Posted: June 25, 2024
Editing your own work is something that all authors should do but shouldn’t be all they rely on. Going to a professional is often essential for success—especially for those who think they don’t need one.
It’s a bit of a difficult situation. Not all authors can afford an editor, so what can they do? Quality is a balance of time and money. If you don’t have a lot of time to put int your book, you need to spend a lot more money on editors. If you want to save on money, you’ll have to be prepared for a long hard slog.
Even if you’re going to hire a professional, the more time you put into editing it and ironing out the kinks, the less time an editor will need to work on it—the less money you have to spend, and fewer mistakes your editor might miss (editors are human too).
So what’s the most efficient way to edit?
I’ve mentioned this before in my article about the Best Order to Edit Your Book, but it’s an important thing to know. Editing comes in two stages: content editing and technical editing. While catching typos is all well and good, it’s inefficient to fix spelling and grammar mistakes if you end up having to rewrite sections of the story afterwards.
Start with making sure the story is the best it can be, and everything is consistent. Then you can worry about the finer details.
If you’re a Plotter, you may have everything already written down. You may be a writer who just has everything in your head and don’t think you need to write it down. Whatever works best for you.
Personally, I recommend going through your story once more and writing down anything of note that needs to come back later. Is there a key scene that’s brought up again? Is a character briefly mentioned that comes up later? I’ve seen some authors who accidentally change the appearance of their characters halfway through. (One time, the main character’s car kept changing make and model—and it wasn’t part of the story!) Ensure that you don’t make mistakes like this.
Inconsistencies—whether big story-related ones or smaller details—take your reader out of the story. However you choose to ensure they’ve been taken care of, make sure you do it.
Find free beta readers (preferably within your target audience) to give you feedback on your work. You won’t be able to please everyone, but oftentimes, you’ll get more than one person pointing out the same thing; when that happens, you know it’s something you should revise.
Finding betas can sometimes be a struggle. Try joining an in-person or online writing group. There are groups on social media platforms (like Facebook) made specifically for finding free beta readers. If you don’t think you can trust random people on social media, there are dedicated beta reading websites as well—most require you to beta read other people’s work before you can get your own done (to build credit).
It’s hard for authors to recognize which words they have trouble with, but there are some things you can do. As you’re going through your manuscript, keep in mind which dictionary you want to use—American spelling, British spelling, Canadian spelling? There are online lists of the words that are spelt differently. A great strategy is to search your manuscript for these words; once you find one, add it to a list in a separate document to remind yourself which ones have been used in your story.
You can also make a list for character names, locations, and other proper nouns in the book. It’s great for keeping track of things, especially if you have a lot of characters. Ensure that no two characters have the same name unless it’s intentional.
This function has been an absolute Godsend for me as an editor. Not only can you use it to find misspelled words, but you can also use it to check for repetition in your story (how many times do you start a sentence with the word “he” or “she”?). You can use it for filtering out unnecessary spaces (double spaces or spaces at the start or end of a paragraph) and turning primes ("straight quotes") into proper quotation marks (“curly quotes”).
There is a function in most word processing applications to read a document aloud for you, but another tip is just for you to read it aloud to yourself.
The Read Aloud function can help you catch misspelled or incorrect words, but reading it yourself adds tone and rhythm to the story. This will help you hear when the story doesn’t flow the way it should.
Seeing text on a screen is completely different from seeing the written word on a printed page. While this tip isn’t the most time-saving, it can save you time in the long run.
Not only should you edit the story separately from editing the grammar and punctuation, you should also split up technical editing. Do not try to fix everything at once.
The first time you read through your document, focus only on the punctuation. Make sure you understand how to use each and every type of punctuation (it never hurts to refresh your memory!).
The second time through, you can focus on spelling.
The third, consider the sentences. Are they all the same length? Do a lot of them start with the same word(s)? Are they all the same type of sentence (basic, compound, complex)? Variety can help exponentially with your manuscript’s flow.
And finally, read through your document with language in mind. What kinds of words are you using? Does the narrative have a focus on any one thing? How does your word choice translate into the voice of your narrator? This type of editing (line editing) can sometimes be the most complex step, so don’t worry about getting it perfect. Take care and be diligent, but don’t run yourself ragged.
At this point, you’re probably tired of reading your book. Most authors tend to read it upwards of a hundred times before it’s ready for publication, and unless it’s a true thing of beauty, a hundred times of the same thing can get old.
To counteract overstressing or burning yourself out, make sure to take reasonable breaks now and again. When I’m copyediting, I never work on the same book for more than three hours in a row, and even then, I take five-minute breaks now and again. When editing the story, I try to keep the blocks to one hour at most.
Part of editing is finding an editor you can trust to make sure your manuscript is perfect before you publish. As the saying goes “You get what you pay for” so if you see someone advertising cheap editing, you’re going to get cheap editing.
Not to say that you should spend an arm and a leg for an editor. Cheap and affordable are two different things. Make sure to get a sample edit first (typically these are free) and check out other books that editor has worked on. If you have other author friends, ask them who they worked with and who they recommend.
Self Editing and Why You Should Do It
How to Get the Most out of Self Editing
The Best Order to Edit Your Book
10 Tips for New Self-Publishers
10 Tips for Copyediting Your Own Work
Punctuation: The Period
Tigerpetal Press is a small book press dedicated to publishing local authors and poets.