Highlights of the presentation by Julie Coulter Bellon

CLAW—the 4 secrets for self-editing

Check off your basic editing checklist
Let someone else read it for you that will give you good feedback
Always print it out and read a hard copy
Walk away for a few hours, days or weeks and come back with fresh eyes.

Check off your basic editing checklist:
Never rely solely on your spell/grammar check (“Misspellers of the world, untie!”; see also “Always print it out and read a hard copy”). Watch your tenses and subject/verb agreement.

Avoid too many adverbs/adjectives [emphasis mine: some people read this advice without reading the examples and think you can never use adjectives or adverbs. Also note that repetitive adjectives like “green grass” below are also something to watch for]—laundry lists of description: Julie called this “the laziest writing”:

• “It was a beautiful sunny June day and the lush, emerald green grass reflected the bright yellow sunlight and hurt my eyes.”
• “She desperately wanted to kiss him passionately.”
  • Telling versus showing!

Shun redundancy and repetitiveness [I am HILARIOUS]—on the micro level (crutch words, using obscure/unusual words over and over, and empty words “just,” “actually,” “really,” etc.) and the macro level (do you have two chapters that serve the same function? Cut one).

Balance: break up really long paragraphs (never more than a page!!), balance narrative and dialogue. (But leave out unnecessary dialogue tags.)

Let someone else read it for you:
Get more than one brutally honest reviewer—no mothers or grandmas!

Always print it out and read a hard copy [To which I add: read it OUT LOUD.]
Changing the font can be helpful [Also helpful, from Stein on Writing: change the author’s name to one you either love or hate.]

Have a pen with you to jot down notes as you read [and also as you were writing—change a character’s backstory on page 127? Make a note of things to fix and fix them in this edit].

Walk away for a few hours, days or weeks and come back with fresh eyes
Take time to enjoy having finished. [Dance of joy!] But seriously, leave it alone—the changes will come to you.

Leaving it can also give you the emotional distance necessary to cut anything that doesn’t advance the story, even if it’s your favorite part. (Julie points out that you can put deleted scenes on your website!)

Now what?

The deep edit: down & dirty with the editor’s checklist

Looking at the big picture with the editor’s checklist:

• Show us what your character is experiencing in that moment
• Avoid passive voice
• Stick to one POV per scene, please!
• Make sure you have hooks to keep them turning pages, especially at the beginning and end of chapters
• Does each character have a motivation? (villains, MCs, not so much a concern for secondary characters)
• Does the setting contribute to the piece?
• Is the story timeline consistent?
• Does the conflict keep the tension throughout the story? (don’t resolve things too quickly)
• Natural flow—nothing contrived [no deus ex machinas!]—to keep believability, don’t pull the rug out from underneath your readers. [That makes people throw books.]
• Is there a balance of narrative, action and dialogue?

The drive-thru edit vs. the seven-course meal edit
The combo meal story: a string of clichéslike ordering your usual at the drive thru: you hardly have to look at the offerings anymore. It’s like an editor’s slushpile. They will spot your combo meal story a mile away.

Critique partners/readers describe it as “familiar” and “predictable.” Lots of unnecessary “fat”—characters that aren’t vital, characters that are one-dimensional, too much description, loose ends.

To fix the combo meal story: give it a twist, dig a little deeper. Expand your writing menu. Conversely, be prepared to cut extra words, descriptions, narrative, even characters, even if they’re good. Instead, use active, powerful scenes and action verbs.

On the other end of the spectrum: 7 course meal story: some of later courses smelled so good your mouth watered, but you couldn’t enjoy it because you were too full. Lots of characters, twists and turns, complexities—lots of places to lose your reader (and yourself in your editing!).

To fix the seven-course meal story: Again, cut unnecessary words, descriptions, narrative and characters. Strive for simplicity and clarity—and focus on the compelling story. Maintain a character notebook.

When do you stop editing?

• When you’ve done CLAW and a deep edit
• When you’ve addressed your readers’ concerns
• When you’ve gone through it for plot, continuity and characterization and setting errors
• When you’re sick of it.

Find a happy medium

• enjoy what you’ve created
• dont’ beat yourself up over mistakes [Do you get the self-referential joke I put in there? Totally on purpose 😉 ]
• realize that the writing and editing process is a journey and some trips are longer than others.
• Keep learning—figure out your weaknesses and now to combat them—be willing to do the work

A polished piece with an author who is still teachable is valuable to an editor, agent and publisher. [Aside from the great editing advice, the word teachable was my biggest takeaway from this session. It’s something I know I need to work on—and I guess acknowledging that is a good start!]

I put my MS back together—where do I go from here?
Pat yourself on the back, remember that writing—and editing!—can rejuvenate and SUBMIT IT!

About the conference: LDStorymakers is a writing contest geared to LDS writers. The conference covers both the niche, regional publishers that cater to the LDS market as well as national publishers.