#Editing-11 – Scales Falling From My Eyes

Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except… it nearly is finished!

Last week’s post centred on my concern over a holiday interrupting the editing. I take it all back. I might even plan one to coincide with the final round of edits of the next novel. Yes, distance really does help to remove the scales from our eyes. For me it has proved better than letting the typescript rest in a drawer; in a drawer I still think about it. Away on holiday I didn’t.

I’ve been engaged on the final final edit this week, and the last series of Comments I made in the margins – those I stared at and tussled over, seemingly for weeks – have been resolved in double-quick time, by additions, deletions or rewriting scenes.

I am currently on my last read through to ensure I’ve left no loose threads. And guess what? I’ll be away three days this week, too [rolls eyes].

However, upload is imminent. You’ll be the first to know. Or at least immediately behind my Newsletter readers - LOL!

See also: 

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update 

Editing-6: Beta Readers 

Editing-7: Metadata 

Editing-8: Beyond Beta Readers
Editing-9: Writing in a Circle
Editing-10: Polishing the Novel
Editing-10A: Scheduling Hiccup

#Editing-10A: Er… Scheduling Hiccup

Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except it’s not… because I’ve been on holiday.

Was this a good plan? Obviously not, though it seemed to be when the holiday was booked back at the beginning of the year. A few members of Hornsea Writers, the support group I belong to, had marked their respective cards to “have summer off” and mine was supposed to start at the beginning of June. Best laid plans…

Yet burn-out is as rife among authors as the rest of the creative industries, and the marketing & publicity side of authorship carries on regardless.

This weekend I’m taking part in a freebie promo – Best of British – with a 25% extract of Torc of Moonlight. At least my Welcome sequence of newsletters is now fully automated, complete with their discounts and freebies. 

For those interested, my mailing list now tops 1,000 recipients. Check out my new Newsletter landing page by clicking the blue button, top right. You don’t have to follow it through.

Back to the editing.

See also: 

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update 

Editing-6: Beta Readers 

Editing-7: Metadata 

Editing-8: Beyond Beta Readers
Editing-9: Writing in a Circle
Editing-10: Polishing the Novel
Editing-10A: Scheduling Hiccup
Editing-11: - Scales Falling from my Eyes

Editing-10: Polishing the Novel

Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except it’s not.

I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the number of page reads this series of posts has gathered. Readers who have been with me from the first will realise I am now into dancing mode. It feels like it – two steps forward, one step back.

As part of the editing process, last week I needed to Write in a Circle. Well, the opening chapters have been re-structured, the flow eased, the echoes between characters and between time periods re-established on a slightly different footing, character motivations and fears ramped up and/or pulled back. Short stories, even novellas, may fall from brain to page in a single torrent, but novels need coaxing, marshalling into form, and drilling until the disparate elements are… dancing to the same beat. It can take time and numerous reruns.

However, there comes a point when the writing is not improved, merely made different. I am now at the stage of enough! It is time for an unemotional, mechanical, walk-through. I use Pro-Writing Aid – other software is available – which will highlight everything from passive verbs to convoluted sentence structure.  I don’t expect it to find much that I haven’t intended, in fact I’ll be miffed if it does, but it makes a good final check.

See you on the other side.

See also: 

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update 

Editing-6: Beta Readers 

Editing-7: Metadata 

Editing-8: Beyond Beta Readers
Editing-9: Writing in a Circle
Editing-10: Polishing the Novel

#Editing 9: Writing a novel in a Circle

Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except it's not.

How many editing run-throughs does a novel need? It depends on how much of a perfectionist the author is. And I'm definitely a tweak & fiddle writer. Should I be? Or should I be to the extent I am?

Probably not to the extent I am as inevitably it becomes time-counterproductive. However, whenever I read a novel - mainstream or indie - and come across phrasing which makes me wince, or characterisation so shallow I yawn, or authorial viewpoint that makes my eyes roll, there's a little voice in my head saying yours could be like this. And I don't want it to be.

Take the beginning. One of my beta readers brought up a point about it, and the more I've edited the whole the more valid the comment has become. In truth, this is no surprise. When I was teaching I maintained that a novel should be written in a circle. No matter how much prep work is undertaken, during the writing of the opening chapters an author is flexing muscles, marshalling characters, juggling motivations, laying down the atmosphere, honing the tone... By the midpoint, all the facets are jumping to the same beat, and by the ending it should be flowing like silk, or giving the impression it is. 

It's always worth setting the beginning against the ending to see if they balance. I'm not talking about pacing - the ending should be streaking away - I'm talking about the building blocks: sentence, paragraph, and scene structure. Is the beginning too flighty or turgid? Are the characters as introduced human enough or do they need a bit more work?

