Message Board Topic 3/23

[Comsie]

Sometimes, when an author has gone through the long and often draining process of putting an entire story together from beginning to end...the only thing they have to look forward to is the almost 'painful' experience of editing that story down to bring out that special 'shine' they want it to have. So we go back and we fix what needs to be fixed. Tweaking little things as we go along.

 

Now spelling and mechanics can be considered the 'easy part', I guess. But then comes the story itself. Maybe an author thinks some dialogue could have been better, or a character could use more depth, or a certain situation could really benefit from some more detail. That's where some of the real magic happens for a lot of writers. Giving it that glossy appearance that will give the readers what they expect. But...is it possible to just plain overdo it on the editing side?

 

Can an author get so wrapped up in perfecting their story that they lose the original heart of the story and drown it in corrections and amendments that maybe don't belong there? How far should a writer go before they see their story getting weighed down by the extra work? How far can you go before you lose your natural instincts and end up killing the story that you worked so hard on? Let us know your thoughts!

[Graeme]

It's definitely possible to over edit a story. Some people edit more than others, and for a handful, they keep editing and never publish because there's always another tweak they can do.

 

I've got no suggestions on how to avoid this, though, because it's not something I do. I write, maybe review a handful of times, and then hand it to my editor. I won't make tweaks after that point unless my editor indicates there's a problem with the story that needs addressing.

[StoriesByCirrus]

The short answer I think is "instinct". This is one of the places where the "art" aspect of writing comes in, where you have to make subjective decisions about whether something needs editing, and whether its been edited enough. Sometimes the potential audience is a influential factor. When writing stories for Comicality's library, I assume my readers will prefer chapters to be "finished" rather than "perfect". I'm writing a story for a contest at the moment, and that one I do desperately want to be as perfect as I can get it. In that situation, editing is a nice escape route. I can bulldoze my way through the story itself, even if I'm not completely satisfied with the way its going at the time, knowing that if I finish it quickly, I'll have lots of time to buff it and polish it to a high sheen. Sometimes stories are easier to manipulate once they've been committed to the page, instead of existing solely in your head.