Me and You and a Mic name Blue

Fi yuo cna raed tihs, yuo slouhd nto be na etidor. I learned long, long ago that I can powerread through almost any poorly written sophomore journal entry. Aoccdmig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno’t mtaaetr in what oerder the ltteres in a word are, the only iproamtnt thing is taht the first and lsat letter be in the right pclae. 

Which makes me a terrible editor.

See, I can read right past these mistakes. I learned that lesson as a yearbook editor and then as a self-published author (2003-2010ish). I could squeeze my eyes and hold that page closer and closer to my nose, but my brain would simply fill in the gaps and it would appear to be a coherent sentence. The mistakes would slip right past me.

With an English degree, I kinda knew the rules. Then I started teaching kids with faster brains than mine. After a semester of Katie the Grammar Goddess, shame forced me to take that Warriner’s Grammar book home for the summer so that I understood all the rules. By 1999; I mastered punctuation and homonyms. Its embarrassing when you know the rule but you’re fingers just drop the wrong answer into the sentence (see what I did their). Eventually I realized that while I knew the rules my stream-of-consciousness brain had other ideas while writing.

So I learned the importance of editing.

After self-publishing from 2007-2013, I waved the white flag. Yes, I loved writing, but I also needed a team. In my humiliation, I looked to hybrid publishing where a team of other people were responsible for the final product. While effective, I also paid for my in$ecuritie$. I learned an important truth: most writers suck at editing.

Professional publishing is interesting. 

Most professional writers belong to informal writing groups based on talent, status, and masochistic desires. With all of my undiagnosed autistic wiring, I can’t stand the thought of writing groups. From what normal people tell me, you bounce ideas off each other on a weekly basis and shape and craft your novel’s idea. This gauntlet of social revision is antithetical to my nature. I was the kid who’d go find a quiet corner of the playground—not because I’m being bullied but because I needed some quiet. I write to live in an alternate universe where I can control the situation. Why would I put myself through unrehearsed small talk where the goal is to destroy my happy place. So I’ll never improve this stage of writing, but I have found a few people I trust to read my early drafts. I want the feedback, but I need to be alone when I read it so it does not overwhelm me. 

To compensate for my lack of a writing group, I give myself a year from first draft to the second draft. I’ll usually work on a couple projects in between, and when I open it up, it’ll be fresh. My process will usually be about three years from first word to publication. It’s just what I need for myself. 

The next stage of professional editing is the developmental stage. I’ve learned to love this stage so, so much. Once you think your story is coherent, you send it off to a developmental editor for analysis. Think of it this way: It’s like S&M. You know those people who wear leather and dog collars and let people abuse them. That’s what a developmental editor does to your ego: humiliation. Ohhh, but it grows on you because each little humiliation makes your novel stronger. Each reaction/concern/question forces my brain to find a way to untie the knot, and in doing so, you find new and creative ways to answer the question. Once again, my brain’s wiring will imagine what is NOT there. A developmental editor will make me fill in all of the gaps and truly make my story appear on the page.

After the developmental stage, I’ll send it off to a different editor. The “pleaser” in me wants to impress my developmental editor with my changes, but I find another set of eyes helps catch things the other two brains didn’ notice. A COPY EDITOR is a completely different mindset. Each clause, sentence, and paragraph needs to work, so moving words and clauses, compressing, and upgrading—those are the traits of a good copy editor. Back when I self-published, I’d shrug and assume folks would figure out what I meant. So a copy editor makes ugly syntax prettier. It’s the frosting on a well-constructed cake.  Unlike the months of fixing a developmental correction, it only takes days to fix sentences. Your ego is at its lowest since most corrections are, in fact, better than what you wrote. 

There are professional PROOF editors, who’ll read through the manuscript and look for typos. By this stage, several sets of eyes have looked at the manuscript, so what could go wrong? Well, I’ve been known to type the wrong thing when I go to fix a word. A copy and paste can vanish (I my keyboard out of batteries) only to show up 50 pages later in some random sentence. After 20 yearbooks, I kinda like doing the tedious layout work. A typical chapter will have about 15 details to check, which requires absolute concentration, so I will only do a chapter or two and then take a break. Even in  layout, you can wreck some nice looking syntax also. Since I try to keep my book budget under $2000 per project, I’ve come up with a new way of proofing: I record myself reading each and every word.

So my office has two work stations. Right now, I’m at my standing desk reading from a large TV screen six feet in front of me (it’s good for the eyes). My other desk is this work-of-art created by my former student Josh shaped like an L, where I have adjustable microphone stands and monitors with that cliche leather chair that is oh so comfy. With my finished page in front of me, I’ll open up an audio program and, starting with the title page, read each and every word in the stinking manuscript. While it doesn’t guarantee a 100% flawless manuscript, I feel pretty good about things once I’m finished and put the book to rest. Publish.

While selling books, I’ve noticed how many people are turning to AUDIO BOOKS. Drive-time and work time allows folks to rip through a book just by listening. Having seen more and more students unable to focus on words on a page, I saw this trend coming. If you can’t beat them, join them. So after my recording stage, I take my audio files, add a bit of intro music, label the chapters, and upload it to YouTube? Why Youtube? Well, I’m already a visual storyteller, and currently I have around 500 subscribers. Apparently, you can monetize on FB. Dropping my audiobooks on Youtube gives me those precious minutes. And boy, are audiobooks long. I like big books and I cannot lie! My audiobooks are well over 10 hours! I’ve seen a lot of other authors shelling out big bucks for professional recordings, but until I see the profitability, I’ll just give mine away for free since it’s a rough recording. 

Currently, I have my last 3 novels in a playlist, so I’ll include the link below if you want to listen.