What You Need to Know About Editing Your Book
Writing a book is more than merely sitting down, typing several thousand words then aircraft it off to a printing (or cocky-publishing information technology). Before you lot can share it with readers or publishers, you must learn how to rewrite, edit, and shape your manuscript into the best possible version of itself. Fifty-fifty if you're going to piece of work with professional editors, this part of the editing process is something that every writer must exercise for themselves.
In this post, nosotros'll show how to edit your own volume — with the help of our free, downloadable checklist.
Editing requires a unique set of skills
Writing a start draft is an human action of pure cosmos. Editing, on the other hand, is an analytical, trouble-solving process where you'll slowly scrap away at that lumpy draft until you have something you're proud of. To get you in that editing frame of listen, here are a few pointers:
Requite yourself a scrap of fourth dimension
It is a truth universally acknowledged that you lot should set up your manuscript bated for a few days before you begin editing. Neil Gaiman puts information technology this way: "Once information technology's washed, put it abroad until you can read it with new eyes. When you lot're ready, choice information technology upwardly and read it, equally if you've never read it before."
Don't try to fix everything at the same fourth dimension
Imagine an artist painting a landscape. They don't start past shading a tiny tree in painstaking detail — they begin by sketching out the mountains and the river. That'due south the arroyo you should accept when self-editing your book. You'll be doing multiple rounds of editing that look at different elements of your writing, so don't worry nigh making each judgement perfect before you movement on.
Understand that you lot'll be cutting out some of your favorite parts
Writers often hear the advice "impale your darlings," significant that you should cut out whatsoever wonderful passages that don't serve the bigger picture. Again, don't stress: you can e'er file away your 'deleted scenes' in case yous can use them later. And remember: if you wrote something amazing, you can do the same again — so don't sweat it.
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What kind of editing does your book need?
Takes ane infinitesimal!
How to edit your ain volume in 4 simple steps
Now y'all're in the right headspace, permit's accept a leafage out of our checklist and run you lot through how to edit your own book:
1. Attack the 'big moving picture' bug with an ax
If your plot is water-tight, your structure is strong, and your characters are relatable and grow in a satisfying way, you're halfway there already. With that in heed, your beginning stage of editing volition deal with these broad-stroke bug.
Plot 📈
Plot consists of a story'due south connected events, with each leading to some other plot indicate. At the most basic level, your plot simply has to connect in a logical social club that escalates towards some sort of climax. It should also deliver on what the setup of the story promises (for example, a detective novel should actually involve some detectin').
Here are some plot questions from our editing checklist:
- Is the plot engaging and believable?
- Do plot points flow logically and gather or maintain momentum?
- Are all major and minor narrative threads tied upwards past the ending?
- Do the plot twists make sense? Are in that location plot holes in the story?
- Does the plot match the conventions of your genre?
Pro-tip: Write a i-sentence summary of each scene on individual flashcards and pivot them onto a corkboard. With your plot laid out in front of y'all, information technology's easier to motility scenes around (or toss them out entirely).
During this role of your edit, don't worry if you lot feel like you're losing the plot (!) — you lot'll always have a guiding light in the form of story structure.
Story structure
While a book's plot can go anywhere, story structure isn't as flexible. Stories largely follow the same pattern:
A hero is in a 'normal world' before something forces them out of their condolement zone, and in pursuit of a goal that they must either achieve or face the consequences.
Whether you lot're planning your book in line with The Three Human activity Structure, the Hero'southward Journey, or any other narrative framework, you should exist able to distill your story into a single sentence following this formula:
[Grapheme] must [do something] to reach [goal] or else [reason why the audience should care]?
For example, you could describe 1941's Casablanca this mode:
A cynical nightclub owner must stick his cervix out in order to help his old flame and her married man escape Casablanca or else endanger the French Resistance.
To make sure your own book adheres to basic narrative principles, bank check out our in-depth guide to story construction and pick a framework that speaks to you.
Your book needn't follow whatsoever detail structure to the letter — story isn't a strict science, after all. Nonetheless, you may find these structures useful for identifying missing or misplaced 'story beats' that could prove vital to solving your story's narrative issues.
To become even deeper into narrative construction, sign upwardly for our gratuitous course on the Iii-Human action Structure.
Character
In many ways, a story is about how a character reacts to an event or situation. How does a kind, romantic orphan male child react to a secret inheritance? How does a spider react when her porcine pal is condemned to the slaughter-house?
For your protagonist to go on a satisfying, challenging journey ( where they can react in an interesting fashion), certain things need to be in place: a primary goal, strengths that tin help them reach information technology, and weaknesses that get in the way.