In my case I'm writing the final novel in a trilogy, yet all three must be able to be read as standalones or even out of sequence. And this was my problem. I've walked with the main character, Nick Blaketon, through six years of his life. I know him like a brother. It's his book, it's his trilogy, yet the new characters and time period stood brighter than he did because I was seeding them within their individual realms while allowing my mate Nick to wander in like an old hand.

It didn't need much: a shake-up of the initial chapter sequence, a couple of new scenes, but the difference is vivid. Nick now steps into his book with emphasis and stakes his claim to main character. 

If you're close to finishing your own novel, take time to set the ending against the beginning and weigh the two for balance. It could make all the difference, especially if you're sending the work to an agent.

See also: 

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update 

Editing-6: Beta Readers 

Editing-7: Metadata 

Editing-8: Beyond Beta Readers
Editing-9: Writing in a Circle
Editing-10: Polishing the Novel

#Editing 8: Beyond Beta Readers

Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except it's not.

Beta Reader reports are in. Now is the time for a sustaining breath (or a strong coffee, or a stiff  drink) and a study of the comments in as detached a manner as possible. 

There's a glitch in the structure? [Check other readers' comments to see if the same has been mentioned.] A character has been given point-of-view prominence close to the start whereas he's a mere walk-on through the rest of the book? [Slapped wrist for not noticing; mark text for alteration.] Various words mis-used / over-complicated phrasing / suspect grammar? [Go through relevant passages to agree/disagree/mark for change.] And so on.

All in all the typescript weighs in not as bad as I feared - no full re-writes needed - and this is usually the case. As writers we are far too close to our own creations, juggling nuance alongside pacing, characterisation, theme, and the other 101 elements that make up a novel. It is our place to fret in case our skills have not matched the scope of our vision. It is the place of beta readers to tell it straight. And mine do. I am from Yorkshire, after all. It comes with the territory.

Now to rewrite what needs rewriting, tweak what needs tweaking. When completed the text will be given a full and slow read to ensure both the pacing and balance have been maintained, and nothing else catches my eye. Then section by section it will be run through Pro-Writing Aid [other software is available] for a mechanical check. Just as with a spell-checker, this is used to flag possible problems which may have been missed by the human eye; its results are ignored or acted upon as I see fit. 

Catch me next week for an update.

See also: 

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update 

Editing-6: Beta Readers 

Editing-7: Metadata 

Editing-8: Beyond Beta Readers
Editing-9: Writing in a Circle
Editing-10: Polishing the Novel

#Editing 7: Metadata

Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except it's not.

But it is coming along. As expected, the digital file is still with its beta readers, and this respite gives me an opportunity to fine-tune its metadata so it will be ready for upload. What, exactly, is metadata?

Metadata is all the background information attached to an ebook, but not a physical part the text. An e-retailer uses it to store the ebook, and a reader uses it to find the ebook, on the e-retailer's site. But it starts before that. It starts with the digital document.

I use an old version of MSWord. Under File>Properties a dialogue box appears describing the contents of the file: when it was created and how many pages, paragraphs, etc, it contains. Under the Summary tab I complete Title, Author, Category (Fiction), and enter a few keywords (Fantasy, Paranormal, Thriller, Romance). In effect I am digitally stamping the file as mine. Does this matter? It depends which conversion sites are used, but I’m a great believer in a belt & braces approach to my work simply because it is my work.

Metadata is more usually associated with the upload process, most notably Product Description, Categories, and Keywords. What I have to play with depends on the e-retailer. For the purpose of this post, I’ll concentrate on the biggest, Amazon.

Product Description can be equated to the backblurb on a paperback, except that it is both more and less.

Here’s the product description for my novella The Paintings:

When Kristin Jeffries steps into the wrecked apartment of a missing artist to assess a group of paintings, she steps into a surreal environment of deceit and obsession where artworks are hidden and signatures missing. Should she trust the client who admits he's not the owner?

Concentrating on the minutiae of a single brushstroke beneath her camera’s lens, can she recognise the truth stored in its memory before it overtakes them both?

“...the whole subtle sense of something sinister is very well done...”

It’s short, and I attach one review snippet. It’s an example, not a blueprint. Yet without clicking through to its Amazon page to view its cover, what category is it entered under? Is it, for instance, Romance? Historical? Cozy Crime? Scrutinise the choice of words used and have a guess.

The description is 72 words long, yet only 46 of them – the initial paragraph – appears at first sight on the page. The rest, including the review snippet, is hidden “below the fold” – and who clicks the Read more link? Very few casual perusers. For a product description to work it must be concise, introduce the main story elements in language matching the tone of the work and the category, and leave the reader wanting to read more – a tease – hence my use of a question.

Check this against the product description of my earliest ebook Hostage of the Heart. Above the fold reads okay, but click the Read more and wince. Yes, it needs serious attention. We learn as we go.

Categories can be a minefield, especially if, like mine, the novel sits between categories, but help is at hand via Amazon’s Selecting Browse Categories. Only two are available, so don’t waste one by repeating yourself.

