Re-post: Polishing Your Work

Congratulations! You’ve written the “Great American Novel” and you can sit back satisfied knowing that fame and fortune are just around the corner. You are definitely prepared for the onslaught of movie producers coming to convince you to let them turn your novel into a blockbuster movie. You’ve listened to the experts and written “hard and fast” and gotten those pages done in record time.

But wait! First you’ve got to polish your story, otherwise known as editing. (By the way, it might be time for a reality check as well if you believe the first two lines of this article)
Editing is certainly more than just running spell check and checking your grammar.*A warning I would like to add about spell check – NEVER allow your spell check program to make changes automatically or blindly. I once had an organization’s newsletter almost make it to the printer with a member’s family name changed by the spell checker to a specific part of the male genitalia! Be sure to check for consistency in names as well (is it Jake Carson or Jake Carlson?).
Remember while correcting your spelling, grammatical errors, misplaced words and incomplete thoughts that you wrote the piece and therefore understand what you meant to say. Your eyes may fool you and allow your brain to TELL you what should be there. One writer I know overcomes this expectation factor by checking spelling in the reverse; she begins reading line by line from the back of her manuscript. Another writer reads her work aloud because she finds it easier to “hear” the mistake rather than see it.
Okay, you have now reached the next level of self-editing your story. As you re-read your work, ask the following: 
Did you hook the reader from the first page (preferably from the first line)? Open your story with action, a question, a problem – make the reader want to keep reading, make the reader need to keep reading. “It was a dark and stormy night...” needn’t go any further; a weather report may be suitable for an early morning weather forecast and that’s it. However “She didn’t believe she would survive that dark and stormy night…” leaves the reader wondering who she is and what the threat is. This gives the reader more motivation to keep reading and solve her curiosity. End each chapter or scene break with a “hook”, a reason to keep reading.
Did you increase your word count with a lot of unnecessary adjectives and adverbs? Pretend that you have to pay a dollar for each word and cut out anything that isn’t crucial. Eliminate purple prose, the overly flowery descriptions filled with basically uninteresting and ornate descriptions. Allow your senses (smell, taste, hearing, sight and touch) to help you describe settings, but do not overdo it.
Did you SHOW or just tell your story? Don’t just say that your hero is angry, let him slam into a room, let him frown or yell. Make his actions, thoughts and words products of his anger. Make sure that your characters have depth and are plausible. Your characters existed before the story’s time period and they will react to the situations you throw at them because of who they are and the things they’ve experienced.
Did you deflate your words with uncertain phrases? Don’t say “he was answering the door”, instead say “he answered the door”. Get your point across with simple phrases. Don’t hmm and haw by tossing in unnecessary words. Put the subject of your sentence in the forefront – use “I gave him the book” instead of “he got the book from me”. Make your statements definite. If you want a character to do something, let him do it.


Writing Exercise: Choose a few objects that you have had for a while. What emotions come to mind when you concentrate on those objects and any memories they evoke? Go through the five senses of sight, smell, taste, hearing and touch - write what the objects make you experience through each sense (or memory of).

Writing Prompt: In one paragraph, tell the reader about your day. Try to “hook” the reader with the first sentence. For instance, “I made a decision. My appointment with my boss was right after lunch…” Does that make you wonder what my decision was about?

Challenge Assignment:  Think of a chore you really dislike doing and your perspective/emotions while you are busy with that chore. Write yourself into a scene in your latest work-in-progress as the main character experiencing the emotions you would have BUT staying as consistent as possible with the character you already created. Is your character believable?