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November 7, 2017 @ 8:21 PM

Seven Sensible Steps to Success as a Writer
Conclusion

We’ve come thus far in the writing journey to the point where the book is now ready to be published, and one has the inexpressible joy of holding the offspring of all these labours in the hands or seeing it smile back at us from the electronic screen.

Of course, there are all sorts of topics that I’ve not touched upon in this series of posts titled ‘Seven Sensible Steps to Success as a Writer’: proof-reading, book design, typefaces, choosing a cover, understanding the publishing contract, the publicity campaign and so on. Yet these are either technical issues outside my focus on the actual business of writing and producing a manuscript – or, in .........

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Writing tips 51

October 27, 2017 @ 3:05 AM

Seven Sensible Steps to Success as a Writer
Step 7 (continued): Suzanne

I may have had a few problems along the way. Who hasn’t? But I’ve also been exceptionally fortunate in having as my principal editor a woman whose contribution to my books has been to strengthen and improve them immeasurably.

Suzanne has either copy edited or proof read all of my significant books. She’s a grammarian, walking lexicon, stylist, disciplinarian and guide all in one. Yes, and also a friend.

Let me tell you, she is somebody who knows when to use ‘onto’ (one word) or ‘on to’ (two words) … who can not only advise you to use the double possessive ‘Banks’s Journal’ but explain why from .........

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Writing tips 50

October 27, 2017 @ 2:55 AM

Seven Sensible Steps to Success as a Writer
Step 7 (Continued): One cruel word…

While a good editor is a valued partner in the production of a book, it's also true that an unsympathetic one can turn what should be a rewarding experience into a misery, indeed destroy creativity altogether. Which means that you probably have the wrong editor, and need to find – or ask your publisher to find – another.

In the course of a writing career stretching over thirty years and some eighteen books, I've had only a few editors that I couldn't get along with. One, I remember, tried to get me to change a direct quote because that person didn't agree with the substance of the remark.

It's a cardinal rule of .........

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Writing tips 49

October 6, 2017 @ 10:03 PM

Seven Sensible Steps to Success as a Writer
Step seven (continued) Ninety-five percent

As a general rule, I try to give my editors ninety-five per cent of what they ask for when it comes to changing my manuscripts.

This is not necessarily because I think they're right most of the time … although often they are, and there are many ways to express a thought correctly in the English language. That’s what makes our mother tongue so generous and flexible a tool for the writer of books.

No. The principal reason behind my ninety-five per cent practice is to keep my editors happy in order to protect the five per cent that I really wish to retain.

It’s a political ploy, if you like. A trade off.

If one is to .........

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Writing tips 48

September 30, 2017 @ 4:35 AM

Seven Sensible Steps to Success as a Writer

Step 7 (continued): Taking time…

As with everything, I find it’s much better calmly to absorb what is being said by the editor about one’s precious manuscript, and to consider the point carefully from every point of view.

Always look up the reference to confirm the answer to any query that’s been raised on a factual matter. You've done the research and mostly you’ll be correct - but sometimes not, and then you'll be thanking your editor for providing another form of safety net.

Above all, take your time before deciding whether to accept or reject what is being proposed. Even in today’s world of faster turnarounds, you’ll usually have a few .........

Writing tips 47

September 30, 2017 @ 4:32 AM

Seven Sensible Steps to success as a writer
Step 7 (cont): Your editor suggests…

It’s not only novice writers who sometimes find the business of pulling the sacred text apart on the editorial desk a somewhat trying experience.

Even those of us who have several books under our belts can still jib and argue when a manuscript comes back with various passages marked in blue pencil for amendment, or questions raised as to meaning or factual content.

‘Surely anyone with half a brain can see that what I intended to say was … Of course that’s correct … I think … Oh, I see … sorry…’

It’s always best, I find, to read an edited manuscript once through .........

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Writing tips 46

September 15, 2017 @ 11:36 PM

Seven sensible steps to success as a writer
Step 7. Learn to love your editor

The process of self-criticism and constant revision that is the author’s stock-in-trade with each draft of a book, is similar on a smaller scale to what’s required when you come to the serious business of working with a professional editor.

It may by an independent editor you engage on a personal basis - or, more usually in my experience, it’s an in-house editor employed by your publisher. Either way, the judgement, clarity and professional detachment demanded of the author is taken to a whole new level.

And here let me say to every new author, that editors are not just necessary evils, as certain lawyers and politicians may .........

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Writing tips 45

September 9, 2017 @ 7:23 AM

Seven Sensible Steps to Success As an Author
Step 6 (continued). The wonderful wells…

A work in progress never leaves you, of course; but taking a little holiday from the desk does allow the waters to flow again into the wonderful wells of the human imagination.

It never ceases to astonish me that, just when I think I must have exhausted every idea and image in my brain, I’ll return to the source after a little while and find it brimming again with new words and possibilities.

It’s the font of all our dreams … and while life persists will always replenish itself.

So that when you return to your book, it is as one refreshed in mind and spirit. You look at the pages with new eyes, and the approach is .........

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Writing Tips 44

September 1, 2017 @ 7:33 AM

Seven Sensible Steps to Success As an Author
Step 6 (continued): Taking a break

The second draft usually takes me three or four months to complete. But before getting down to it, I generally take a break of at least several weeks from the work.

Indeed, I will often do so at the mid-way point of a long and time-consuming book.

Like a baker’s loaf, I put the typescript aside and cover it over – to give the yeast time to prove itself, and see if it will rise...

Put it in the oven to cook for a while, if I may extend the metaphor, and discover if the bread tastes as well when I come back to it in the morning.

For me, this short break gives the mind time to rest – to smell the roses, as they say – and to review the book at some leisure without the urgency of the original creative impetus.

It's extraordinary how very worthwhile it can be.

Next: the wonderful wells…

Photos:

Bread in oven, by Jean-Bernard Vuille. Wikimedia Commons.

Rosa Gold Glow, by Stan Shebs. Wikimedia Commons

Writing Tips 43

August 25, 2017 @ 11:46 AM

Seven Sensible Steps to Success as a Writer
Step 6 (continued): How many drafts?

With the first and second drafts of the book completed, the question arises: How many drafts should one do?

Like most things involving the creative arts, there is no fixed rule about the matter. It depends entirely on the individual writer and the success - or otherwise - of each particular draft.

Some writers can do up to ten drafts before they’re satisfied. Even then, it is sad but true to realise that nothing is ever as sublime as it seemed in that first glow of inspiration. When the Muse spoke.

For myself, I usually do three drafts of a book on the computer before I send it to the publisher to read, after which it’s sometimes .........

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