Keywords – up to seven are available - can prove as difficult, but the above Categories link can again prove useful.

Write your Product Description, make decisions on Categories and Keywords, and then check the pages of your favourite authors in the same genre for inspiration. Yours need to be at least as good, and if you manage that without several drafts you are doing well.


See also: 

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update 

Editing-6: Beta Readers 

Editing-7: Metadata

#Editing 6: Beta Readers

Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except it's not. 

But it is coming along. The initial editing sequences have been completed and the novel is now with its beta readers. Hurray! But what are beta readers?

Beta readers test-drive the novel, yet they aren't your normal fiction readers. They are readers with attitude. Often they'll be writers themselves, sometimes they are would-be or ex- editors. The skills brought will include sharp eyes, a firm grasp of grammar, pacing, and all the other elements mentioned in previous posts. If they understand the requirements of the chosen genre/sub-genre, so much the better. Their job is not to edit per se, but to mark potential problems.

My being a member of Hornsea Writers means my novel has a two-stage beta-read. During weekly meetings chapters are read aloud for constructive criticism while still a work-in-progress, an ideal opportunity for me to raise queries and for niggles to be flagged by listeners, meaning there is less chance of a character or the storyline taking an unnecessary detour. The second stage is for the novel to be read as a whole work. Anything catching the beta reader's eye is annotated on the digital page via Comments.

My beta readers are given an idea of what I'd like from them, plus the proviso that they are to stop at any time if they don't feel empathy for the text or the slant I've given the genre. A beta reader who isn't at least interested - they don't have to be enthusiastic - is going to start scan-reading as the story progresses - a waste of their time and effort, and mine. The final page will include a short list of my own concerns which the beta readers may or may not address.

Multiple beta readers? One is better than none; three are better than two. Every reader brings individual skills, and what one notices another may not. However, their comments are advisory. I am, after all, the writer, but if all beta readers draw attention to the same element, I'd be a fool not to pay attention.

Are beta readers necessary? In my opinion, yes. Hot off the printer, a writer is too emotionally invested to view the work with the necessary objectivity. Hence the need for beta readers with both the necessary insight and the lack of fear in pointing out what could turn out to be a few unpleasant truths. Better the beta reader than a gaggle of caustic reviews on Amazon.

Do you use beta readers? Are you a beta reader? Share your experiences below.

See also:  

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update 

Editing-6: Beta Readers

#Editing 5: *How long* to do a Line Edit??

Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except it's not.

I wrote that opener, partly in jest, back on 10 March. Such things have a habit of returning to haunt us. This was part of my original plan:

•    Structural edit
•    Content edit
•    Line edit
•    Continuity edit beyond books 1 & 2
•    Combined structural/content/line edit
•    Transfer to e-reader for eagle-eyed read-through
•    Beta readers... and the rest

I have just completed the Line Edit. Notes made during the Structural and Content edits have been addressed and decisions taken. I now know I need to shuffle the Structure - again. Three different storylines move forwards, the two contemporaries within the same time zones, except that one is slightly adrift. Correcting the time sequence will mean the main storyline is pushed out of the spotlight for too many chapters. I believe the response I’m looking for is argh!!

Plan A: write a supplementary chapter for the main storyline - 1,000+ words should do it – except this smacks of padding. If it doesn’t need to be there what else can it be called? For it not to be padding I need to invent a further complication, or even a further thread, go back along the chapters to seed it throughout the novel so that it doesn’t burst onto the page unannounced, have the main character resolve the complication further along the run of chapters – there will be no ...with one mighty bound – and allow the ripples to touch further chapters, probably unbalancing the pacing, especially as it's so close to the end.

Plan B: colour-code all chapters in and either side of the run according to viewpoint character and play jigsaw with the offenders.

No gold stars for guessing which I’m trying first.

See also:  

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update

#Editing 4: Line Edit

Pilgrim of the Pool, the final novel in the Torc of Moonlight trilogy is finished. Except it’s not. And that’s no April Fool’s joke.

Having done Structural and Content edits, next up is the Line Edit. I prefer to use this label rather than the all-encompassing Copy Edit as it truly fulfils its goal. Now is the time my eyes bleed as I go through the typescript line by line. It will take longer than a week because I work slowly. Yes, it can be pressed into three days, but tiredness produces mistakes and working fast means I end up reading the story, not weighing the words which make up each sentence.

What am I looking for?

