A while ago on K.M. Weiland's blog Wordplay, she has a post up on the 50-page edit. In it she suggests that every 50 pages or 20,000 words to go over and edit what you've written so far. I stored it away as something I might try. About a week ago I came to a big change in my WIP and I was having trouble finding the characters and story again from this big change.
Then I remembered the suggestion of a 50-page edit. I'd gone a bit over the suggested word count with over 30,000 words, but I still buckled down and decided to try an edit-as-I-go strategy. And I think it really helped. Not only do I recognize things I should bring up as I continue writing, but I also felt re-established with my characters. Since I decided to edit on paper, I'm still making the changes onto my computer, but after today I should be rearing and ready to write through again.
This WIP I have going is really tricky, it's like nothing I've ever written before. It's challenging and making me switch strategy of how I write. But I'm loving it. I'm loving the challenge of it and learning new ways and adapting in my writing.
Do you edit as you go? Have you ever needed to switch around how you write?
Showing posts with label editing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label editing. Show all posts
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Editing and Publishing
Today my school had a forum featuring Stacy Whitman, an editor at Tu Books, an imprint of Lee and Low. I thought that this would be a great chance to see what happens once the book is written and revised, to look into the editor's point of view on things.
One thing that astounded me was Ms. Whitman showed a slide featuring a series of pages from a book she had edited a few years ago after it had been edited. Blue highlights showed revisions, red highlights showed deletions, and green highlights were for formatting. Some pages were completely blue or completely red. Other pages had a mix of blue and red, but very little (I'm talking maybe a paragraph among twenty pages) were left of what had been originally written. Now, I'm hoping she pulled out some of the most dramatic pages to show us how much work editing can be, but even still, that's a lot of revisions!
Along with the massive amounts of revisions, I also got to see what process a book goes through once in the hands of an editor. Finally, there was a Q&A session at the end, and we discussed ebooks (of course), salaries of editors, graduate schools, and well, lots of random things about books and publishing.
One thing that astounded me was Ms. Whitman showed a slide featuring a series of pages from a book she had edited a few years ago after it had been edited. Blue highlights showed revisions, red highlights showed deletions, and green highlights were for formatting. Some pages were completely blue or completely red. Other pages had a mix of blue and red, but very little (I'm talking maybe a paragraph among twenty pages) were left of what had been originally written. Now, I'm hoping she pulled out some of the most dramatic pages to show us how much work editing can be, but even still, that's a lot of revisions!
Along with the massive amounts of revisions, I also got to see what process a book goes through once in the hands of an editor. Finally, there was a Q&A session at the end, and we discussed ebooks (of course), salaries of editors, graduate schools, and well, lots of random things about books and publishing.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
My very first workshop
I guess I've done workshops before. I've had my peers review my papers when the teacher assigns us to do so. But those were all essays, dealing with thesises and topic sentences and supporting arguments. While I don't mind writing essays (depending on the topic), it's not the same as the writing I do for fun and that I hope to do for a living one day.
And I guess, in all technicality, I've had people review my work. But they've all been close friends and family. While I could expect honesty, I could also expect some sugar coating to go with it. They wouldn't crush my dreams entirely.
Now I take my creative writing course. We did our first piece in the creative nonfiction genre. Still isn't the type of writing I plan on doing, but it's closer than an essay. The only difference is this piece actually happened to me, so I am the protagonist rather than someone else I create and write about. And today we sat down for our first workshop to analyze our work.
I walked into class with a knot in my stomach and I felt very weak. To me, this was when I would finally know my standing as a writer, or at least a basic understanding of my level. I could just imagine my peers trying to muster up something decent about the piece to pacify their dislikes about it, what they would criticize, and whether I should just crawl in a hole now or go through the torture first.
But...magic. First, my peers really enjoyed my piece. My heart got a little fluttery when I realized they were being genuine. And then they talked about it, and I clicked on parts that I can make stronger, cut out, improve, or add onto, as well as the parts that were strong and I did right. It was so very helpful and not at all painful.
Moral of this post: let people read your work.
It's only going to make your piece stronger and better, as well as your writing.
And I guess, in all technicality, I've had people review my work. But they've all been close friends and family. While I could expect honesty, I could also expect some sugar coating to go with it. They wouldn't crush my dreams entirely.
Now I take my creative writing course. We did our first piece in the creative nonfiction genre. Still isn't the type of writing I plan on doing, but it's closer than an essay. The only difference is this piece actually happened to me, so I am the protagonist rather than someone else I create and write about. And today we sat down for our first workshop to analyze our work.
I walked into class with a knot in my stomach and I felt very weak. To me, this was when I would finally know my standing as a writer, or at least a basic understanding of my level. I could just imagine my peers trying to muster up something decent about the piece to pacify their dislikes about it, what they would criticize, and whether I should just crawl in a hole now or go through the torture first.
But...magic. First, my peers really enjoyed my piece. My heart got a little fluttery when I realized they were being genuine. And then they talked about it, and I clicked on parts that I can make stronger, cut out, improve, or add onto, as well as the parts that were strong and I did right. It was so very helpful and not at all painful.
Moral of this post: let people read your work.
It's only going to make your piece stronger and better, as well as your writing.
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