Review and Revise: Tips on Editing Your Work
- Aug 8, 2017
- 3 min read
The day that I first showed my parents the first edition of my first novel, my mom flipped so a page and found a spelling mistake.
**screams internally**
Since then, I have re-published a few other editions with edits to spelling and grammar mistakes. It annoys me that they existed, but I also did publish that novel when I was sixteen--can't be too hard on my adolescent self.
While I despise the editing process, it's a necessary one. When writing my first novel, I went through the entire thing at least 4 or 5 times. The first draft was often written on paper, then transferred to a rough-draft document (1 edit). Within the rough draft edit, it was looked over (2 edits), then transferred to an official document formatted for publishing (3 edits). In the official format, it was edited again (4 edits), and once I was finished with the entire novel, I read most of it aloud to myself (5 edits)--and I STILL found mistakes. Of course, my biggest flaw was that I never showed the novel to anyone else to edit, though I did show it to my friend Christy to read in snippets (she was the person who told me to publish the story in the first place! Shout out to Christy!). The main reason for this was that at the time, I wanted my novel to be a surprise. I also did not have the confidence to show it to other people. After taking a course on writing where the entire thing revolved around reading snippets aloud and getting feedback from peers, it's safe to say that I'm starting to move past this fear of having other sets of eyes on my rough drafts.
As many mistakes as I've made when it comes to editing, I like to make mistakes so you all don't have to. So, compiled below is a short list of how to review and revise your work--both from me, my friends and from some professional writers as well:
1. EDIT // Seems a bit obvious, am I right? One would think. I've read stories before--usually ebooks--where the author failed to edit at all or did the bare minimum, and it showed. Never neglect editing! Even if it may seem daunting, time consuming and you just don't want to do it because your novel is over two hundred pages and ain't nobody got time for that (guilty)....do it anyway!
2. READ YOUR WORK ALOUD // I believe I first learned this in elementary school, but it was reiterated by my short stories professor this summer in Scotland. Reading work aloud gives you a chance to catch things your eyes and brain would skim over and miss reading in your head. This is usually when I catch many mistakes!
3. HAVE OTHERS READ YOUR WORK // It may seem scary, but it's helpful to have another set of eyes look over your work. Someone else reading your piece for the first time can help with catching holes in the plot or points of major confusion. It can also give you a huge confidence boost if you're having doubts about the quality of your work. Chances are you're being hard on yourself, and it could take another set of eyes to help you realize your story's potential!
4. SMALL EDITS VS BIG EDITS // Know the difference between the two, and focus on one at a time! Small edits are things like grammatical and spelling errors that may be occasionally in your work. Big edits focus more on questions like, "does this section/ character/ event really need to be in the story? Does it further the plot?"
5. PLAY AROUND WITH YOUR FIRST AND LAST SENTENCES // This tip was given by my short stories professor this summer. Sometimes, all you've gotta do to give your beginning or your end a greater "umph" is to switch around your first or last sentence with a sentence a couple of lines up or down.
Hope this was helpful...now go get to writing (and editing)!!
Reina M
Comments