Length matters, but story matters more.

Every writer that is serious about publishing, particularly those attempting the traditional publication path, will know that agents and editors put a lot of weight on word counts. The acceptable limits vary depending on the age category and genre of the book.

(By the way, Young Adult is NOT a genre. It's an age category. And Fiction is NOT a genre either. You can find more information about the various age categories here. More information about the main genre classifications can be found here.)

It's incredibly important to have a good understanding of the average word counts for the type of story that you are writing, but it's just as important to understand word counts are not an excuse for poor storytelling.

We can tell you haven’t edited your book.

There are many out there now self-publishing. They're decisions to head down this path have come about for a variety of reasons and there is nothing wrong with it. There have been many successful writers who have self-published, just as there has been many writers who have been traditionally published that bombed.

In some cases, writers elect to push for self-publishing because it's the fastest way to get your book out there. For time-sensitive, non-fiction books, this is likely the path you'll take. However, there is a HUGE difference between (1) producing a quality product that was self-published and (2) self-publishing because you want it out there.

In a previous post, I spoke about rushing the process. One flavor of the rush-the-process beast is the publish-without-editing variant.

Trick from the Editor’s Hat: Apps that Read Aloud

You spend hours/days/weeks editing and you're struggling to get through it. Here is just one of the many tricks one could when editing.

Use an app to read your story to you

Many will happily agree that hearing a passage will trigger different editing skills than reading a passage. When we read a passage, our brains often fill in the missing words or correct the awkward sentence so it reads as we think it should, but it's not what it says. As mentioned in a previous post, reading a passage aloud allows you to register unnatural dialogue, awkward phrases and many other things that could have been missed.

Let's face reality: not everyone is comfortable with reading things aloud to themselves, but there is a solution. There are apps out there that will read a story to you.

To Oxford Comma or Not?

Before one can make the decision about whether they should use an Oxford comma or not, one must first understand what the Oxford comma is.

Consider a list with at least three different items: apples, oranges and bananas. If one was to use an Oxford comma, then the list would look like apples, oranges, and bananas. Notice the use of the comma before the and. However, you won’t always find a comma before the and. If the list has only two items, that list of apples and oranges wouldn’t use a comma.

Confusing, right?Read More→

Trick from the Editor’s Hat: Use Paper or an Ebook Reader

You spend hours/days/weeks editing and you're struggling to get through it. Here is just one of the many tricks that I employ when editing both my own and clients' writing.

Use Paper or an eBook Reader

I never do all my editing directly on the computer. The back-lit screen is too much on my eyes. The smooth reflective surface will catch the overhead lighting, adding to the eye strain. This is why I don't use a tablet for editing either. They too are back-lit and reflective. No, when I can, when the size of a document permits me, I will print out the manuscript and pull out my trusty red pen, writing all over that printed document. In those instances where the manuscript is too large, say 100k words, then out comes my Kindle and I'll read the document on that, adding comments and notes to the file as I go. (Yes, you can do that on a Kindle.)

Finding value in a critique…

Every writer who puts their work out there will have to face critiques of all flavors: the good, the bad, and the outright mean. For the new writer, one just starting down the journey, sending that baby out for review can actually be a terrifying experience. "What if they don't like it? What if I'm doing it all wrong? What if they tell me my writing is shit?"

Well... Not everyone is going to like what you write. Writing is like art — filled with subjective opinions. If you're determined to have everyone in the world like your writing, then you might as well give up now. It's never going to happen. The best you can ever hope for is that the fans of books you like to read, the stories that influenced your writing, also like your book.

In terms of doing it wrong... I'm sorry, but this is your writing. You are the only one who can judge if you are doing it wrong or not. What others can do is tell you why something didn't work for them, potentially providing suggestions to make your writing stronger. Whether you take on board those suggestions is entirely up to you.

Editing Reality Check

When writers have spent such a long time at writing, crafting their stories, many will happily turn their attention to editing. However, it saddens me to realize that many writers don't fully understand what editing actually entails.

In a post earlier this year, I spoke about the who, what and when of editing. In that article, I mentioned that editing falls into four main categories: critique, developmental, line and copy-edit. Each stage is important for a manuscript's development but for different reasons. Unfortunately, the number of writers that seem to miss the critique and developmental editing phases, going straight to line editing, is surprising.

Trick from the Editor’s Hat: The “Was” Edit

Trick from the Editor’s Hat: Read Aloud

You're staring at a manuscript that you have spent countless hours, days, weeks, preparing for publication or submission. It's as stellar as you can make it. Or is it?

Here is just one of the tricks that I occasionally pull out of my hat when editing. This technique is the best method of making dialogue sound natural and will pick up the awkward sentences faster than any other method. There are times when I use this technique while writing too. It is one of the best tricks one can have stashed under their hat.

Read Aloud

You can read a line over and over again, but you still don't see the mistake. It's something incredibly simple, like a missing "the", but you still don't see it. Our eyes filter what our minds see. The eyes make the corrections needed and hence our brains don't register anything different. However, when we read something out, vocalize the line, our brains work differently. And guess what... That missing "the" becomes obvious.

Tag Archives: editing