• Syntax – narrative and dialogue shouldn’t read as interchangeable; neither should dialogue from different characters.
• Sentence openers – we all have our foibles; mine is And, He/She.
• Adjectives – too many or not enough? Readers want to experience the story, not take a description-by-numbers course. Two is enough, one might do. If it slows the action in a high-action sequence there shouldn’t be any.
• Adverbs – overuse of words ending –ly is laziness. Choose the correct word. Walked forcefully equates to strode. I suggest doing a global search on a chapter to see how many are flagged. For newbies the result can be horrifying.
• Colloquialisms – mine should not be on the page; the characters’ should. For this novel, my historical characters should not sound like my contemporary; neither should they sound stilted or laughable to modern readers.
• Mixed Metaphors & Symbolism – mixed metaphors can turn a tense scene into a laughable scene; too many snow lay like a fat blanket and readers will do more than roll their eyes.
• Repeated Words/Phrases in Close Proximity – repeats are useful for wracking up tension; used by accident they wreck the pacing.
• Dialogue – should each be given plain, or is a dialogue/action tag needed to delineate who is speaking? Or is one needed to act as a pacing spacer?
• Punctuation – is it both correct, and correct for the principal market? For instance, the American market  doesn't use semi-colons the same way the British market does. My trilogy might be going to the American market but it is a story set in the UK featuring British characters. The American market can lump it.
• Spellings – the same applies. My Native American historical uses US spelling: favorite, color, etc, and I can get away with it because of its setting. If I was writing in a contemporary US setting the grammar would need to be changed, too.
• Word Use – the same applies. I use that in dialogue and feel it’s okay, but I use it far too often for comfort in the narrative. An American reader would balk at any. Is there a rash of had had?
• Spell/Grammar Checker – most authors have at least their computer’s spellchecker in operation, but these can’t be trusted for fiction where syntax and word contractions are manipulated for tone and atmosphere.
• Length of Sentence/Paragraph – this will depend on the action/passivity/dialogue of the section. I ensure that each sentence doesn’t contain too many images or actions, or readers will feel as if they are juggling. I want them to juggle the motivations of the characters, not words in a sentence. E-readers usually take 150-180 words to a screen-page under normal usage. It doesn’t want to be a wall of solid text. I tend to split paragraphs more for an ebook than I do for a paperback.
• Anything else – again my catch-all. At this stage it will be mostly items I’ve previously missed or have queried.
• Automated Checker – yes I use one. Pro-Writing Aid is my choice; there are others. Notice that I use it last. It is my final flagger. Mostly it pulls up items I’ve made a conscious decision to use as aiding the tone or atmosphere of the novel’s delivery, but it will also flag items I’ve overlooked, which in turn concentrates my mind not to miss it next time. I play the same game with it as I did with the editors of my earlier magazine/novel length works: to produce fiction where nothing needs to be changed. It won’t happen, but it is a good goal to aim for.

Next week... I’m still on with the Line Edit so I’m not sure yet, but I’ll be back!

See also:

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update

#Editing 3: Content Edit

Release date coming soon

Pilgrims of the Pool, Book 3 in the Torc of Moonlight trilogy, is finished. Except it’s not. 

Last week was spent on a Structural Edit. Some chapters were re-positioned, others were queried and marked for a future decision, but overall I’m happy with the balance. My notes – just over a page of A4 – were reviewed, line-editing changes I’d marked along the way were keyed-in, and a clean copy of the typescript printed. Beyond this stage, working with a typescript festooned with different coloured annotations soon becomes a recipe for disaster.

This week I’ve been concentrating on the Content Edit. What am I looking for?

• Facts – yes I’m writing a novel, but facts are the bedrock of any fiction, no matter the genre, and these facts need to be correct. I am working with contemporary conservation, wind turbine and oil-shale hydraulic fracturing; a lab environment using a mass spectrometer and a chromatograph; true places; and a historical thread set around 1150. Can the Benedictine monks of Durham’s priory actually walk in the Chapel of the Nine Altars or was it still under construction? What was the church actually called at the time? What did they eat, when and where? How did they travel? And on it goes... Obviously much of this was either researched prior to the start of the novel, or on the hoof as it was written, but the context still needs to be weighed.
• Seed, Mature & Harvest – information and artefacts the characters use within the conveying of the story need to be in place (seeding), and mentioned (maturing), before they can be used to the effect necessary (harvesting). If one character is going to slug another with a baseball bat, that bat had better be talked about or dusted long before it’s needed. The same goes for information imparted. Most pertinent detail is slipped on the page as a throwaway line so readers don’t gleefully jump all over it believing they can read the writer’s mind. Once, they’ll forgive; three times and they’ll seek another novel to read. Also, it is very rare that an item is seeded, matured and harvested within the same chapter or couple of chapters, for exactly the same reason. Each needs to be woven into the fabric of the novel so they over-arc one another.
• Hooks & Bombshells – just as the opening of a novel needs a hook so as to engage the reader, throughout a novel hooks are used to pique interest, and conversely bombshells are end-of- sections or chapters written so the reader desires to know what happens next. These can be as overt as portrayed in a TV soap opera, but not all the time or they become laughably wearying. In a novel the use of a series of subliminal bombshells, each ratcheting up the tension by degrees, often works better. It depends on the genre.
• Conflict – a chapter should not tread water. It matters little whether the conflict is external or internal, pin-prick small or devastatingly large, it needs to be there.
• Pacing graph – no novel of any length can ignite on opening and keep soaring like a rocket; readers would be emotionally exhausted before they were halfway through. There has to be slower, perhaps more introspective, segments where both the character and the reader take stock. A check of the graph, be it mentally or physically plotted on a wall chart, ensures that variations are sown throughout the length of the novel, with the final quarter increasing in pace to the climax.
• Character – consistency. This is something I broadly looked at during the Structural Edit. Now is the time to look at it in detail. One set of subsidiary characters were subsidiaries in Book 1 so I need to ensure they speak with the same syntax and haven’t developed an odd accent or extra children or talk about a dog that was never mentioned in Book 1. Also, the main character was alcohol-free in Book 2, yet in this typescript there is mention of “a pint” in a pub situation. So is he or isn’t he on the wagon? He also wears a ring that is pertinent to the story, yet it’s not mentioned between pp54-120. That’s a hellova gap. Likewise, the Benedictine monk starts with “prayer beads” which become “rosary beads” which are forgotten halfway through the book. Somehow I don’t think a medieval monk would forget their use.
• Time/Continuity – the three story-threads move forwards, but not at the same pace. Now is the stage to ensure the days of the week/s are in sequence, particularly as certain chapters have been repositioned.
• Anything else – this catch-all was used during the Structural Edit, and in truth it acts as a coarse filter for whatever edit follows. Picking up phrases or overlong sentence structure at this stage helps to clear the decks.

