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For those following this journey. I will soon begin work on the copy edit, which is when the editor really begins to scrutinise how the manuscript reads. Until now we've been taking a more general overview approach of how it all bolts together but now we get down to the nitty gritty of how it looks, feels, sounds, etc, at a more micro level. It's usually the hardest edit...and where the longest yards are run. I'll keep you posted. Fx

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Yet another step on the long mile.  Hopefully you're not going to have too much to dig out or patch up beyond some minor quibbles here and there.

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Slàinte!

 

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No, M. If you're at copy edit stage then you are way, way past first draft. What you need to do - as a first timer - and long before you send off anything to an editor is to ensure you've polished that manuscript as best you can to your ability. So you've already had plenty of draft readers go through the mss and give their feedback. You've taken note of what people have said and after consideration you've decided which feedback to act upon and which to leave alone because your instincts say otherwise. You have then made your own structural edit having read through mss a couple of time and tidied up areas and you've been through carefully to decide that your dialogue is crisp, your scenes are filled with strong imagery, that your characters leap off the page and that the story has no blubbery bits. You've spell checked thoroughly and made sure that the mss is set up in Courier New, double line spacing with wide margins and that every page is numbered and titled. Then only do you send off a few chapters either to your manuscript assessor who is charging you plenty to do a professional editorial report, or, you are sending it off to an agent. The assessor will come back to you as an independent editor and you will make another major pass on the mss. If to an agent, that person might also make some suggestions or he/she may be impressed enough to start presenting it to editors. When your mss is accepted by a publisher, it will give you an editor who will then start working with you on the manuscript and the first thing you'll do is the structural edit together. After you've considered all of the suggestions and made your amendments, done the rewrites, etc, it will go back to the editor or a freelancer. And then only will you get the copy edit back that scrutinises the mss at a more micro level. The copy edit at a publisher is the most important edit and where all the major shaping and pruning and finessing goes on. The line edit that follows, adds the spit and polish! Fx

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It really is an interesting thing, this publishing business.  I can't recall who it was I read an interview from but they were discussing the point that writers as artists are treated so much differently than say a painter is.  They made the comment "Do you think anyone would say to Picasso 'I think you need more blue here. And can you tone down the red?'"  Meanwhile, editors take an author's work and tell them to take this out, rework this, and did you think of this.  When I read about editing and editors, all I can think of is the scene in "Amadeus" where they discuss the new Mozart piece as having "too many notes," to which Mozart replies that if they point out the extraneous notes he will remove them....which they can't do, of course.

But I'm sure editors are all fine people.  Not an indictment of them, just one of those things that makes me chuckle.

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Slàinte!

 

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Indeed....food for thought!

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Crikey...

I can see why it's best to get the initial story down as quickly as possible.

Mdx