5 ways to drive your editor batty

Every editor has a few pet peeves, things that irritate them when they see them. But we editors suffer in silence, correcting those issues and moving on to the next page of the manuscript. But there are editors like me who happily turn those pet peeves into blog posts, showing the world how irritating they can be.

Today's post dives into some of the things that writers do that can drive an editor to the coo-coo train.

(Now, watch, some of my writing buddies will turn this into a challenge to see if they can work all of these things into their next writing piece that they share with me.)

Your book is in Barnes & Noble, and you’re complaining?

It was a random post that came across my feeds about how the science fiction and fantasy author Fonda Lee was complaining that she was competing against dead authors. I will grant you that it was an old post, dating back to 2019, but it was one that struck up a bit of negative emotions in me.

In her local Barnes & Noble bookstore, she had discovered that J. R. R. Tolkien and Robert Jordan were taking up roughly four shelves of space. She went on to complain about how there was only one copy of one of her own book on the shelves.

While I understand what it is she's complaining about, what she's trying to highlight to the world at large, my initial reaction was: "Get over it!" As I read through the article, my reaction started to include a level of irritation aimed at Fonda Lee and other writers like her who are complaining about not seeing their books in brick-and-mortar bookstores.

Communications is the key

It might seem obvious, but for whatever reason, it isn't. Occasionally, I get the odd email that actually tells me more about the writer than anything else. And when my spidy-sense kick in, I tend to have one response: "Danger, Judy L Mohr. Danger."

I've written before about how those initial communications with an editor play a big role in the working relationship. I've written on the topic a few times, in fact. And there were a few occasions where I've described how I turned a client down because of it.

In today's post, I want to show you how your messages could easily lead to the incorrect assessment of the situation, which could also have a negative impact on a potential working relationship.

Are we dumbing down language?

Recently, I took a grammar refresher course to help with some aspects of my editing. I took the course because often enough I encounter something in ProWritingAid or in conversations with other editors that I don't understand. The terminology occasionally goes over my head. So, I thought that perhaps a refresher course would help with some of the terminology confusion.

The course certainly did do that, and I was glad I took the course. However, there were a few comments that actually irritated me—and they all revolved around this philosophy that we're dumbing down language.

11 tips for getting quality editing on a minimal budget

Professional editors are expensive. You'll get no arguments from me on that one. Behind the scenes, editors constantly agonize over what rates we should be charging, trying to find the balance between being affordable and actually earning enough to pay our own bills.

And as much as editors try our best to be affordable, more often than not, a writer's budget doesn't extend far enough to make such a venture worth the pennies involved.

Developmental editing (my area of expertise) is the one aspect of editing that seems to suffer the most from this cost dilemma. Under ideal circumstances, every writer heading down publication roads would be able to hire a developmental editor to help them with the story and characterization aspects of their manuscripts, and hire a copyeditor to help with language and the line-level editing. It would be fantastic if every writer could benefit from the professional eye on how the narrative is constructed. But the cost of such a venture doesn't make it practical. So, writers need to think outside the box to find that help with editing.

Today, I want to explore some of the ways that you can edit your manuscripts cheaply without compromising your editing standards.

How “current” should our stories be?

COVID-19 has entirely changed the global landscape and has likely driven a few writers into insanity (not that we weren't insane before). The #BlackLivesMatter movement has changed the landscape too, but in different ways. You put the two forces working together, alongside a whole range of other current events, and it's no wonder that so many of us are confused about what defines a contemporary setting.

But is it vital that we include "current events" into our stories?

I've written about this topic before, recently in fact, highlighting that if our brains are demanding that we write that story, whatever that story might be, then we should write it. Writing can be therapeutic for many writers, myself included, and putting our thoughts to paper can be a vital component of making sense of the crazy that the world has thrown at us. And I dare anyone to say that 2020 hasn't been filled with crazy—and mean it.

But the real question isn't whether we should include these current events into our stories. There are many events throughout history that have had a massive impact on the way we view the world, and that change in mindset should be explored. But by the time a book hits the market, how "current" is it?

It might be current, but should we include it?

It's not surprising that I've encountered a decent number of conversations regarding COVID-19 mixed with writing in some fashion. Most have been regarding productivity (and I'm sick of those conversations). A few have been related to whether self-published authors should continue with their publication plans. Others have been related to those seeking traditional roads and querying agents. But a few of them relate to writing contemporary stories and whether we should include COVID-19 into them.

To be blunt, I wouldn't—and here's why put as simply as I can.

Because we're already bored with it.

Why the Black Wolf?

Reviews and Mixed Emotions

Well… As every writer knows, reviews are important. However, reviews seem to be a fickled beast. If one was to receive a large number of 4- and 5-stars, someone like me starts to question how many of those reviews were posted by friends and family. The odd negative review actually gives merit to those high-ranking reviews. On the flip side, if you have a large number of negative reviews, readers will begin to steer clear of your book (possibly even future books), and sales will go down. To complicate matters, if your book has hardly any reviews at all (good or bad), people are leery and unwilling to try their hand at something new — especially from a new, untested author.

Let’s not forget that getting reviews is a mission and a half.

For my book, Hidden Traps, I didn’t quite know what to expect, and now I feel all confused and uncertain.

Be a Good Reader of the Pre-published