See you next week for my take on a Line Edit.

If you're busy (and who isn't?) but would like to read the series as it unfolds, add your e-address to the 'Follow My Posts By Email' box in the righthand column and Blogger will send you notification as soon as the posts go live.

See also:
Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit

Editing-5: Line Edit Update

#Editing 2: Structural Edit

When I was still messing with the novel's Structure

 Pilgrims of the Pool is finished. Except it's not.

I’ve been busy this week staring at the door in my office. As you can see from the image, this is where I Blu-tack a précis of each finished chapter, colour-coded to show its point of view, and more or less split into the quarters of the novel which make up the elements of the principal’s Character Arc. And the reason for this? I had an extra chapter that needed fitting in. Why? Because I messed up. Sometimes authors just do. The trick is to realise it and correct the problem.

Each of the novels in the Torc of Moonlight trilogy have three story threads: the main which arcs across all the novels, a subsidiary contemporary, and a subsidiary historical. Because I’d messed up early in the writing (chapter 7 of a 41 chapter novel – doh!) the story threads were out of kilter. Does this matter? It does to mine as each chapter echoes and/or reflects elements of the story threads around it.

This highlights exactly what a Structural Edit is all about – the overview, the big picture – hence it is far easier to see set out on a door than it is on-screen or even in a paper document.

What am I looking for?

• Balance – are the separate threads in groups or spread deftly through the whole, feeding from one another? Is the main story thread actually the main story thread or has a subsidiary usurped it? My main thread has 20 chapters; my subsidiaries 15 each, therefore this is a close-run thing so will be monitored during further edits. Another novel might have a single forward storyline but use flashbacks; the same need to balance applies.
• Continuity – something can’t occur on a Thursday if it isn’t set up until Friday of the same week. Elements of a story are seeded, allowed to grow, and harvested – in that order, even if there’s a big time/chapter gap between.
• Pacing – do the story threads reach their individual climaxes and the novel’s – and the trilogy’s – in the correct order, within a tight time-frame so as to elicit the planned reader reaction?

After re-arranging the chapter order to fit in the orphan, I then spent three days with the paper copy of the typescript, a coloured pen, and a pad. At this stage some authors like to push their typescript onto an e-reader so they simply read, make separate notes, and don’t fiddle.

But I like to fiddle. It’s part of my on-going line edit that starts as soon as I commit the first sentence to a Word document. There is no correct method; it’s whatever works for the author. My colour of choice this time round was green, simply because the typescript already holds blue, red, black and pencil. Sometimes the page can be that messy; sometimes I’m on the third printed version of a chapter, marked such in a corner.

