How To Edit Your Manuscript Without Losing Your Mind

(and if you believe I'm capable of teaching you that, I have a nice bridge I'd like to sell you)

I don't think I'd be too terribly wrong if I told you minions that every writer edits differently. You just find your niche, your way of doing things, and before you know it, you discover what works for you. The following is what works for me (and this is oh-so appropriate as I tackle the revisions of NINTH GRADE SUCKS, the second book in THE CHRONICLES OF VLADIMIR TOD).

Step One: I print out my manuscript. For some reason that physics cannot explain, words read differently on paper. So I print it out and usually staple the chapters together, so that if I drop them (and I will), it doesn't make a big, confusing mess. It just makes a little, less-confusing-than-it-could-have-been mess.

Step Two: I get ready to edit. I grab a Diet Pepsi, settle on my favorite end of the couch, tuck my legs underneath me until I'm all comfy, sit the little desk pillow on my lap, grab my handy dandy liquid highlighter set and pen and begin to read. If something feels out of joint, I mark it with a highlighter. I go through the manuscript pretty quickly, marking pink what needs deletion, marking yellow what needs changing, marking purple what feels off, but I don't know quite what it needs. Most of my editing will be purple the first time. Sometimes I highlight a word. Sometimes it's a page or two...or three. I highlight plot holes, logic issues, even spelling mistakes. I make notes in the margin with my pen--mostly suggestions for what should be there instead. Occasionally, I jot down a helpful reminder to myself, like "draw out the tension, you twit!" or "But Vlad doesn't eat meat..." (okay, that one is actually from today) And once I go through the entire manuscript (which can take days or weeks or months) and it looks like a rainbow of "Wow...I suck", then I move on to...

Step Three: It's back to the computer. I pull up the manuscript file and go through the marks I've made on the physical draft, deleting all the pinks and, if I've noted with a pen how the yellows should be changed, I make those changes. If not, then I wait until the pinks are taken care of and the noted yellows are finished, then I brainstorm to try to correct the remaining yellows. (It's during this phase-and certainly throughout the dreaded purple phase-that my husband loathes the phrase "Pauly, could you come here for a minute?". I tend to use him as a sounding board and, at times, as a suggestion vending machine. Our minds run on the same wavelength, you see, so if he has an idea, I'll usually smack myself on the forehead and say, "I SO should have seen that!") Often, the key to finding out what works in those non-noted yellows and the purples is for me to read it outloud. Nine times out of ten, I can tell what it's missing just by speaking it outloud. How? Well, words have a certain natural flow and if what you hear when you read it outloud sounds less like a conversation (yay, fun!) and more like a lecture (boo, hiss!), then you know what needs to be fixed. How to fix it is another question.

Step Four: I repeat steps one through three. Then I print out a final copy of the manuscript to read through without a pen or highlighters anywhere near me. This time, I'm not looking for mistakes. This time, I'm reading it as a reader. This, generally, is my favorite part. I might find a few things that I'm not happy with and, once I've finished reading, I'll make those changes on the computer file, but I'm usually pretty happy with it by this round.

Step Five: I let my Critique Partner and readers have a go at it. They're brilliant and I love them for being honest. Once I hear back from them, I take the advice I agree with, leave out what I don't, and send it on to my fabulous agent.

And that's it. It sounds so simple, doesn't it? And yet, at times, it's driven me to doubtful tears. And, on more than one occasion, sent me into a fit of hysterics. I wish it felt as simple as it looked. I wish it were easy. But it's not.

The other stuff--recognizing plot troubles, identifying what's missing--has been largely instinctual for me. But the best thing that I ever did in order to learn just how to write, was to read. I devoured books, picking them apart and figuring out just what made this scene so good or that scene so terrible. If you want to be a good writer, the answer is pretty simple.

Read. And write.