True Confessions
Karyne Corum lives in New Jersey where she was born and grew up. She has written several winning short stories for online publications. Her supernatural short story, “Harbinger†was released last spring by Night Fall publications in the anthology, From Nightmares and Shadows. She is feverishly working on the second draft of her suspense novel set in New Jersey. She believes you can’t get enough pizza, bagels or mystery in the Garden State. For help on getting fearless or a close enough facsimile, contact her at jerseykaryne@gmail.com. Or visit her Jersey blog page, www.jerseywisefiction.com
I’m going to confess to a terrible secret. Something no self-respecting writer ever wants to admit.
I hate rewrites. Dread them.
I’m convinced that once I dig into my work I’ll discover that I’ve been wasting my time all these years. Not able to write worth a damn.
I have a novel, fully written that is just waiting for me to revise.
That’s two years worth of hard work, late nights and butt busting emotional effort and I’m not about to give up now. I have no money to afford a professional editor, though I wish like hell I could.
Forget about a shoestring budget, mine is more akin to dental floss.
The cheap kind that tears on your back molar.
But I’m not an editor, that’s what I’m thinking. I’m a writer. Writer’s write, they don’t edit.
Like hell they don’t, my friend Sunny assures me. Here, she said, take this, it’s probably the best book on editing you’ll ever read.
Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne and Dave King.
What. A. Find.
This book is simply and beautifully written, with no overblown explanations, just clear, concise directions on how to clean up your creation.
By the time I was half-way through reading it I’d already begun murdering my extraneous characters left and write. Deflating bloated verbiage, dumping expositions like excess passengers on a sinking life raft.
In short I was thinking and working like an editor.
Passive Voice, Point of View, Plot Proportion, Interior Monologue, even that most elusive of butterflies, Voice. Each one handled, in such a way that any writer can learn the vital skills to craft a better book right from your first draft.
Now I make no promises that these books will help you create a great book, the talent part is on you. This book can certainly help you find your way down the tricky, twisted path that is called revisions.
There is one other thing that I feel, very strongly, each good writer needs to develop before you even start looking at your manuscript. Become fearless, able to realize that a good book is the result of talent, hard work and perseverance, but a great book is the profit of being able to put your ego in a corner. No writer really likes discarding words they fought to find or deleting a scene that came to you in a blazing flash while getting your teeth cleaned or during really bad sex.
Trust me, I know.
During the course of writing this blog as I was editing my manuscript, a lot of things were happening in my personal life that affected how I looked at my work. They altered my perspective, and I had the choice of letting them or blindly continuing on with my original vision. But that wouldn’t be truthful, to either the story or to myself. It’s a fearful task to cut your own vein, emotionally of course, and let it bleed into your work, changing the landscape in shades and dimensions you never imagined. I think it’s scarier to never see what truly lies beneath and let it breathe into life.
November 27, 2011
Posted in: Guest Blogs
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9 Responses
Thanks for the awesome post. I used to hate rewrites myself. I recently finished a massive rewrite and found my self slaughtering whole scenes, knocking things down to the bare bones and rebuilding. It became very liberating and I found myself thinking it was a much stronger piece by the time I was done. I have an editor, and so far she hasn’t made as many of her normal complaints as she’s editing.
One thing I have found that really helps my editing is editing for others. I have several writer friends who are part of a writers group, we often edit each others work, and I find I improve by doing that. When you have to do things cheap this is a great way.
Lots of luck and write on.
A.M. Burns
A.M,
I agree, when I’m editing for someone else, and then go to my own work, it seems a much easier job.
So far, I’m halfway done and the body count is steadily rising. lol
I’ve always known I could never be a writer because I don’t have the discipline needed—I sure don’t have the discipline to do revisions after the initial effort. Karyne, thanks for being here today
Thanks for having me Leila. This was alot of fun.
Aw, what a beautiful photo, and post. I admire your fearlessness–and that is indeed what it requires.
I agree that the better we get at self-editing, the less rewriting there may be, though I think that every writer needs independent eyes on her work, ideally a range of professionals and avid readers, for the blind spots we all inevitably have.
But don’t worry–you have trusty readers lined up out the door, I know!!
Writing fiction requires courage, no way around it. And I can relate to the cheap dental floss budget!
I really need to get that book, Karyne. Thanks for reminding me.
Hi, Karyne,
You and I are definitely on the same wave length! I discovered Editing for Fiction Writers many years ago and love the book. It’s been so helpful. Writers these days have to do lots of self-editing. To submit a novel that’s not well-edited amounts to almost instant rejection.
Jenny, your so good for my ego.
Sara, I think we could start our own dental floss brigade.
Judy, I’d lend you my copy but you’d probably never want to give it back. lol
Jacqueline, I wish I’d found it years ago!
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