So what am I looking for? The above, plus:

• Theme – consistency. I want only one, not half a dozen. Sometimes novels are winged and the theme develops during the writing, sometimes the theme only becomes apparent at this stage, sometimes the theme only becomes apparent when a beta reader points it out. For this novel the theme was in place before I started writing. It is, however, the theme of the novel, not the theme of one character’s story thread, hence an eagle-eye for consistency.
• Motifs – are they mentioned and then forgotten? Are there too many mentions? Are there too many motifs?
• Characterisation – consistency and continuity. All main characters should change through the course of the novel because of their experiences, so if there’s a change there’d better have been a corresponding experience, or more likely a series of experiences, to prompt it. I don’t fiddle in-depth at this stage, but annotate the page and make notebook observations to study later.
• Sense - Does the novel make sense? Are questions asked at the start answered by the end? Overall, is it too complicated or too shallow? The trilogy is deeply layered so this novel shouldn’t be at all shallow, but I can’t make it too complicated either. People are reading for entertainment. It’s a matter of balance, and adhering to the genre/sub-genre expectations.
• Anything else – if it catches my eye, no matter what or why, the page is annotated and detailed observations are written in the notebook. Specifics are important here. Check character means absolutely nothing several days down the line. It also acts as a preliminary pass towards a Content Edit.

See you next week for my take on a Content Edit.

If you're busy (and who isn't?) but would like to read the series as it unfolds, add your e-address to the 'Follow My Posts By Email' box in the righthand column and Blogger will send you notification as soon as the posts go live.


See also:
Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit

Editing-5: Line Edit Update

‘Pilgrims of the Pool’ Is Finished. Now what? #Editing

Final in the 'Torc of Moonlight' trilogy

Let’s be correct here: Pilgrims of the Pool is not finished; the first draft is finished. But let’s celebrate a bit on that score. After much angst it finally has The End pinned to its typescript. It – and me – now moves into the Editing phase. But what does this actually mean?

I don’t write what is often termed a ‘fast and dirty draft’ so the novel is edited, sometimes ferociously, alongside the writing of it. This says a lot about why I’m not a fast writer. It also means that my editing regime wouldn’t work for everyone, but for me, this is the schedule:

• Structural edit
• Content edit
• Line edit
• Continuity edit beyond books 1 & 2
• Combined structural/content/line edit
• Transfer to e-reader for eagle-eyed read-through
• Beta readers
• Draft the metadata (all the descriptions needed for publishing)
• Edit (or hopefully just tweak) after studying comments from beta readers
• Collapse (a rest period where I ensure the marketing is ready for the launch)
• Format for ebook
• Transfer to e-reader for final eagle-eyed read-through
• Finalise metadata

Over the coming weeks I’ll be writing posts on what each entails. If you’re interested in receiving these as they are written, key your e-address into the 'Follow My Posts By Email' box in the column on the right. Otherwise, I'll be back next weekend with the whys & wherefores of a Structural Edit.


See also:

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit update

Cutting to the Bone - #Editing

How do you write your fiction? I currently write detailed, building tone and atmosphere in pastel layers to create a vibrant depth in which to seed information and incidents that echo other parts of the story as it builds to a series of harvest points.  

This doesn’t happen over a single page, or even a couple; it needs space. But what if there is only the single page? For an anthology submission I’ve been cutting a Horror short story – 2,750 words – down to 666. Trying to write “up” to 666 words I found beyond me. When I was teaching, my mantra was... if a story is to be cut by more than 25%, then it needs to be rewritten not edited. 

Did I follow my own advice? No. I excised, I trimmed, I amalgamated. It took seven passes to get within ten words of the target. Only on the eighth pass did I start rewriting, replacing word for word, to ensure that the atmosphere, the tension, the building dread necessary to the genre, was present in the quantities that would elicit the targeted reader reaction. 

Did it work? I’m told so, and I certainly feel that I’ve brought the story to fruition. But it was my third story, so I still believe that not every concept can be cut to the bone and survive intact. Would I like to take such a knife to my current detailed writing? Emphatically no. However, it’s a great exercise for opening a writer’s eyes and showing what is possible. Give it a go.

Wednesday Writing Prompts + Editing Posts

Don't be fooled by the above date. This page works as a handy Index for writing craft posts. Currently there are two sections: Writing Prompts; What To Look For While Editing.  Doubtless more will follow.

Writing Prompts

Working from 'first lines' with discussions on what to look for and how to extrapolate:
WPrompt #1 : WPrompt #2 : WPrompt #3 : WPrompt #4 : WPrompt #5

WPrompt #6 :   One idea is never one idea
WPrompt #7 :   How and where to find your own ideas
WPrompt #8 :   Building a character from the inside out, not a stereotype from the outside in
WPrompt #9 :   Beware - Naming imbues with life
WPrompt #10 : Show and Tell - examples
WPrompt #11 : Show and Tell - considering the senses - smell
WPrompt #12 : Theme - writing to, or recognising an inherent theme
WPrompt #13 : Detail - how much is too much?
WPrompt #14 : Show and Tell - considering the senses - sound
WPrompt #15 : Elements - a full story exercise
WPrompt #16 : Using an image to kickstart fiction