So there are antagonists and secondary characters. While they should also have a rich, relatable inner life, they demand to contribute to the protagonist's story in order for your book to work. If they don't somehow assistance, hinder, or shed lite on your chief character, you may need to edit some scenes, add new ones, or remove characters entirely.
To determine whether your characters are sufficiently rounded to carry a story, permit's turn to our checklist:
- Practise the master characters have clear traits, strengths, and weaknesses?
- What are the protagonist and antagonist'south motivations?
- Do characters human action believably and consistently in each scene?
- How practise the secondary characters serve the story?
- Chart each principal character'southward overall arc. Is every arc clear and compelling?
For more than help, check out our guide to creating character profiles likewise every bit our free grade on grapheme development.
2. Bring your conflicts and themes to the foreground
After your first phase of editing, y'all should ideally accept a story that works on a basic level. This next stage is all virtually infusing your volume with texture and pregnant by focusing on conflicts and themes.
Conflict is at the heart of every story
Conflict must escalate over the form of the story. The roadblocks preventing your protagonist from achieving their must get more than insurmountable as the story goes on. The bad guys close in on the detective; the romantic lead's sense of self-doubt grows more acute.
In your editing, make certain that your primal conflicts — any they are — steadily build toward the climax. Not but does this edifice tension assure your readers that your story is going somewhere, but information technology volition also grow your stakes and let your large finish to have an fifty-fifty greater impact.
Bank check out this guide for tips on how to place and develop your book'south fundamental conflicts .
With your protagonist'south cardinal conflicts clearly divers, yous will soon see your themes sally from the woodwork.
Fleshing out your themes
While many authors don't start writing with a literary theme in mind, they very often observe these themes emerging in the rewrite. No thing how niche and unusual a protagonist's conflict is, it should be grounded in something universal — and that is the theme.
Once you understand what 'universal truth' your book is really about, y'all can find ways to accentuate that theme.
If your book is about fear of aging, peradventure the antagonist could exist a plastic surgeon. In your descriptions, you can perhaps focus your descriptions on motifs of natural disuse — or use a ticking clock as a plot device. Anything that can subconsciously make the reader more receptive to your themes tin and should exist planted at this phase.
Editing checklist for disharmonize and themes:
- Are your intended themes adult through conflict?
- Is the central disharmonize intriguing, yet articulate? Is it resolved (at least for the time being) when the story ends?
- Does this conflict escalate gradually over the course of the book?
- What dramatic question(s) ascend, and are they answered past the end?
- What sacrifice is your protagonist faced with making at the climax?
At present that the skeleton of your book is fully aligned and the flesh is starting to adhere to the bones, it'due south time to zoom in and showtime working on the details.
3. Chisel away at your scene-by-scene issues
Adjacent comes scene-by-scene editing. Here, y'all'll ensure each scene contributes to the story, and that the details within are compelling. You may take already washed some light scene editing in service, but at present's the time to confirm that each one accomplishes its purpose — and if not, to change or cutting it. Let's separate this into 3 parts:
Scenes and chapters 🎬
If you're fresh from editing your plot, then editing your scenes and chapters should come pretty naturally. This is where you look at your scenes, especially the important ones (like the opening, the inciting incident, and the climax), and try to brand them more connected to each other and more enticing to readers.
Editing checklist for scenes and chapters:
- Does the opening scene hook readers? Does it begin in the right place?
- Are in that location enough scenes, and does each one serve a physical purpose?
- Are scenes paced well and are your chapter lengths appropriate?
- Is each scene conspicuously oriented in time and place?
- Could each scene start later on?
- Is foreshadowing used effectively, if applicative?
- Are scene and chapter transitions smooth?
As you tin probably tell, this phase of editing is well-nigh getting into the nitty-gritty. Don't be agape to "micromanage" your scenes: cut them, tweak them, and shift them around until y'all have them exactly right.
Also, make sure your pacing isn't too tedious (which can bore readers) or likewise fast (which can confuse them). If you lot're unsure nigh pacing, have a beta reader cheque information technology out — this is one flaw that'southward especially hard to diagnose in your own writing, and then a fresh pair of eyes can be helpful.
Dialogue 💬
Time for everyone's favorite part of the story: dialogue. Of class, merely because dialogue is fun to write, doesn't mean information technology's easy to do well. We accept a comprehensive guide to dialogue right here on the blog if in that location'southward anything you need to analyze, just if y'all're ready to dive into the edit, read on!
Editing checklist for dialogue:
- Does the dialogue serve a purpose in each scene? Does it provide information? Advance the plot? Assistance the stride of the story?
- Does each character have a distinct voice?
- Does the word choice accurately reverberate the fourth dimension and place?
- Is in that location a balance among dialogue tags, activity beats, and implied tags?
