My editor at Savant Books has been working on my manuscript for a couple of months. This week she forwarded all of her comments and suggestions to me. This is always a little anxiety provoking because you never know how deep the edits will go. By that I mean, will the comments be on tensing or confusion about who is speaking or whether you are in the past or the present; or will the comments focus on problems with character development; or dialogue; or believability of the story; or whether a good narrative tension is maintained so the reader always wants to turn the page; or will there be fundamental problems with how the story is structured, that ‘a’ doesn’t lead to ‘b’ and ‘b’ definitely doesn’t lead to ‘c.’ Or, worst of all, will the ending just not work; will the story miss the mark and leave the reader wondering why he or she wasted so much time on something that was unsatisfying (I’ve felt that way at the end of some books I’ve read; when that happens, I seldom read the author again.)
My manuscript is now formatted for editing which means it’s much longer (488 pages) than it actually is. I’ve reviewed over 300 pages of my editor’s work. I also looked ahead to see if she had any problems with the ending (Happily, she liked it.). I’ve agreed with almost all her suggestions and have made the changes she’s recommended without much difficulty. The characters are strong and the first person narrative voice of the main character is memorable. I needed to move some sections closer to the beginning of the story to enhance character development; change the beginning itself because it said too much too soon; edit some dialogue; delete parts of some scenes that went on too long; but nothing worrisome. So far, at least!
I should finish work on this edit soon. Then it will go back to my editor and she will review my changes and suggest more, I’m sure. Eventually we will move on to line and word editing, the details. The publisher will also look at it. Then cover art. Marketing. All of this will take time, but everything should be done in time for releasing the book in August.
In the meantime, I’m inching forward on my next novel, “Chimney Bluffs.”