my Novel's Journey: Mind Over Mind Edits

Three's a charm?

Got the third round of MIND OVER MIND edits, and still had a couple of issues to work out. One was making tomato soup. Gabrielle wanted the tomatoes mentioned at the beginning, and I wouldn't do it because you put the tomatoes in last. What I finally understood this edit was that she didn't need them in the pot, necessarily, just mentioned--stick the can of tomato sauce on the counter or something. It's the same idea as putting that gun in scene 2 if you fire it in scene 6. I'm facepalming.

The other issue was one where I was too subtle in showing something. I think a couple of phrases fixed it.

The last thing was a rewrite, changing another flashback into a present-time event. It was one she'd asked me to do before, but I had two flashbacks in one spot (I think. It's fuzzy now.) and missed the second one. So I rewrote it, which was fun, because I got a little more of Josh's reactions in. Josh really is a fun character.

So, now that's off, and I spent the rest of last week and this finding homes for all the stories I'd had languishing in my files. I also went back over Coyote Fires and need to find a home for it. It's been a difficult time at home, so I've not had much heart for DISCOVERY; however, that isn't stopping me from my other writing.

Know what I need for DISCOVERY? An editor like Gabrielle. Maybe I should start asking myself WWGD?

my Novel's Journey: Mind Over Mind Edits

Once again, Discovery takes a back seat to a more pressing writing need; this time, the first round edits to Mind Over Mind.

This is the revision of the first novel I'd ever written, the story of a young man who develops psychic powers, and has aliens communicate with him. The experiences drive him insane, and at the start of the book, he's been in an asylum for five years when a young intern decides to help him by pretending to believe him and teaching him to control his powers. In the meantime, the aliens--representatives of warring factions--each think he's their savior and try to get him to fight on their side.

I've loved this story for a long time, but knew the manuscript needed some work, so I'm very pleased to have Gabrielle Harbowy, editor of DragonMoon give it a very critical eye. It's the most invasive editing I've ever had, with scenes that need re-written and some changes in the placement and flow of the text. Overall, however, I've loved her suggestions. Revising has been an exciting experience.

It's been a couple of years since I've seen this manuscript, so my first run of edits is really more of a read-through. I'm approving all the changes I agree with and writing new scenes as they come to mind. Where a change is needed that doesn't immediately hit me, I make a note and move on. Most of the scene changes so far have been to alter point of view switches within scenes. This has been fun because I get to live the book with my characters all over again.

I've gotten through 214 pages in three days, and figure I'll finish it this weekend. Then, I'll go through it looking for the bigger issues: Is my character flawed enough? Are the chapter sizes more even? Did I chop up flashback, or change some to flow in real time?

In the meantime, I am still working on Discovery. I'm trying to write 500 words a day. So far, Sister Ann is taking center stage. A couple of days ago, she came up with a very interesting quote about pain and fear, faith and knowledge and how sometimes you need all four for an epiphany. The next day, I wrote a scene where she declared someone a genius because he just skipped straight to the epiphany. The fun thing about Ann is going to be that none of the characters are going to understand her, but the reader is going to be able to see all the connections.

Thoughts on Form Rejection Letters

I was in a conversation online recently about form rejection letters. The other person was asserting that she put a lot of time and effort into her story, and all she gets is a ready-made form that may not even address her by name.

I agree, that's irritating. However, think about it from the POV of the editors. You are sending out one story you worked on maybe a week or a month. They have to read, evaluate and accept/reject hundreds every month, every week or every day. Plus, they have regular writers to work with, layouts to determine, advertising to coordinate, readers to communicate with... If they didn't use a form letter for those that didn't make the cut--whether because the writing is awful or because they just did a similar article or because it simply doesn't meet their needs--they would never have time to put the magazine together.

Plus, there's another reason some go to form letters--one I've dealt with: the author who argues back. When I put together ISIG I, I wrote personal rejections to every writer. I was not harsh, but I did give them the reason--and not "this was just not well written" but something constructive. I got back argumentative e-mails about how I didn't "understand" their story or arguing the points of their rejection. Imagine getting 10, 20, 100 of those every month. (As for me, I now send a pretty generic letter except in the case where the story is good but doesn't fit our needs, in which case, I can usually recommend a different magazine to submit it to, but I only have to worry about 40 or so submissions over a year.)

