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Gold From My Editor
This might seem like really basic advice, and it is, and yet, sometimes it’s easy to forget.
In my revision letter my editor reminded me of something very important: I’m telling the hero and heroine’s story. That’s my objective. Not to tell a marriage of convenience story, or a royalty story, or pregnancy story. It’s about Max and Alison and their journey, their love. It’s that simple and that complicated.
As I got forth with my revisions, that’s what’s forefront in my mind. The characters, how they react to the situation and how they create the next scene, not how I mold them into the scene.
Merry Christmas To Me! (Revisions!)
So funny that I happened to do a post on revisions right before receiving a fresh new set of my own! I felt immediately compelled to come to my own web site for a reminder of why revisions are good. 🙂
Christmas Eve morning the revisions for my second submission to M&B landed in my inbox. Thankfully, my lovely editor is more than willing to talk with me, either through email or on the phone after the Christmas Holiday, so that was a major relief.
As I’ve mentioned, it’s definitely a good thing to let the revisions settle in for a bit before diving into them, but for me, that’s easier said than done. So, with my husband and kids still in bed, I drove across the street (head hanging out the window so I could see since I didn’t wait for my windows to defrost!) and went to my parent’s house for coffee.
And they, kindly, let me bounce inane idea after crazier idea off of them for the next hour or so. Then my mom and I baked pies and did the bulk of our Christmas prep work while I ran back and forth from the stove to my laptop taking down notes (if you can call my half-formed ramblings anything so sophisticated as ‘notes’)
I admit, I was feeling a bit panicky. Again, I agreed with the revisions and reservations my editor had, but there’s that moment where you have no idea how to fix it that feels a little bit like it might if you jumped out of plane and realized you weren’t quite sure where the ripcord for your shoot was. Yeah, a little bit like that.
But after a couple hours of baking, frantic emails to my crit group, more baking, and more general nail biting, I did start to have some ideas. And with ideas came a return of my sanity!
Christmas I really did manage to let it all go and just enjoy my kids opening their gifts (and I enjoyed the heck out of my gifts!) and today I was back to work. That old excitement is starting to return, along with all the second guessing and insecurity that seems to be so common to us author types!
It is exciting though to be going on this journey with a new MS. I know in the end it’s going to be better and those moments of panic as I rolled out pie crust will seem silly.
So I shall humbly continue to be your revision expert and commiserater. 🙂
More On Revisions (Since I’ve Done My Share)
I’ve been reading on blogs that a lot of people have gotten revision letters lately, or rejections with revision suggestions, and since the topic is so near and dear to me, I thought I’d offer up some more thoughts on the subject.
Yes, it can be daunting to stare down the barrel of a revision letter. And my natural tendency is to want to jump straight in and tackle the bad boy head on. When I received my letters though, my crit group advised me to read the letter and give the points a day or two to really set in, and I think that’s good advice. It allows you to get some emotional distance and gives you the chance to analyze it a bit.
My next step, after really going over that letter, is to line out what points in the revision letter need to be applied to what things in the MS. I make a list of what things I think need changing based on the letter.
Example: if my revision letters says I need to make sure I don’t let my hero slip back into the ‘all-American guy’ character I had established him as in an earlier draft, I write myself a note that’s somewhat nonsensical but gets the point across to me, something like: Check Marco’s dialogue, watch out for slips out of character. Cut diner scene?
You get the idea. Anyway, anything to do with either character would probably get grouped together, and anything to do with plot, pacing, etc, would each get their own group.
Then I would pick one thing at a time to work on, like Marco’s character. It helped me to break it up so it didn’t seem seem so huge. Once I was satisfied I had taken care of the character issues I could then move on to pacing or whatever else it was I needed to work on.
As for the emotional aspect of the revisions, my best advice on that is to take a deep breath and realize that they don’t give revisions if they don’t see huge potential. The ed didn’t look at your MS and see a disaster, she saw the places you were capable of taking it. She saw that it could go from good to great, and editors are trained to really wring the great out of you!
I was just thinking I’m actually kind of excited to get my revisions for the new MS I submitted. Working through the revisions for HVA made it a million times better and I can’t wait to see what wonderful thoughts my editor has for making the next one even better.
So there’s a positive spin to revisions, you just have to look to see it. It isn’t about what they didn’t like, it’s about what they DID like. It’s about elevating every aspect of the manuscript so that it matches your strengths.
Do you have a special system for tackling revisions?
The Party Rolls On…
So today was my party over on ihearts, yay so fun!! Thanks to all who came and visited, and are still visiting, and who come and visit me here!
And tomorrow they are posting my dear, darling Jilly’s (Gill C) winning MH chapter! I’m so excited to see it up and posted and to read it again. So, ihearts is definitely the place to be this week!
Save The Date!
On Monday Dec. 21st my full, official Call story will be posted on ihearts! So of course I’ll be haunting the site all day to make sure I respond to all the comments. 🙂 So please, come visit me!!
Maisey
Great Post On IC!
My dearest Jane Mulberry has put up a wonderful post with some great IC insight!
http://waitingforthecall.wordpress.com/
Maisey
Ever Changing Conflict
One of my dear CPs brought up a very interesting point yesterday as we were discussing the changes His Virgin Acquisition had to go through during revisions.
