice, and each book is a single .odt file. Work in progress is currently at about 90,000 words. No chapters yet; just scene breaks. This makes it really easy to move scenes from Point A to Point B. I add chapter breaks after I'm sure all the scenes are in the right places.
Personally I can't manage a document as big as a novel in a word processor, because it's a nightmare trying to find anything. I hit 25k in my first novel back in 1994 and just gave up.
I use the word processor's "find" tool. Works well enough for me.
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One word or odt file. I've been migrating. :D
I've tried all the writing software (even ywriter) and always ended up back in one word processing file.
I generally don't have trouble finding things, but I also make use of find when I need to track down a particular reference.
One big file is just how I like to write.
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I do varying amounts of editing, depending on how the novel turns out, but I don't do anything that could be described as a rewrite. I have to have the whole thing in one Word file, otherwise I have a feeling I would lose the flow. But I tend to try not to check back on things too much as I go along, I just mark doubtful things up either with asterisks or highlighting and go back to them later. I suppose that's how the 'dog with 3 names' incident happened.
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I generally don't have trouble finding things, but I also make use of find when I need to track down a particular reference.
My problem with 'Find' is that it's only any good if I can remember a phrase or a pair of words I used in the paragraph.
E.g. I've never had much luck searching this forum or KB for a specific topic, because I remember the gist of the conversation but nothing else.
I'm much more likely to remember that something happened in a scene starting with occurrence X, and in writing software it's trivial to select the chapter then click scenes to preview the first couple of lines.
Back in the 60s and 70s computer programs were one long listing, with GOTOs jumping all over the place. Then came the idea of breaking these monolithic files into separate pieces of source code, and editing smaller bits and pieces at a time. I've written code both ways, and the latter makes it so much easier to manage even a modest-sized project. That was the idea behind yWriter back in 2001 or so - turning a novel into sort of source code.
Of course, the main difference is that source code won't run if there's a problem, whereas novels can have any number of mistakes that only a reader will find. That drives me crazy, and I wish there was a compile button for a novel...
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Of those who don't really change much after finishing the first draft, how many use novel writing software like Scrivener or yWriter? (Or use document outline features in Word.)
I'm generally in the don't change much group. My first readers haven't found major issues so far (knock on wood.) I've also written short stories for most of my writing years. I'm only on my second novel. I changed to Scrivener for this novel. I used Openoffice for the prior novel, and Word before it got annoying and went subscription.
Just curious. Personally I can't manage a document as big as a novel in a word processor, because it's a nightmare trying to find anything. I hit 25k in my first novel back in 1994 and just gave up.
I haven't found Scrivener to be more search friendly than Word/OO Find was. (I'd be interested in knowing if there's some Scrivener feature I'm missing.) I do have a pretty good memory for exact phrasing I've used which makes Find work well enough with either product. I like Scrivener and don't expect to move back to OO, but this isn't one of the places I've found it to be strongly advantageous so far.
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I've never seen Scrivener running, but yWriter looks like this. Click a chapter on the left, scene list appears top right with the first scene selected. Click a scene, and the content appears below right.
So, if I know the scene where something happens but not the precise wording (very common for me) I just click chapters until I see the scene in the list on the right, and then click it to preview the content below. (Or double-click to edit the content.)
I can still use search across the whole doc, I so don't lose that functionality.
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I have a question:
Of those who rewrite a lot, how many write their whole novel in a single Word document, or use other similar word processing software?
Of those who don't really change much after finishing the first draft, how many use novel writing software like Scrivener or yWriter? (Or use document outline features in Word.)
Just curious. Personally I can't manage a document as big as a novel in a word processor, because it's a nightmare trying to find anything. I hit 25k in my first novel back in 1994 and just gave up.
I just use word. I don't rewrite a lot, mostly typos and changing little things here and there, but if I do need to change something, I do okay finding what I need. Right now I have the characters referring to meeting in their teens and meeting in their twenties. I have to change one, but I haven't figured out which one is the right one yet. I always have a hard copy on hand and I'm flipping through it and rereading constantly. I don't know, my brain just recalls enough to find stuff. I did fine on my last novel that was 150+K. IRL people ask me to find stuff for them on the internet, or they'll just ask me random stuff figuring I know. I guess I have a knack for narrowing down searches or something. :shrug
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I do a Word .doc and date it and the next day I date the next iteration if there are major changes between versions. I almost never have to go back to an older file to reinstate a deleted bit, but they all exist.
Flow is important and I try not to shift scenes around because doing that can mess up the flow. My stories generally grow organically so the only reason to go back looking for something is if it needs to include foreshadowing or if the information or thought or action happened too soon in the story. Easy to find since Y can’t happen before X.
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Since I was primarily a short story writer, I liked having chapters in separate chunks--I used yWriter long time ago :)
Now I use Word and use Styles/Headers that make an automatic TOC, which helps in navigation. I name my chapters in the working document so that I can find things easily. And the Find feature works great.
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I like scrolling. Sounds silly but all the clutter of scene and chapter lists annoy me and if I want to look at something from the scene before I don't even have to move my cursor. I can scroll back, read what I want no matter how far back it was, hit the spacebar and I'm right back to typing.
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I have a question:
Of those who rewrite a lot, how many write their whole novel in a single Word document, or use other similar word processing software?