- Have you more often than not used "said," and but occasionally other words for said?
Some dialogue bug, like overusing fancy dialogue tags, are like shooting fish in a barrel to prepare. Others, like giving every character a singled-out vox, might be harder to piece of work on. If you don't have much feel with dialogue, why non sign upwardly for our free course on writing natural dialogue?
Prose and perspective ✍️
Here are another ii elements y'all might non have thought were related: prose and perspective. We've grouped these together because stories are often told from a certain person'south point of view, which naturally affects the prose mode. It's also ane of the concluding stages of editing because many of these issues will have been corrected or improved throughout the process! And then while this part is mostly a safeguard, it's worth checking over just in case.
Editing checklist for POV and prose:
- Is the narrator's phonation clear and consequent?
- If the point of view grapheme changes, how is that alter marked? Could there be a better alternative viewpoint character in any given scene?
- Does the prose manner more than-or-less match the POV character'due south phonation?
- Does each sentence contribute to the story — i.east. no purple prose?
- Do you "show, don't tell" your dialogue, characters, and setting?
Over again, if you've gotten this far, most of these issues have probably resolved themselves. But there are still a few hands missed points, such as clarifying when your POV character changes and tidying up patches of majestic prose. Then accept some time to scout for these things, even if you think yous've got it covered.
4. Fine-tune your prose with a copy edit
You've come so far — but in that location'due south still more to go! This concluding step in our process focuses on the nitty-gritty of your text: it's the re-create edit. And the great thing well-nigh re-create editing is that it's and so cutting-and-dried. If you spot a grammatical error, yous know exactly how to fix it.
So when you're prepare, sit down down with our copy-editing guidelines and knock 'em out.
Here are 10 tips for copy editing your writing:
one. Supercede passive vocalization with active vocalization where appropriate.
❌ The ball was kicked.
✅ She kicked the brawl.
2. Limit the use of adverbs in your dialogue tags. (Prove, don't tell!)
❌ "Why did you consume my turkey sandwich?" said Harry angrily.
✅ Harry upended the tabular array. "Why did y'all eat my turkey sandwich?"
3. Supercede weak verbs and adverbs with stronger verbs.
❌ Leonard ran quickly to school.
✅ Leonard sprinted to school.
4. Supervene upon all "hidden" verbs.
❌ Offer an explanation
✅ Explicate
5. Delete vague, subjective words and "crutch" words.
❌ "could," "might," "maybe," "more," "poor," "some," "multiple," etc.
❌ "really," "literally," "suddenly," "but," "just," "a petty," "almost," etc.
vi. Check for instances of overly complicated language.
❌ In shut proximity
✅ Near
seven. Delete all instances of clichés in the text.
❌ It was a dark and stormy dark.
8. Check that all of your dialogue is formatted correctly.
❌ "I honey you." Said Pam.
✅ "I love you," said Pam.
9. Make sure the point of view doesn't accidentally shift. (Head hopping)
❌ She was only settling downwardly with a cup of coffee when the fire alert went off. "Oh, perfect timing." I grabbed my coffee and stood back up.
10. Watch out for descriptive inconsistencies.
❌ Devon's blonde pilus shone in the sunlight ... "Whatever you say, man," replied Devon, flipping his brown locks away from his eyes.
Once you've finished tinkering with the copy, your volume should actually be meeting.
Go an editor to take your book to the side by side level
Once you've taken your manuscript as far as you can — and maybe shared it with a few beta readers — you lot may want to become information technology ready for publication. If yous're self-publishing, it'due south worth hiring freelance editors to brand sure your book is as good as it tin can be. To discover out more, cheque out our guide to professional person editing, or sign up to our marketplace to browse the profiles of editors you could work with.
Perfect your book with a professional person edit
The best developmental editors, copy editors, and proofreaders are on Reedsy. Sign up for gratuitous and meet them.
Learn how Reedsy can help you craft a cute book.
If your intention is to land a traditional book deal, yous'll find that the editing process will begin anew once your book is in the hands of a publishing company, which will accept its ain squad of editors. Still, before you start querying agents and publishers, you may wish to get a developmental edit (or at least an editorial assessment) to improve your chances of impressing the 'gatekeepers' with your writing samples.
Download: Book Editing Checklist
To guide you through your editing process, yous can download Reedsy's Volume Editing Checklist and print it out.
Enter your email address to get Reedsy's Ultimate Editing Checklist!
We'll transport it to your inbox correct away.
Recall that a book is truly written in the edit — so don't brusque-change your potential by rushing through the stages. Savor the procedure, learn from your mistakes, and take all this wonderful experience with you lot to your next book!
Source: https://blog.reedsy.com/how-to-edit-a-book/
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