Fact-Checking in the Editorial Process Fact-checking is verifying that the information included in a ms is accurate: World War I took place in the early twentieth century, production of Hummers stopped in 2010. An author (even a novelist) who gets facts wrong irritates and alienates readers, so one of our roles as dev editor is…
The Importance of Separate Developmental Editing and Copyediting Rounds As I mentioned in my previous blog post, indie authors often want editors to combine DE and CE in one round of editing. I mentioned that one problem with doing this is the likelihood of overwhelming the author. Another problem is the complexity. There’s no point…
Several times in the past few weeks, colleagues have asked what to do when a manuscript isn’t in shape for a developmental edit. Maybe there are obvious issues that the author should correct before hiring an editor—a lighthearted romance that weighs in at 200,000 words, an unfinished draft, a first draft. Working with the Unready…
I’m often asked the meaning of abbreviations used when we’re talking about editing books. These are some of the more common: Abbreviations Used in Editing AE = acquisitions editor (usually your contact person when working for publishers) CE = copy editor/copyediting DE = developmental editor/developmental editing, sometimes referred to as “dev” ms = manuscript mss…
In my post on editing satirical fiction, I mentioned the message being the driving force in such stories. A recent question from a student made me want to explore the question of editing novels with messages a bit further. The Problem with Message Novels The student pointed out that some authors start novels with a…
One of the first things that acquisitions editors and literary agents learn in their jobs is to use the query letter to evaluate a manuscript. AEs and lit agents are looking for cues that a project is or isn’t right for them. In my career, I’ve worked as both an AE and a lit agent….
When our authors write stories with perspective problems, generally they’re in for a long haul during the revision process. An author who can’t “see” the head-hopping (jumping from one character’s perspective to another’s within a scene) they’re doing needs a lot of sentence-level handholding to get it right. Steps to Take Since a big perspective…
When we write editorial queries for the author, we need to identify what the problem is and why it’s a problem for the manuscript—in other words, we can’t just slap generic slogans on a manuscript (“Use fewer adverbs!”) and think that’s editing. Effective Editorial Guidance Part of the editorial guidance we need to offer in…
Do the work. Get feedback about the work. Do better work.
When you’re editing fiction, you’ll find that many developmental problems are interrelated: An insufficient conflict can be connected with unclear character motivation (or lack of motivation) to do something or achieve something (a goal). If the protagonist doesn’t have a goal, they can’t really come into conflict with another character who has a different goal….