Of those who don't really change much after finishing the first draft, how many use novel writing software like Scrivener or yWriter? (Or use document outline features in Word.)
Just curious. Personally I can't manage a document as big as a novel in a word processor, because it's a nightmare trying to find anything. I hit 25k in my first novel back in 1994 and just gave up.
I write on an Alpha Smart Neo then transfer my work into a single Word doc. While the file is transferring I can read it over and make any obvious corrections. I write four to five pages in a session.
I always add in scene breaks as I go, but never chapterize until I'm ready to publish. If I need to find something, it's easy enough to do using the search function in Word.
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I wrote my first 4 books in WordPerfect, and 2 of them were well over 100,000 words. However, I didn't have one all-inclusive file for those longer books. Not a file for each chapter either, but several for large sections. The other two (75,000 words for the mystery and 90,000 for the other romance) were in one big file.
I learned WordPerfect in my legal secretarying days and always thought you'd have to pry it from my cold, dead hands to part me from it. And I suppose that's still true as I still use it for everything non-book writing.
Anyway, my fourth book, 90,000-word romance, got unanimous beta reader feedback that the male character was just too hard. My romances have different scenes in hero/heroine POV, and to soften the guy, I wanted go through all scenes in his POV and wanted to have them contiguous so I could be sure to keep him consistent. Getting all those scenes into one file and then putting each back where it belonged in place of the original was a royal PITA.
Right after I finished struggling through that, there was a Scrivener discussion at That Other Place with users posting screen shots of how they used the program. Looking at those screen shots, I realized how relatively easy those revisions I'd struggled with would have been in Scrivener, how much easier moving anything in a draft around would be. So I tried Scriv and have used it ever since.
One problem I've had is that Scriv has encouraged me to move things around a lot since it's easy to do, and I was spending way too much time moving a scene from this chapter to that one. So for the novel I'm working on right now, I've stopped using the structure of chapter, scenes; chapter, scenes in Scriv. I started out with a single chapter as a folder and have all scenes within it. The theory is my scenes are already at the right level, so once the draft is done enough I'm no longer moving things around, I can put in more chapters and move scenes into them once instead of constantly fussing. Worst case it won't be that easy after all and I won't do it this way again.
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I tried Ywriter once and thought it was a great program - I still do. But once I was asked to think out analytical questions like - who are my characters? What scene am I on? I froze up and couldn't write a thing. I find it much easier to dive straight into a scene rather than trying to figure out ahead of time what I'm actually doing. I can't seem to figure that stuff out until after its written.
I write in one long document. I don't know why I remember what I've written - probably because I've re-written it a few times! It sounds horribly inefficient and I think it is, but it seems to be the only way I get anything done.
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I've never seen Scrivener running, but yWriter looks like this. Click a chapter on the left, scene list appears top right with the first scene selected. Click a scene, and the content appears below right.
Scrivener is similar. But Word has Outline mode and OO has Navigator which achieve the same thing. Neither is quite as elegant as in Scriv but that basic type of high level organization is there if you want it.
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I wrote my first 4 books in WordPerfect, and 2 of them were well over 100,000 words. However, I didn't have one all-inclusive file for those longer books. Not a file for each chapter either, but several for large sections. The other two (75,000 words for the mystery and 90,000 for the other romance) were in one big file.
I learned WordPerfect in my legal secretarying days and always thought you'd have to pry it from my cold, dead hands to part me from it. And I suppose that's still true as I still use it for everything non-book writing.
Anyway, my fourth book, 90,000-word romance, got unanimous beta reader feedback that the male character was just too hard. My romances have different scenes in hero/heroine POV, and to soften the guy, I wanted go through all scenes in his POV and wanted to have them contiguous so I could be sure to keep him consistent. Getting all those scenes into one file and then putting each back where it belonged in place of the original was a royal PITA.
Right after I finished struggling through that, there was a Scrivener discussion at That Other Place with users posting screen shots of how they used the program. Looking at those screen shots, I realized how relatively easy those revisions I'd struggled with would have been in Scrivener, how much easier moving anything in a draft around would be. So I tried Scriv and have used it ever since.
One problem I've had is that Scriv has encouraged me to move things around a lot since it's easy to do, and I was spending way too much time moving a scene from this chapter to that one. So for the novel I'm working on right now, I've stopped using the structure of chapter, scenes; chapter, scenes in Scriv. I started out with a single chapter as a folder and have all scenes within it. The theory is my scenes are already at the right level, so once the draft is done enough I'm no longer moving things around, I can put in more chapters and move scenes into them once instead of constantly fussing. Worst case it won't be that easy after all and I won't do it this way again.
I'm with you on Word Perfect and I still miss it. I also learned it in my legal secretarying days.
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I've never seen Scrivener running, but yWriter looks like this. Click a chapter on the left, scene list appears top right with the first scene selected. Click a scene, and the content appears below right.
I tried to look at Scrivener once, but just couldn't see wanting to devote that much time to learning it. Scrivener comes with a thirty day trial period and it's thirty days of use, not thirty days from the first day you try it. I think I still have about 23 days left on the trial.
I started using computers (like a lot of us) back in the early 80's and the first word processor I used was WordPerfect. The DOS version. I wrote all my college papers and thesis on it and used it up until the early to mid-90's. Switched over to Word around 2000, because of work requirements and used it until about four or five years ago when I went to OpenOffice, then LibreOffice. I haven't looked back since.