Finally, imagine you are applying for a job with 200 applicants and you don't get it. Do you expect the supervisor to write you an encouraging note, critique your interview, and make recommendations? Would you consider them rude if the HR person called and said, "You didn't make it"? For that matter, how often do you simply not hear from the employer if you didn't make it?

We write for the love, yes, but publishing is a business--one where the supply line (stories and authors) is glutted. If editors don't ask us personally to submit, they don't owe us a personal reply.

My Novel's Journey: Off to the Publisher

Live and Let Fly went to the publisher at 10:30 CST last night!

I want to thank those who took the time to proof and critique the manuscript, especially my friend Ann Lewis. Ann's mother died last month, so she only got through the first chapter before her life went topsy-turvy. However, she pegged me on my main weakness--the early data dump--and called me on it. As I looked it over, I decided I liked the narrative, and didn't see a way to weave it into the action of the first chapter, so I made it the prologue, which is a much nicer fit for the information, anyway. Then I needed a title for that, and Ann came through again.

Everyone who read the manuscript and got me back comments made a difference. When you read it, know that you have them to thank.

Of course, another great help to a manuscript is to read it after not having laid eyes on it for a few weeks. As I went through it for the last time this weekend, I found even more repeated words (that's becoming my pet peeve!) and a few places where I missed a detail or felt, now that I saw the action with new eyes, that I hadn't explained enough. No matter how much you tweak a manuscript, there's always something more you can do.

However, there's also a point where you say, "Good enough!" and send it off. That time was late last night. I feel really good about Live and Let Fly.

What's next? Christmas decorating, editing Infinite Space, Infinite God II, and finishing my sci-fi novel, Discovery. I had planned to make Discovery hard sci-fi, but given the publisher I hope to send it to, I'm going to soften it up by putting more of the tech behind-the-scenes. It's less pressure on me, too. Stay tuned Thursday evenings or Friday mornings for my next Novel's Journey as we explore writing Catholic sci-fi.

My Novel's Journey: "Second" Edit Done

This week, I finished reading Live and Let Fly to the kids. That ends what I usually call my "second edit." We had a 2-hour marathon read toward the end; I was anxious to be done, and the kids were anxious to get to the "Loki chunks" line. Like "Run Away!" from Monty Python's Holy Grail, I think that's one phrase that will be heard in our family for a long time.

My oldest son has a new saying, "That never gets old." He sometimes repeats a punch line or gag to himself, then chuckles, "That never gets old." Usually, it's about something slapstick or puerile, but funny nonetheless. He's now quoting Live and Let Fly. How could I not agree with him?

One thing I discovered this time is that I'm using phrases and in-jokes that are at a more mature level than I'd expected. Many times I had to stop to define a word, explain a situation or joke, or remind them of how something earlier in the book applied to the current situation. I enjoyed it--and I found it encouraged my younger boys to ask me about words they didn't understand in other situations as well. (Liam has asked me several times in Church to define a word from the Scripture reading.) We still read to the younger two at night, but usually the stories they want to hear, so I enjoyed expanding their horizons with my story.

I did find the epilogue needed a restructure, but it was a simple enough change. Now I wait for the critiquers.

Fave Phrase: Here's one of Steven's "never gets old" and has Monty Python elements, too.

Sister Michaela Joan hopped onto my back, strapped and bucked herself on and declared herself ready to rope an errant demigod.

The command crew gathered outside to watch us.

The lieutenant said, "You know, when we got called to duty yesterday, I never expected to see something like this."

I reared up dramatically and Sister Michaela Joan, an experienced rider, held her balance.

I said, "No one expects--"

"The Spanish Inquisition!" my caballera nun finished with me.

I flapped my wings, applied my magic, and we flew off amid applause and calls of "Oorah!"

"Someday, you must tell me why that is so funny," Sister Michaela said to me as we gained altitude.

My Novel's Journey: Third Stage Edit Brings Embarassing Results

This week, I started the third stage edits of Live and Let Fly.

Second stage is read aloud, which I'm still doing. (Reading aloud lets you hear your book: its cadence, phrase choice, joke set-up and execution. You engage a different part of your brain, and it judges your manuscript differently.) Since my kids love Vern stories, it's become our nightly routine. However, that takes awhile when going one chapter a night, so I also started the third edit, which is read it backward.

