So lucky you, you get to hear from me TWICE this week (today and then again on Wednesday). I can here the cheers and whoops (I hope that's cheers and whoops I'm hearing).
Since Kacey is busy revising, and D.S. is working on her manuscript, and I'm in the process of tweaking and editing the heck out of my Western Zombie Romance novel (Don't chuckle. I'm being serious here), I thought why not share some of our own tricks and tips that we use to edit to help you. Feel free to look the tip over and apply what you feel works for you.
1. First drafts are meant to be crappy. It's okay. But it's at this point, when we have a completed first draft that we should start to analyze its crappiness and figure out where and how to improve it.
2. Before editing the first draft, wait at least 2 weeks before delving in. When you were writing, you wrote hot. You were in the middle of it all, passion and creativity flowing--that's good. But for editing, you need to write cold. You need to be able to step back and analyze your work. The 2 weeks will give you time to cool down.
3. Before you do any editing at all, find a comfy place and read it through from beginning to end (this may take a couple of sittings depending on the size of your novel) and read it like a new reader, getting into the book for the first time. Don't stop and make any changes yet. Just read.
4. Now your ready to edit.The best way to look at your writing is to do one of two things: print it out in a different color ink or change the font. This way your mind has to work a little harder and can't simply insert missing words or read over misspellings. It tricks the brain.
5. Check that words are spelled correctly. Check grammar and tense.
6. Create stronger verbs. Remove adverbs, or as much as possible. Convert adverbs into verbs and adjectives into nouns. Check for -ly words.
7. Remove extra words or repeated phrases. Look for the overuse of the word THAT. Many times it can be removed and is unnecessary.
8. Remove cliches.
9. Do a search for words like, COULD and FELT. See where you can remove or revise the sentence to make it stronger.
10. Search for scenes that tell rather than show and revise.
11. Search for to-be verbs.
12. Make sure each scene is character driven. Make sure each character is well developed and serves a purpose to the story.
13. Check for plot holes and ways in which to fill them.
14. If you find yourself skimming over passages, not wanting to read them, then remove them. More than likely, your readers will skim over them too.
15. Watch for repeater words in the same sentence, paragraph, or page.
16. Give your manuscript to some beta readers and get their feedback on your story as to what they liked and didn't like. Then revise again.
These are just a few tip. You can find more online, but this will get you started in the right direction. Have a wonderful Monday! And remember, good books aren't written. They're edited.
~The Reluctant Hooker
3 comments:
I output my manuscript as a .mobi file and then read it on my iPad. Seeing it as a "real" book made it easier to approach it from a reader's perspective.
Reading throught it once was the best advice I'd ever received. You pick up so many little mistakes. I would jot them down to know what to look for when I came back and read on.
There are moments I hate revising. It's when you're close to the end, you can see the silver lining. That's where it's rough. During the process though you can see how much it's improving.
That is, until the crit group gets a hold of you.
PS - Western Zombie Romance Novel actually sounds really AWESOME. Just sayin'
Thanks for this list. Surprisingly, I seem to be doing many of these while putting together my newest WIP, so I'm happy that my skills are improving even more than I thought they could, :-)
Maybe when I have more to round the tale a bit, and when you ladies are freer, I'll submit it and see how it goes. It's definitely more fun to read than my last submission, though I think it takes more than five pages to get going.
I don't know. We'll see how things go, :-)
Post a Comment