I use LibreCalc to outline my stories, creating my own version of the Save The Cat beat sheets in the spreadsheets. I use a timeline program to hash out the original storyline and then I start typing in LibreWrite. One document from beginning to end. I'm 61-years-old now and don't see much reason to change my ways now.
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It was trying to edit in one long OpenOffice document (never had Word) that made me download yWriter all those years ago. That's when I discovered that I have a fetish for novel writing software - is there a group for people like me? You know, Shinythings Anonymous grint.
I bought Scrivener, but whenever I try to move scenes around, I never get them in the right place and end up "losing" them and, although I love its Corkboard, it's word count display isn't a patch on yWriters. Then came The Novel Factory, and WriteWay, before I settled on StoryBox.
Whichever software I use, though, once I've finished my draft, I export to OpenOffice for a final read through and a global F&R for double spaces and such, before I send it to my proofreader (Him upstairs ;) ) and thence, after further corrections, to my beta readers.
I do write a fairly clean first draft - apart from fricking commas - but I correct as I go, and it's still a two-stage process between software and one long document.
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Oh, yes, WordPerfect. I loved it. Learned how to do the chaptering/TOC and a hundred nitpicky things, like footnoting, when writing my thesis.
Word has all those features now.
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I've never seen Scrivener running, but yWriter looks like this. Click a chapter on the left, scene list appears top right with the first scene selected. Click a scene, and the content appears below right.
Scrivener is similar. But Word has Outline mode and OO has Navigator which achieve the same thing. Neither is quite as elegant as in Scriv but that basic type of high level organization is there if you want it.
OO / LibreOffice also has bookmarks etc listed in the Navigator, so if I ever want to bookmark any spot to come back to (so I can finish a read through etc) I can see it at a glance. :D The Navigator is a very handy little thing and I have all the keyboard short cuts for it the style toolbar in muscle memory F5 and F11. They come and go as needed and I never have to look at them when I don't want to.
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It was trying to edit in one long OpenOffice document (never had Word) that made me download yWriter all those years ago. That's when I discovered that I have a fetish for novel writing software - is there a group for people like me? You know, Shinythings Anonymous grint.
Oh, yes. No one can say I write the way I do in one long doc and use Libreoffice (formerly Word 2007 but can't stand Word 2019/office 365 version) because I've never tried anything else. I have oodles of half finished stories saved in writeway pro wwb files and yWriter all the way back to yw2/yw3 files. :D I tried Scrivener and a few other flashy programs too, but none of them worked for me either, in the end. I spent far too much time playing with the software and hardly any time at all actually writing. ;D (I have a bad habit of trying new things and reorganizing, etc, and ending up right back where I started.)
The big thing for me is that as I've changed as a writer, I've found that I hate having old docs in formats that aren't easily opened these days. Old doc and odt files still open with even basic software that's freely available. :D
And then I started finishing things, and I really discovered that I like having all my story in one place and that scrolling though the doc works for me.
But I fix things as I go, and I don't do big edits or revisions at the end. And I write in a mostly linear fashion. Skipping scenes just doesn't work for me. I have been known to go back and add a scene, but that's rare. Just did it on a novel I have in progress and I'm glad I did, but it felt really weird to need to do it! That's so not my usual process. I do add things into scenes, when I go back through any of the billion times I go back through the story as I'm writing, but that's not the same thing at all.
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I use Word and do one long document (though with tentative chapter breaks).
I've been using word for many, many years--long before I became an author--and I'm comfortable with it. I suppose that's part of the reason I stick with it.
When I first started, there were a lot of people having trouble getting their Word document imports to convert well in KDP. I started using Scrivener at that point because of how easy it was to convert the finished product to mobi or epub. (I've always thought that the less pressure I put on the distributor's conversion process, the better.) Anyway, I never had the conversion issues I heard people complaining about.
I switched back to Word when I got Vellum for my formatting and conversion needs. I hadn't been using any of Scrivener's special features, so returning to Word, where the editing was much easier for me, made sense.
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I have a question:
Of those who rewrite a lot, how many write their whole novel in a single Word document, or use other similar word processing software?
Of those who don't really change much after finishing the first draft, how many use novel writing software like Scrivener or yWriter? (Or use document outline features in Word.)
Just curious. Personally I can't manage a document as big as a novel in a word processor, because it's a nightmare trying to find anything. I hit 25k in my first novel back in 1994 and just gave up.
I don't content edit. I outline so I don't have to. All in one Word doc.
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It depends what you mean by edit, of course. By the time I'm finished with a draft, ready for what I consider edits (grammar, internal consistency, etc.), I'm not taking out or putting in any more scenes. Period. I'm also not removing or adding characters, moving around scenes, adding more sex or taking any single aspect out. I make all those choices during the writing process and they're my decisions.
But that doesn't mean I think it requires no editing of the other sort. :-) That's just how I work. I decide how my scenes and stories work. Nobody gets to tell me anything about that part anymore. As others have said, each writer has their own process.
These days I write mostly on a Neo 2 Alphasmart and then transfer into Word. I've written lots of different ways, but this one seems really good for me right now.
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I have a question:
Of those who rewrite a lot, how many write their whole novel in a single Word document, or use other similar word processing software?
Of those who don't really change much after finishing the first draft, how many use novel writing software like Scrivener or yWriter? (Or use document outline features in Word.)
