Getting Edited, An Inside View by Marilyn Levinson

Sending a completed manuscript to my editor is always a joyful occasion. Finally, my novel is finished and after going over it three times, I know it's in pretty good shape. After writing twenty-three books, I'm attuned to the pacing, my characters' development, the complexities of the mystery, and other aspects of the plot. Still, I'm handing over the novel I've been working on for nearly a year. This action renders me completely vulnerable as, with open arms, I tell my editor "Have at it. Edit me, criticize and correct me so this book will appear before readers in its best possible form.

A month ago, I sent my editor Death On Dickens Island, the first book in my new series. Creating all new characters in a setting I'd invented required a good deal of work, much more than writing a second or any follow up novel in a series where everything is already established. I was used to being edited "lightly"-- asked to add a line or two to explain a character's action or to delete lines where I repeated myself -- but this book, which my editor and both wanted to get just right, required more.

She asked me to elaborate a bit regarding the impact my sleuth's short marriage had on her and why she'd left her son in her parents' care for twelve years. I was going to bring in my sleuth's best friend from high school in the next book, but my editor thought it best to bring her in earlier, and so I did. There was an issue regarding a legal matter I agreed it best to change, and to make a character a suspect, at least for a short time.

The problem that took the most time to correct was fixing the sequence of days. For some reason, while writing I lose track of the days of the week and I'd managed to skip a few. To resolve this problem, I ended up extending the time frame another week. But that was fine, and it gave me the opportunity to include my sleuth's outing with her old friend. I'm ashamed to admit that this is the second book I've written where I lost track of the days and had to rework them. My editor assured me that I'm not the only author to do this. At least I didn't change any character's name midbook as I've done once or twice in the past.

I addressed all the points my editor had questioned and felt needed attention, and they passed with flying colors. Now I await the Copy Editor's corrections, which center around comma usage and words I'm never certain if they're a compound word, two words, or hyphenated words. But that's some weeks off. Getting edited is a vital step in the process. It helps to assure that readers will receive my novel in its best possible form.