Working With An Editor

I’m currently working with an editor on my latest book Sarah’s Baby the third book in the series The Mulleins of Katherine Bay through the 10Day Bookclub.

This is proving to not only a very interesting exercise but the source of invaluable advice.

Valuable because the editor is reading the book Cold Turkey. She’s nowhere near as close to the work as I am after writing and countless rounds of tweaking and editing.

Already the editor has pointed out that one scene in Chapter One doesn’t work as well as it should and commented that “while the scene was well-written it took away from the energy of the story.”

The energy.

I just love that term. It aptly describes just what an author aims to ceate. The leap off the page energy between your characters… and is something I’ll keep in mind in future

She commented…..”In the scene, the hero’s had a horrible day and finds a young woman from his past hiding in his home. As a reader, I want to know more about what’s going on between these characters, why she’s there, etc. than cooking…. so perhaps you might want to rethink that part and see what you need to keep the action between the two characters going.”

Aww! I really loved that scene but…. as soon as that three letter word enters your mind to validate keeping a scene or not changing the focus of a scene, that scene doesn’t belong in your story.

This is the hard part of the editorial process but for every hard part there is a reward.

And for me this was reward enough… “I’m only on page one and I already love your writing.”

“Storm clouds as black as his mood reached from the tops of New Zealand’s Coromandel Range to the sea. Lightning split the heavy sky. Its lurid, sulphurous light reflected eerily off the waters of Katherine Bay.”

“What a beautiful description.”

I read a post on Facebook the other day that aptly decribes the process of story telling.

“The difference between writing fiction and non fiction…is fiction has to make sense.”

Truer words have never been spoken.

Tags: editing, featured, working with an editor

Published on Thursday, January 31st, 2013, under Latest News