Just curious. Personally I can't manage a document as big as a novel in a word processor, because it's a nightmare trying to find anything. I hit 25k in my first novel back in 1994 and just gave up.
So far I am writing each trilogy in one long word document. Originally I only had scene breaks, but because I don't write sequentially I was spending to much time transcribing scenes in the right spot. Chapters with titles help me figure out where I am. It almost feels like a small outline yet I'm avoiding outlining.
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I've tried Scrivener. I like the concept, but it's a bit much and I didn't really feel like having to learn it. I watched a really good Scrivener tutorial on youtube and it gave me a headache, it has a lot of options that I don't want or need.
I like word because I already know how to use it and it's what my editors use. I can integrate it with any of the cloud programs I use and I can write from my laptop, computer, or even my phone if I want to.
I write the entire novel in word. My current WIP is at 94k, and probably another 10-12 thousand words before it's done. I haven't had any trouble finding specific sections if I want to edit something earlier in the book. Find and replace helps immensely, but I wonder if everyone realizes that if you format the word doc properly using headers there is a navigation panel with your chapter titles and you can easily select the chapter you want to go to and even move chapters around that way. If your word doc is formatted properly at the start not only does it make it super easy to navigate within the word file but it also makes it incredibly easy to generate good looking eBooks for those who don't use something like vellum.
If I'm writing a series (which I am at the moment) I also keep an excel file with the names of every major character or significant side character. It list the characters ages, height, and details about their appearance. If I'm writing fantasy or something that requires a lot of world building i'll also include details about locations I've made up, etc. Basically everything I would have done if I were using Scrivener.
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The big thing for me is that as I've changed as a writer, I've found that I hate having old docs in formats that aren't easily opened these days. Old doc and odt files still open with even basic software that's freely available. :D
I used to use an Atari ST (1986 until '95), but fortunately I have an Atari ST emulator on my PC, and I still have a copy of all my files and programs from those days. In fact, it's a direct copy of the hard drive so I can just run it and it's like I'm back in the early 90's.
From 1983 to 86 I used a ZX81 and a ZX Spectrum, but I don't have any files from then. Just the computers themselves... heh. To be honest, I transferred the only story I ever wrote on the Spectrum onto the Atari, and still have it. Talk about a backup nut - I have a copy of every word of fiction I've ever written, going back almost 35 years.
yWriter is up to version 7 now (and there's a mac one as well), but backwards compatibility is vital to me. Every version will load files from ywriter 2 and later. yWriter 1 was only for my own use, and it was really just a shell which opened Doc files in Word as you clicked them - one per chapter of the novel.
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The worst for me was the transfer from my old brother word processor diskettes to another format. Computer wouldn't read them of course so I ended up using Dragon Naturally way back when to get the printouts into Word files. :D I swear Dragon was better back then. I bought a new edition four years or so ago and I can't even use it. It was terrible. Or maybe I just had more time back then and didn't notice how much training it took back then to get it to work. I do have copies of everything. But I hung on to the originals too. :-) And ywriter at least saved rtf versions for me!
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I bought Scrivener, but whenever I try to move scenes around, I never get them in the right place and end up "losing" them and, although I love its Corkboard, it's word count display isn't a patch on yWriters.
I had the same problem moving scenes in Scriv when I tried to do it by drag and drop. Then I discovered the Toolbar buttons to do it, stopped trying to d&d and haven't had a problem since.
I tried Ywriter once and thought it was a great program - I still do. But once I was asked to think out analytical questions like - who are my characters? What scene am I on? I froze up and couldn't write a thing.
I had that problem after reading Libbie Hawker's Take Off Your Pants. Trying to follow her method stopped me in my tracks. So I gave up on all that and ignore things like beat sheets, character sheets, and all that kind of stuff. I work out a story in my mind with characters I think fit, do a minimal outline and go for it. Admittedly slowly.
I've tried Scrivener. I like the concept, but it's a bit much and I didn't really feel like having to learn it. I watched a really good Scrivener tutorial on youtube and it gave me a headache, it has a lot of options that I don't want or need.
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If I'm writing a series (which I am at the moment) I also keep an excel file with the names of every major character or significant side character.
We're all different. I didn't find Scrivener hard to learn. I just stuck an old 3-chapter short story in it and played around. Admittedly I still only use the most basic features. Every once in a while I hear about something that sounds handy and incorporate it or go looking for how to do something I think it will do that I need at the moment. My total resistance is to learning Word or any spreadsheet program. I'm old enough I figure my odds of getting out of this world without ever having to give in on that are good.
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I tried Ywriter once and thought it was a great program - I still do. But once I was asked to think out analytical questions like - who are my characters? What scene am I on? I froze up and couldn't write a thing.
I had that problem after reading Libbie Hawker's Take Off Your Pants. Trying to follow her method stopped me in my tracks. So I gave up on all that and ignore things like beat sheets, character sheets, and all that kind of stuff. I work out a story in my mind with characters I think fit, do a minimal outline and go for it. Admittedly slowly.
That's kind of amusing. That's one of the only plotting books that was ever useful to me:) But I used it to rough out an overall big picture and then hardly ever looked at it again. I just had to be able to write it all down first. I also used her points to outline other movies and books I'd read, but I've always had trouble with plot and needed a lamp post for a while. I had always been a panster and realized that when people said they wrote an outline, I had no clue what that even looked like. Once I realized I needed something, her book worked for me.