That's right, backward. Starting at the bottom of page 192 and working to the top of page 1, one sentence at a time. Some people like to read backward one word at a time, but I prefer to do it one sentence at a time, so I can check punctuation and meaning as well as phrasing.

Why read backward? When we read forward, especially when reading fiction, we tend to get caught up in the story. As a result, our minds overlook errors, fill in blanks and "forgive" clumsy phrasing in order to continue the story. When you read backward, you separate the sentence from the context, and you mind can focus on it alone. As a result, you can catch more errors, especially in grammar and word usage.

Well, I thought I'd done a pretty good job with my first edit, but when I started the third, I was mortified at the errors! Using the same word twice within a line of each other. ("...bring them in," he said. The doors opened, and they brought in..., for example.) I also found misspellings and grammar that Word didn't catch. (Never trust Word alone.) I had phrases that added nothing and some sections that didn't make full sense without a little more explanation. I found things I brought up in the end that I didn't set up earlier on. I also found (partly through read aloud, partly from thinking back) that I didn’t tie up all my loose ends in the last chapter. I had to add several pages.

Here are a couple of pages with edits. I used red for one edit and black for another. (They get mixed up in the middle, so don't ask which is which.)





In all, the manuscript was such an embarrassing mess that I wrote my critique crew and begged them not to look at it until I'd sent a better copy. It took about five days to read it backward and will take three to put in all the changes. It's worth every minute.

My Novel's Journey: Musical Minions

I'm in the read-aloud edit right now, which is slow since I'm reading it as a bedtime story to the boys. (Steven, 15, has joined his little brothers and Amber occasionally joins in.)

Tuesday night, we came to one of my favorite scenes, when a badly outnumbered Vern evens the odds by picking off minions in a variety of unusual and comical ways. We'd made it through the laughs and were gearing up for the big crisis when Alex noted, "Mom, you've got too many minions."

He was right--this was a fast-writing scene with nine minions to start, and I'd lost track of who Vern had picked off when. I even had two minions still going after Vern after they'd left the room! Oops.

Lessons here:
1. Read your stuff out loud, to someone else if you can. You catch so much!
2. Sometimes drawing out a scene graphically works better than trying to make a list or keep track in your head.

So Wednesday, I sat down with a pen and paper, made a list of McThing's McMinions and drew a map of the evil overlord lair.



Then, as I re-read the scene slowly, I made notes of who moved where, who left, who replaced whom, all on the drawing.



When I finished, I realized I'd still written about twice as many minions as Vern really had to deal with. Guess he was seeing double. It also made for an interesting conundrum. Vern can take three guys, even in his weakened state. Why didn't he? Fortunately, I had a ready-made excuse: Heather, who refused to be much more than a damsel in distress. Vern and Charlie could never count on when she'd show her plucky side.

So, it's taken some re-writing, but that's what the editing process is all about--finding the mistakes before the editor--or worse, the reader.


Editing progress: Through page 86, but loving hearing my kids laugh. Lots of boy humor. Of course, my husband just about spit out his Diet Coke when he heard me describe the Top Secret briefing room. After years of working in that world, we both know how true it is.

My Novel's Journey: the Bleeding Manuscript

Finishing the draft is only the first part of writing a novel.

I write pretty clean copy, meaning that I don't generally have to rip the entire thing apart bit by bit and rearrange the whole thing, but I always have a lot of work to do when the last word gets set on the paper. Live and Let Fly, being a thriller/mystery, has some interesting challenges, too, since I need to make sure clues are set and loose ends tied up--at least the ones I want tied up. (Which reminds me, I need to make a note. Excuse me!)

Back.

My method of editing is to read it three times: Once for content, once for readability, once backward for detail in grammar and wording of individual sentences. This week, I did the content proof.


First, I print it up, because I catch more errors when I see it on paper. (Incidentally, this is after the minimal spell and grammar check on Word. Never trust Word alone!)



Then, I read it through once. I'm looking for flow, characterization, obvious mistakes and holes in the content. For DragonEye, I also highlight or circle any important items I need to include in my glossary and DragonEye Canon. That way, I can keep my facts straight from story to story. Also, I read it just to enjoy the finished work. Usually, 70 percent of the pages look something like this:



I put in those changes, then print it up again. If I have time, I do the next two edits, then send it to my critiquer friends. This time, however, I'm on a tighter deadline, so I sent it after the first run.

Next week, I'll tell you about the second and third edits.