I was trying to explain how, during revisions and a half rewrite, the conflicts of the hero and heroine had changed. She said maybe the internal conflict had always been there, but certain things had shifted and brought it into the foreground. And I see exactly what she meant. The conflict was there, I simply had to emphasize elements that had already been alluded to in order to bring it out more.
In the first draft the conflict was mostly external, even though the H and h had their issues, but by the time I got to the rewrite of the last half I had decided to remove all the secondary characters cluttering up the end and focus on what inside of the hero and heroine would keep them apart. And that’s when I learned a lot more about them both!
For me, it was like a gradual uncovering, a peeling away of layers until I had simplified it and brought it down to what’s essential in a romance anyway: The hero and heroine. And then all that was between them was their fears and issues.
It’s been that way a bit with my WIP as I’ve been working on it. As I’ve gone they’ve really shown me which parts of their initial conflicts I came up with are even relevant, and that parts of their background I didn’t know were as important, were more defining to them than I’d initially realized.
What are your thoughts on the dreaded internal conflict/character development? Do you get your IC nailed during the plotting? Or is it a process?
Character and Building it
There’s been a lot of discussion over at http://jackieashenden.blogspot.com/ about characterization. One of the commenters suggested using astrology to help nail down a character, and that got me thinking of all kind of fun things a person might try…
The Myers-Briggs personality test…taken as your hero or heroine of course! Here’s a link: http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp After you score it, make sure you click on the link that will break down what the personality type means. (I’m ESFJ, for those who wanna know!!)
Also there’s the ‘temperament test’ http://www.oneishy.com/personality/personality_test.php (I’m Sanguine Choleric)
And a little Chinese Zodiac (I’d be the tiger!)http://www.chiff.com/home_life/holiday/chinese-zodiac.htm
Have fun!
Professionalism
I’ve often joked that the process of submission, rejection, revision, submission, revision…so forth…is like the world’s longest job interview. Your submission is your resume and the ensuing revisions and contact with the editor are like your interview.
Can you take direction? Do you meet deadlines? Are you easy to work with? Or are you a whiny, petulant artist who believes their work is perfect on arrival? The editor is going to get a sense for all of this via revisions and other contact.
Writing is a competitive business. And it is a business. We, the writer, need to make a product that the distributor can sell. That’s our job. Not only do we have to write something great, we need to do it their specifications, and, I believe, we need to be easy to work with.
Because talent is only a piece of it. It matters, trust me, but it isn’t the only thing.
Comp Results: The Saga Begins
Well, there’s an absolute controversy brewing on the ihearts site due to the fact that the winner and runner up for Presents Modern are published authors. Now, as Jane pointed out, if they are not currently on contract with HM&B this not a rule violation. I will say that upfront.
However, having had two friends who entered Presents chapters, I understand why people are upset about it.
So, I’m not going into the right or wrong or fair or unfair. What I will go into is this: You don’t need the contest.
The contest has given the winners an amazing opportunity to bypass the slush pile, which will save lots of time, trust me. But, as someone who didn’t do well in comps (to put it mildly) and who made it through slush to The Call, I can tell you, it happens. Just because you don’t place in a comp or get good comp feedback does not mean you don’t have talent.
People have said on ihearts that the winners of the Presents category didn’t NEED the contest. Well, no one NEEDS it. Not in any way minimizing what was won here, because trust me, getting an editor to work with you is huge. HUGE.
I got mine through slush. I needed more time to refine some things, but the editor saw the potential, even if it wasn’t all the way there yet. She helped me get there.
I emailed my editor to ask her if I could enter this contest because when it was announced I was not under contract, neither did I really think I would be any time soon, and she told me that I didn’t need the prize since I had an editor already. That made my week…month…let me tell you.
Success comes from these competitions, look at Lucy King and Lynn Raye Harris, and very soon, Gill Clegg :-). But success also comes from other places. This isn’t the end. For me, a ‘failed’ contest was the beginning.
Keep writing, friends. And submit, submit, submit.
Congrats to the Winners!!
Okay, I am bursting with absolute pride and joy, because my dear friend and critique partner Jilly, Gill Clegg on the iheartpresents site, has won the Modern Heat category of the Harlequin contest!!
Her chapter was truly amazing. I had the wonderful opportunity to read it before she hit send, and I can honestly say the feedback she got from the group on it was, ‘You’re brilliant. It’s brilliant, don’t change a thing!’
She’s a wonderful person, a wonderful writer, and my wonderful ‘sister.’ She spent lots of hours critiquing my writing and helping me get my own book in ‘up to publishable standard’ shape. I can’t wait until she gets The Call!
So, sorry for those who didn’t place, but, if it helps, I was in this exact same position the last two comps I entered. Not only did I not place, I did not receive personalized feedback. And it was tough. But, that wasn’t the end of my journey, it was the beginning. So get out there and sub sub sub!!!
Congrats again, Jilly! I love you much and I’m so happy!
Comp Announcement Tomorrow!
The Iheartpresents comp results are going to be announced tomorrow! Best of luck to all who entered!
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