Editing Fiction: Manuscript Prep
Help for Writers Formating and Appraising First Drafts
Writing fiction is just like any other process: it takes time, work, and lot of fine-tuning. Developing a solid editing process will help make good fiction great.
If you’ve written a short story, novella, or novel, and you’re not sure what to do next, don't take the finished product and immediately send it out to editors, agents and publishers in hopes of becoming the next superstar. Instead, fix up your English style usage, grammar, and presentation after you've cast an objective eye on the plot, characters, dialogue, and tone.
1. Double-space every story! This makes it easier to write between the lines. With plenty of room to make changes, there are no excuses for leaving in anything that doesn’t work. Leaving anything in during this process with the intent of changing it later can be dangerous—writers, after all, have a tendency to forget, which is why we write things down so often.
2. Print out your work. Looking at the writing on a piece of paper makes it easy to write in the margins, make notes, cross out useless information, or underline important moments that need be looked at with a more careful eye. This technique also makes it easier to look at work with more scrutiny.
3. Show the first draft to other writers. Avoid friends and family who may omit suggestions in order to prevent any hurt feelings. Good writers know how difficult the editing process can be, and are more often than not willing to offer suggestions that improve your writing. As the creator of the work, you’re likely to miss some obvious areas requiring improvement. Offer to look other writers' fiction as well— learn from each other’s mistakes.
4. Look at it sentence by sentence. Take a look at this example and take special note of the underlined sections in which entire sentences are weak and need to be reworded. There are many notes in the margin regarding the text. Dialogue is changed above the lines.
This is a good start, and should provide a roadmap for completing a competent second draft. Editing is never an easy process, but sticking with it and establishing a routine.