And I'm finding it less useful now that I'm working on a second mystery. But in general, I agree with you. I learn things from those types of tools on occasion, but hardly ever actually use them to write.
Someday I think it might be useful to write the book, then put it into something like yWriter after, and sort of 'see' the structure of the book, so to speak. but I'm probably too lazy.
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Someday I think it might be useful to write the book, then put it into something like yWriter after, and sort of 'see' the structure of the book, so to speak. but I'm probably too lazy.
As long as the chapter headings are 'Chapter 1', 'Chapter 2' and so on, and you've used scene breaks like '* * *', you can save a doc to RTF and then yWriter will import it and split it up into a project.
I swear I'm not trying to turn this into a yWriter support thread. (I get enough of that by email and in the google groups list!)
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I used to use an Atari ST (1986 until '95), but fortunately I have an Atari ST emulator on my PC, and I still have a copy of all my files and programs from those days. In fact, it's a direct copy of the hard drive so I can just run it and it's like I'm back in the early 90's.
Oooo, another Atari man. My first computer was an Atari 800. I used that for a couple of years before getting an Epson XT clone. With the Atari, I found it fun and frustrating at the same time, trying to turn a 40 column screen document into an 80 column print doc. Those were the days.
:tup3b
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I had the 520 STFM and the megafile 60 hard drive (eventually) - the latter cost me $1500 for 60mb of storage.
It was a pretty decent system though. Easily as fast as the PCs I was selling for my day job. But when the first Pentium 90 came along with Windows 95, I was sold instantly.
All my life I'd bought computers that weren't as popular as the mainstream (Commodore was huge in Australia). That's why I've always stayed away from the Mac - the PC has just about everything. I do own a Mac mini, but only because it's necessary to develop IOS apps.
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I had the 520 STFM and the megafile 60 hard drive (eventually) - the latter cost me $1500 for 60mb of storage.
It was a pretty decent system though. Easily as fast as the PCs I was selling for my day job. But when the first Pentium 90 came along with Windows 95, I was sold instantly.
All my life I'd bought computers that weren't as popular as the mainstream (Commodore was huge in Australia). That's why I've always stayed away from the Mac - the PC has just about everything. I do own a Mac mini, but only because it's necessary to develop IOS apps.
As with other things, it's very much a question of what works for you. I know a lot of contented PC users and a lot of contented Mac users. Typically, people change platforms only when their existing choice isn't doing what they want it to do or in the way they want to it.
I'm a PC man, though I've worked with both. When I was teaching, I got a Mac laptop for the use of students bringing presentations from home. (PowerPoint should be cross-platform compatible, but in fact there are glitches.) That particular purchase works to my advantage now because I'm able to use it for Vellum. Everything else I do on the PC.
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The Destructive Pursuit of Perfection
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The Destructive Pursuit of Perfection
Just the title got me predicting Kris or Dean. Sure enough...
FWIW, my personal experience working with lots of authors in critique groups is the opposite of what they say most of the time.
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The Destructive Pursuit of Perfection
Thanks for posting, but the title is kind of misleading, isn't it? She’s talking about editing out the soul of our books, which we’ve discussed here. The pursuit of perfection is not the same as refining the narrative, reinforcing voice or tightening the emotion. Simply understanding the story does not automatically make it entertaining.
For example, she singles out King as having a great voice, and yet he rewrites his books to death; which means she’s accepting of his process as a means to an end, even if that necessitates using editors.
At the end of the day, she’s preaching that we should be protective of our work and have the confidence to ignore banal conformist advice - not that we shouldn’t strive to publish the best books we can.
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What she says is pretty close to my experience at least most of the time. There are exceptions.
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The Destructive Pursuit of Perfection
I needed to listen to this. I just had a beta read that has confused me so much that I’ve come to a screeching halt with my book. I suspect the reader (who is a romance author) is telling me to rewrite the book in her voice and now I need to sort out what part of her advice might actually be helpful and what to ignore.
I like the recommendation in this video to have only readers (rather than authors) as beta readers.
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I suspect the reader (who is a romance author) is telling me to rewrite the book in her voice and now I need to sort out what part of her advice might actually be helpful and what to ignore.
Under no circumstances do you listen to anyone that would tell you to change your voice, especially if they want you to write in their voice. Your voice is what is going to make you unique in the field of literature.
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I suspect the reader (who is a romance author) is telling me to rewrite the book in her voice and now I need to sort out what part of her advice might actually be helpful and what to ignore.
Under no circumstances do you listen to anyone that would tell you to change your voice, especially if they want you to write in their voice. Your voice is what is going to make you unique in the field of literature.
The problem is not as much for established authors as it is for newer authors I would think. We don't know what we don't know. We hire a person trusting that they are supposed to know their job. Then we take the advice we pay for.
I was in an editor group trying to pick up as much information as I can. I kid you not one editor said I should get cowriting credit and several other editors agreed with them. When an editor gets to the point they feel that way are they really editing your books.
I've seen editors posting developmental edits where they write 350 words for every 1k of manuscript. Then they give you a 3-5 page overview. How is that an edit and not a rewrite? How is there anything left of your story?
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I've seen editors posting developmental edits where they write 350 words for every 1k of manuscript. Then they give you a 3-5 page overview. How is that an edit and not a rewrite? How is there anything left of your story?