This and much more is covered in Reading A Writer's Mind. Check its Amazon page for a full list of its Contents page.

~~~~~~~~ 

What To Look For While Editing

During the post-writing process of Pilgrims of the Pool, the final novel in the Torc of Moonlight trilogy, I wrote a series of posts covering the editing process (currently still being added to). Check them out here:

Editing-1: What does editing actually mean?
Editing-2: The Structural Edit

Editing-3: The Content Edit

Editing-4: The Line Edit
Editing-5: Line Edit Update - how long??
Editing-6: Beta Readers
Editing-7: Metadata
Editing-8: Beyond Beta Readers

#NaNoWriMo is live - But is it for You?

It's November so it must be (Inter)National Novel Writing Month, when hardly souls sign up to undertake cracking 50,000 words in 30 days. 

If you have, then you certainly won't be reading this post. It equates to 1,700 words per consecutive day, 7 days a week, or 2,500 words per day, 5 days a week if you wish to remain on speaking terms with your nearest and dearest during December.

A straw poll from close writer friends found that half wouldn't even attempt it because to write at the required speed over such a period would produce "...substandard crap, riddled with plot-holes and trillions of adverbs..."

This brings to the fore my misgivings from last year [read here]: most participants expect to produce a typescript near enough there bar the polishing, when in truth what they are more likely to have is a very dirty draft. And chances are that participants will be so emotionally exhausted they won't be able to tell the difference.

Not everyone I contacted thinks this way. Two who accepted the challenge in previous years found there were pros and cons. Tiredness was certainly a factor, both mental and physical, and after putting in so much work the fear of missing the target, no matter self-imposed, crept in when the cascade of words turned to a dribble. On the other hand, procrastination was eliminated, and hitting the deadline gave a real lift to the senses. As one put it "...I felt energised and renewed...".

Tips?
If your immediate domestic circle isn't on board to support and gate-keep for you, it won't happen.
Being normally disciplined in your writing is a great help.
Pre-planning is a must: characters, outline, research...
Never look back; keep ploughing forward.
Remember that what you have at the finish is a draft.

So, if you are reading this, were you tempted but didn't sign? Why not?

It is always good to push back the boundaries; we never know what we can accomplish if we don't try. But there are other ways, and I'll be covering these in later posts during the month. In the meantime let's consider quality rather than quantity. If you have a finished script, or a work in progress, this could be useful.

For a short period I'm offering a complete chapter of Reading A Writer's Mind... to anyone who signs on to my occasional Newsletter - see top of the page - and subsequent posts will carry a tip from the editing chapter of the book.

In the meantime, do leave a comment on the blog. I'd be interested to hear if you've undertaken NaNoWriMo in past years, or what you undertake as an alternative.

Editing Update #3

The Bull At The Gate has finally come out of editing and is ready for its beta readers, stage 6 in my editing checklist. For those interested, stages 1-5 didn't so much cut the novel as add on another 3,000 words, most of which went into smoothing the historical storyline.

Stage 4 was an automated edit check via software. Over the last few months I've tinkered with the free version of Pro Writing Aid for short pieces to see how it worked, but for the length of a novel I took out a year's subscription - at $35 this was a no-brainer. The analysis is broken down into 20+ reports which to start with I had emailed to myself as a pdf, but once I got used to the software I worked online with the Word document beside me. 

The analysis is very thorough and flags the reports of importance, but I read the lot. We all write with different emphasis, and I write with different emphasis dependant on the type of fiction. For this novel I found that I didn't always agree with the software's suggestions for alteration, but sometimes what it passed as decent I couldn't believe I'd missed in the manual edit. It did, though, make me look at the words on the page in a much more dispassionate light, which was the intention. 

Even though Book 3 of the trilogy isn't truly formulated yet, I need to write the teaser and Prologue for it to be added into the ebook. The teaser is written and the Prologue is outlined. The next job is to sit and write it while the novel is with its beta readers.

Editing Update #2

Two weeks ago I celebrated adding THE END to The Bull At The Gate and wrote a post explaining my editing plan. I thought I'd offer an update. Of the 1-9 steps I am up to No 2. Okay, so I took a few days off to allow my brain to clear, but even so...?

Step 2 is the structural edit. The Bull At The Gate has three parallel storylines, two contemporary and a Roman historical. It is this historical that has caused the problems due to it expanding from a minor subsidary storyline into a major subsidiary storyline during the writing of the novel.

Anyone who writes fiction will realise that this is a recipe for disaster if allowed to stand, as it will unbalance the entire book. The remedy is to rewrite the storyline thread until it meets its true depth and then dovetail the ends. Easier said than done.

Let me be clear about this, I'm not referring to fairly straightforward multiple viewpoints of the same storyline, which can be easily tweaked. Multiple storylines need to be balanced, not just for pacing, but also for tone, reflection of theme, and of the emotional constraints of the characters. Add in the seeding of information, and the harvesting of it at the optimum point further along the storyline - all without disrupting the other two storylines - and it becomes obvious that this is not just a case of writing a few linking scenes.