Quite obviously, you are talking about me as long as I am the only one with such an offer.
What's your question exactly?
Yes, I usually write 350 words of comments (or more) per every 1k of a manuscript. These comments cover usual stuff: the plot, character development, dialogues, setting, etc. Why do you call it rewriting? What else would you expect from developmental editing if not some comments about the plot, characters, etc.?
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I listened to the first half of Kris's talk - I've read her blog before and was familiar with most of it - but at one point she said, 'writers just want to be told what to do' and I know for me at least that's really true. A part of me really, really wants some authority on high to either declare my work brilliant or correct all its faults. But this is such a silly thing to want. Even when I get criticism on my work, I crave the negative comments that will give me something to fix - and yet, almost everything in the story is there because I had a reason for it. I'm starting to realize that a lot of criticism has more to do with the criticizer's taste than anything else.
Not always. Some people, whether through experience or some inherent skill, can read a book and tell when something is wrong with it, and ignore what's right about it. But again, it has to be 'wrong' with the writer's taste as well as the critical reader's.
Not much of this applies to editing at the sentence level - fixing deficient sentences and so on, just the content/developmental edit stage.
'The perfect is the enemy of the good' is something I have to remind myself of a lot. I am not much of a perfectionist in other things but for some reason writing brings out the obsessive compulsive buried somewhere inside me.
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A part of me really, really wants some authority on high to either declare my work brilliant or correct all its faults. But this is such a silly thing to want.
I would say it's an absolutely reasonable request. Technical flaws are technical. They can be found and fixed. If there are no technical flaws, well, you have every right to do this: :banana:
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Some people crave approval more than others.
There's this flawed thinking that if you make something good enough, people will like you. Turns out it's almost the exact opposite in practice LOL. (At least with people who knew you *before success*. Strangers are different.)
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I've seen editors posting developmental edits where they write 350 words for every 1k of manuscript. Then they give you a 3-5 page overview. How is that an edit and not a rewrite? How is there anything left of your story?
Quite obviously, you are talking about me as long as I am the only one with such an offer.
What's your question exactly?
Yes, I usually write 350 words of comments (or more) per every 1k of a manuscript. These comments cover usual stuff: the plot, character development, dialogues, setting, etc. Why do you call it rewriting? What else would you expect from developmental editing if not some comments about the plot, characters, etc.?
Actually no i'm not. Didn't remember reading yours (but I probably have since I read all the editors that post here) I have seen quite a few editors that post the same on facebook. But I wouldn't mind your insight.
I have seen people post in critique groups a 1-2k passage from their book and an editor post the same or more in a response. Which just boggles my mind. I get that a developmental editor needs to speak to all of those things but my assumption would be only if it needs fixing. Why are you commenting on stuff that doesn't need to be fixed? Other than adding a few comments to uplift the writers spirits as you point out the holes in the story. Now if there was a massive hole in the story it would seem more helpful to make a note of where and a few places that lead to the hole and have a discussion with the author. But commenting on ever 1k of the story writing almost a third of it seems like you feel the need to rewrite the authors story to fit your expectations.
I love the idea that you are thorough with your developmental edits don't get me wrong. I love the idea that the editor really thinks about my book and takes the time to figure our how it can be improved. But why improve what isn't broken?
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There are many people who would welcome such a comprehensive report, especially earlier on in their careers, or maybe someone returning to writing after a long break.
But personally, if I get an email from a beta reader highlighting one single, solitary typo, I'll leave it sitting in my inbox for three or four days before I can finally drag myself to the manuscript to locate and fix the offending word. Anything more detailed than that and my eyes glaze over.
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I'm not an editor. But when I'm ranting about books and movies, it's almost never about the story itself. My issues are generally about things that can easily be fixed in the editing process: pacing, motivation, tone, characterization, tension and suspense, layers, setups and payoffs, mood, emotion and voice - all of the fiddly bits that, at the end of the day, make stuff entertaining.
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I've seen editors posting developmental edits where they write 350 words for every 1k of manuscript. Then they give you a 3-5 page overview. How is that an edit and not a rewrite? How is there anything left of your story?
Quite obviously, you are talking about me as long as I am the only one with such an offer.
What's your question exactly?
Yes, I usually write 350 words of comments (or more) per every 1k of a manuscript. These comments cover usual stuff: the plot, character development, dialogues, setting, etc. Why do you call it rewriting? What else would you expect from developmental editing if not some comments about the plot, characters, etc.?
Actually no i'm not. Didn't remember reading yours (but I probably have since I read all the editors that post here) I have seen quite a few editors that post the same on facebook. But I wouldn't mind your insight.
I have seen people post in critique groups a 1-2k passage from their book and an editor post the same or more in a response. Which just boggles my mind. I get that a developmental editor needs to speak to all of those things but my assumption would be only if it needs fixing. Why are you commenting on stuff that doesn't need to be fixed? Other than adding a few comments to uplift the writers spirits as you point out the holes in the story. Now if there was a massive hole in the story it would seem more helpful to make a note of where and a few places that lead to the hole and have a discussion with the author. But commenting on ever 1k of the story writing almost a third of it seems like you feel the need to rewrite the authors story to fit your expectations.
I love the idea that you are thorough with your developmental edits don't get me wrong. I love the idea that the editor really thinks about my book and takes the time to figure our how it can be improved. But why improve what isn't broken?
A developmental edit does not only address plot holes. That is an entirely mistaken idea.
It is an in-depth edit of the entire manuscript, including word choice, sentence phrasing, clumsy transitions, problematic characterization, inconsistent tone, and yes, plot holes. Whether it is the character that has blue eyes in chapter five and brown in chapter ten or the character who completely without explanation changes their behaviour, or lack of transition between scenes, or 'you said that in chapter four why are you saying it again in chapter six?", these are problems that a line edit cannot and does not address. And the problems often exist and are 'broken'.
I am not sure where the idea even comes from that a developmental edit is only to find plot holes.
ETA: The comments in a developmental edit can go anywhere from 'why did the character do that?' to 'this is the 65th time you had him shrug so maybe you should try another gesture' to "that really works '. And the 'that really works' is not "uplift the spirit" but because authors sometimes don't even realise what is working and change it. It is helpful to know.
ETA: Not wanting a developmental edit is perfectly fine. Most indy authors don't have them (although I've read some that could really use one) but maybe we shouldn't attack the concept or misrepresent what one is.
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I've seen editors posting developmental edits where I have seen quite a few editors that post the same on facebook.
I am not unique, then :icon_cry:
But speaking seriously, usually, there are some things which can be improved. And I always try to explain why, so it takes some time. Sometimes, I may give some suggestions, but these are just suggestions, not more.
From my perspective, the main and only goal of a developmental editor is to help you to tell your story, in your style, with your voice.
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I've seen editors posting developmental edits where they write 350 words for every 1k of manuscript. Then they give you a 3-5 page overview. How is that an edit and not a rewrite? How is there anything left of your story?
Quite obviously, you are talking about me as long as I am the only one with such an offer.
What's your question exactly?
Yes, I usually write 350 words of comments (or more) per every 1k of a manuscript. These comments cover usual stuff: the plot, character development, dialogues, setting, etc. Why do you call it rewriting? What else would you expect from developmental editing if not some comments about the plot, characters, etc.?
Actually no i'm not. Didn't remember reading yours (but I probably have since I read all the editors that post here) I have seen quite a few editors that post the same on facebook. But I wouldn't mind your insight.
I have seen people post in critique groups a 1-2k passage from their book and an editor post the same or more in a response. Which just boggles my mind. I get that a developmental editor needs to speak to all of those things but my assumption would be only if it needs fixing. Why are you commenting on stuff that doesn't need to be fixed? Other than adding a few comments to uplift the writers spirits as you point out the holes in the story. Now if there was a massive hole in the story it would seem more helpful to make a note of where and a few places that lead to the hole and have a discussion with the author. But commenting on ever 1k of the story writing almost a third of it seems like you feel the need to rewrite the authors story to fit your expectations.
I love the idea that you are thorough with your developmental edits don't get me wrong. I love the idea that the editor really thinks about my book and takes the time to figure our how it can be improved. But why improve what isn't broken?
A developmental edit does not only address plot holes. That is an entirely mistaken idea.
It is an in-depth edit of the entire manuscript, including word choice, sentence phrasing, clumsy transitions, problematic characterization, inconsistent tone, and yes, plot holes. Whether it is the character that has blue eyes in chapter five and brown in chapter ten or the character who completely without explanation changes their behaviour, or lack of transition between scenes, or 'you said that in chapter four why are you saying it again in chapter six?", these are problems that a line edit cannot and does not address. And the problems often exist and are 'broken'.
I am not sure where the idea even comes from that a developmental edit is only to find plot holes.
ETA: The comments in a developmental edit can go anywhere from 'why did the character do that?' to 'this is the 65th time you had him shrug so maybe you should try another gesture' to "that really works '. And the 'that really works' is not "uplift the spirit" but because authors sometimes don't even realise what is working and change it. It is helpful to know.
ETA: Not wanting a developmental edit is perfectly fine. Most indy authors don't have them (although I've read some that could really use one) but maybe we shouldn't attack the concept or misrepresent what one is.
Didn't mean to attack it. I don't know what it involves that's why I keep asking questions trying to understand what it is and why people say it's so important.
I only know what I read here and in other forums. Reading the explanation doesn't always make sense to me.
When I say I am one of those that don't know what they don't know I really mean it. Edits to me generally mean plot holes, grammar, spelling and inconsistencies. That I why I brought this up. I think there might be more than one uneducated newbie out there.
So when I see editors post like I have been it freaks me out.
I will say that if editors don't do something to uplift the authors spirit they should think about it. Spending pages upon pages telling a person in detail everything that is wrong with their baby/story can destroy a person. I have read countless experiences of that happening.
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My response may have been unnecessarily harsh and I apologise if it was. People do need to understand what a developmental edit is. it basically includes everything except typos on the assumption that it is too early for fixing those. They need to be caught after all the other changes are made so more don't slip in. (A developmental editor may occasionally mention a typo but it's a freebie when they do)
If there is anything that might not be 'wrong' but might be improved or that is problematic, whether plot, characterisation, flow, transitions, symbolism, use of metaphors, absolutely anything, then the developmental editor will mention it. Then it is up to the author to decide whether or not to make a change. I have probably turned down more changes than I have accepted, but the ones I turned down make me think and decide if what I was doing was justified. What an editor does not do is re-write! And any editor who re-wrote something for me would quickly get the boot.