Remind me to next time write a first person novel. Far less hassle.

New Year, New Novel: The Bull At The Gate

Earlier today I nailed The Bull At The Gate, the second in the Torc of Moonlight trilogy. 100,376 words done, if not dusted. Pick up a glass of something sparkling and share my celebration.

I write slowly and edit constantly, so what is now sitting in various Word files will be close to what appears between the covers. But the blood-sweating creativity is only part of the process of bringing a novel to the hands of readers. The hard-headed, and hopefully clear-minded, business end of the process now begins, and I thought I'd share my step-by-step system:

1) to maintain a forward momentum while writing I add in a mass of queries as I go via marginal Comments: these need to be chased down and resolved

2) a structural check/edit to ensure:
-  the balance of the pacing

- that information harvested – the dramatic edge – has been previously secured via seeding and nurturing before it is needed in fruition
-  the three parallel storylines share the correct level of billing 

- that subplots and historical & contemporary detailing remain in subordinate roles
3) a line edit
4) an automated edit check via software to help identify anything I've missed
5) a second line edit
6) a beta readers’ check
7) mulling queries the beta readers highlight and marking priorities for change or honing
8) resolve priorities in order
9) a (hopefully) combined edit + polish, alongside identifying useful snippets for promotional purposes

…and then both it and I shall collapse in separate heaps to moulder, sorry, mature, like good cheese - make that wine - while I reconsider a rather flimsy marketing plan. But that’s a whole other post.

As can be seen, the most pressing of these – the digital cover – has already been completed, by Karri Klawiter, though she won’t be able to finish the wraparound for the paperback until I know its dimensions. And that, too, is a whole other post.

Page Layout - Punctuating Dialogue

Editing costs money - end of story. At least, it'll be the end of your story if you expect a publisher's editor to do it for you. Like all businesses, members of the publishing industry operate to make money, not haemorrhage it. Editing is labour intensive, and no one toils for free.

Editors work to a ratio of input (editing, production, marketing, etc) to sales potential. If your work's required input isn't a good deal less than its sales potential, then it'll receive a fast rejection slip. This is why celebrity faces splatter so many magazine covers, and books by celebrities find so much shelf space; their sales potential is, if not guaranteed, certainly more bankable than we mere mortals. But the balance can be evened up a little, in fact a lot, simply by cutting down the editor’s workload.

“So shes coming towards you is she Paul ”, Duffy offered gloomily looking into the night sky and wondering how many stars made the milky way, not that he could see it, “ And you tried to ram her with your bike”!
“ I swear I did n’t. Your just making this up!
      Duffy shuffled his feet .
“sure you did .”

If that tipped out of an envelope, or into an Inbox, it would be read no further. There is simply too much work involved in correcting the basic punctuation, never mind the time needed to sort the text. Here’s the exchange again, highlighted for problems:

“So shes coming towards you is she Paul ”, Duffy offered gloomily looking [into the night sky and wondering how many stars made the milky way, not that he could see it], “ And you tried to ram her with your bike”!
“I swear I did n’t. Your just making this up!
     Duffy shuffled his feet .
“sure you did .”

A bit of explanation:

• speech marks can differ between publishers, check publicatons from your intended market, but the default is single speech marks for the UK and double for the USA
• speech marks sit tight against the speech they are enclosing – there are no extra spaces – and all other punctuation marks – commas, exclamation/question marks, etc – are captured inside
• beware of exclamation marks on every line; they are regarded as the mark of an amateur
• narrative before, interrupting, or after speech should be pertinent to it, otherwise readers lose the thread, or think they are missing something and jump back for a re-read. Either way the flow of the story has been disrupted
• capitalise words that act as names/titles - Milky Way
• if narrative interrupts a person’s speech, and that narrative ends with a comma, the continuing speech does not restart with a capitalisation; it does if ending with a full-stop
• commas are used to ensure the correct pauses are made by the reader, and the correct sense is taken from the text. Does Duffy offer his speech gloomily, or is he gloomily looking into the night sky?
• correct dialogue tags - is Duffy actually offering his spoken words, or is he asking? It’ll depend on the text that went before
• apostrophes exist, in part, to show that something is missing, in this instance the contraction of two words
• proofread for correct use of a word – your or you’re?
• proofread for errant spaces – did n’t
• paragraphing – all should be indented, and each person speaking needs a new paragraph. Actions made by the speaker usually run on the same line.

Let’s try it again:

      ‘So she’s coming towards you, is she, Paul,’ Duffy offered, ‘and you tried to ram her with your bike?’
      ‘I swear I didn’t. You’re just making this up.’
      Duffy shuffled his feet. ‘Sure you did.’

All this work to get three lines of dialogue in order. Would you do it for a full novel – someone else’s novel? Then don't expect an editor to do it for yours, even if yours isn't anywhere near this bad. Get it right before submission and you are less likely to get it back by return.