One of the hardest things for an author is finding a good editor. Even if you're working with a publishing company, that they are good or someone you can work with can be... a problem. My very, very first novel years ago, the developmental editor told me that the female archer was wrong because they couldn't be women because - boobs. At which point I had what I can only call a hissy fit and refused to work with her. The publisher accommodated me, although I don't know that they had to. I've gone through about half a dozen editors as an indy. I don't always use one any more myself.
i can understand not feeling you can or want to spend the money or that you need somene else to point things out to you, but I recommend the experience at least once. It can be eye-opening.
ETA: Much of what a DE does is show you ways it could be better, more than that it is 'wrong'. There are harsh and mean editors out there. I personally wouldn't work with one who would do an edit in a soul-destroying way. This is a tough enough business without feeling that your editor isn't on your side. What they are supposed to do is to show you ways to improve your work. And if they really hate it they should send it to be done by someone else.
There is also the problem of authors who cannot stand the idea of any criticism of their baby. For those, I can only suggest they need to get over it because there will be criticism.
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A few observations:
Every author should use a professional developmental editor at least a couple of times, just so they can learn the mechanics. There is nothing obvious about writing a book.
For the most part, developmental editors shouldn't really be telling you how to fix anything, they should be pointing out deficiencies, be that missing motivation, pacing, paper-thin characters, plot holes, etc. Occasionally, mainly to save time, they might write an example of what they're talking about. But the author should be the one filling in the blanks and resolving the issues.
Most importantly, editing is not a critique. Editing is all about delivering the best book possible. Developmental editing digs deep into your narrative soup and reinforces the flavor profiles so as to make the book as entertaining as possible. Writers are often much too close to see their limitations - or, for that matter, their opportunities.
eta: I followed most of my developmental editor's suggestions because 95% of the time they were questions that both opened up the narrative, as well as deepened it. The most powerful developmental editing question is: Why?
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I was naďve enough (arrogant enough? ignorant enough?) to think I'd be fine self-editing - after all, I've been writing on-and-off for magazines for decades and already had a few books out, plus I'm an English teacher with a Master's in Education - if anyone should be able to self-edit, it should be me. Ouch. A year ago, when my new editor sent my polished manuscript back that I smugly knew contained no errors, I was very humbled. She's a retired accountant who spent decades poring through accounting documents looking for tiny errors, and her eye for detail made me look a goose - I completely missed repeated words, missing words, some sentences that seemed to lack an ending. It seems I read what I knew should be there, not what was there, and missed well over 100 errors in the 180k words (the book 'Muted') plus she suggested removal of some irrelevant passages that added nothing to the story. Her suggestions hurt my ego. She was right.
I followed all the self-editing tricks, and I was confident that I was an excellent self-editor. I won't publish anything without her going through it, now, though I am improving. The last book (Horses of the Rain - 80k words) was much cleaner, but she still picked up things I'd missed, including something introduced early that was left hanging because I forgot to bring it back in near the end to tie it off.
So, if anyone is reading this who thinks they don't need an editor - I used to be with you. I was a wordsmith. I was a genius with words. I taught grammar. I knew how to edit. I didn't need an editor. Nup - the old rule of 'the more you learn, the more you realise you have yet to learn' definitely applies. I'd like to think I've risen up the author food chain from the krill end to perhaps sardine and I'm only using one editor who does everything, not a range of editors. Maybe if I was more successful, I'd use a variety of editors. Or maybe not. And I just checked Author Central - make that a small sardine - only two books under 100k today, though Muted does have 83 reviews and 76 of them are five star, so it might not be a financial success, but readers like it, and no one has found errors - so I'll stick with my one retired-accountant starting-out editor, who also acts as a developmental editor since I run stories past her before I start writing and she often suggests an addition or twist that adds to the story.
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Maybe that's the trick. I used to be an accountant before I went full-time writing fiction. :D
I have no vested interest in what other people choose to do with their publishing and writing careers. I just choose to do things my way, because I can. That's more important to me than any other aspect of this career.
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I enjoy reading other books far more than writing my own, so my goal is to share everything I know, to inform and to encourage other writers to do their best work, which, hopefully, will lead to long and amazing careers. The toughest obstacles to overcome are always the one's we cannot see - we don't know what we don't know syndrome. When it comes to writing, editors are, by far, the best teachers.
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yWriter is up to version 7 now (and there's a mac one as well),
Oooh! Now you have my attention. One thing I really depend on is the ability to move work from Mac to desktop and if I can't have programs on both, it hampers my ability to use it.
Now I'm off to investigate.
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yWriter is up to version 7 now (and there's a mac one as well),
Oooh! Now you have my attention. One thing I really depend on is the ability to move work from Mac to desktop and if I can't have programs on both, it hampers my ability to use it.
Now I'm off to investigate.
Both versions use the same code so compatibility is assured.
It's just the front end (user interface) that I had to rewrite.
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Since the lack of a Mac version was what moved me from yWriter to Scrivener many years ago I’ll have to give it a try.
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I've been a professional editor and an editee, experiences that taught me any writer - newby or grizzled old best-seller - can use a good editor. At least now and then. And the longer a writer's track record of success, the more likely s/he needs some some shock-and-awe editing. Provided the editor understands your voice - or more correctly your intent with the story. Otherwise, the editor's remarks need to be served heavily salted.