My Editing Process

This week's writing work has been editing work. I'm in the process of editing two pieces for a friend. I'm not a professional editor; I just help out on projects for myself and a specific friend or two. So I sat down and thought about when I do editing work for other people. Here's an overview of MY typical process. 

General Feedback

I read the story - as a reader, mostly. I pay attention to my reactions as much as the story itself. What's my general feeling about this work? What questions did I ask or where was I confused? What do I want to know more about? How do I feel about the characters and their actions/decisions? How do I feel when I finish reading it? For this stage, I'll often just make a list of running commentary and thoughts about it, instead of marking up the story itself. This part's about asking questions, rather than making suggestions. Then it goes back to the author for rewrites and additions.

Story Editing

Once I get the next version back, I'll read again. As a writer, rather than as a reader. I'm looking for the same elements as before, to start with, but I'll look a little more closely at sentence structure and word choices and such. I mark any passages that didn't make sense to me, or that felt contradictory. I may look up a few words or concepts that are unfamiliar to me. I'll also fact-check dates and things like that. I try to listen for the way each character speaks for consistency of tone. They shouldn't all sound like the author, or like each other. Now I'm making suggestions for how things could be adjusted, but it's the author's call which suggestions they implement.

Copy Editing

This is the nitty-gritty part. This part is all about spelling and punctuation. I'm a bear for punctuation, and I love using that red pen all over the place. I will usually do this on the computer screen (probably multiple runs through), then print it out and read it on hardcopy to find anything I missed on-screen. I definitely see the words differently on hardcopy. I may read the hardcopies out loud for a second pass.

Of course, these aren't clear-cut separate processes, either. I'll combine steps when it feels right to do so, and go back if I realized I missed something. Frequently, I'll do the Story Editing and the Copy Editing together, depending on how 'together' the story is when I start it. Also because the copy-editing stuff bothers me while I'm doing the story editing.

The process also shifts a bit, depending on whether I'm looking at a friend's story that they are publishing, or I'm looking at a stranger's story in an anthology I'm actually an editor for. Of course, if I'm looking at my own work, I'm doing all three stages simultaneously with writing. It's messy, but it works for me.

I've edited two anthology projects now, so I've gotten a taste for the proof-reading step, as well. It's definitely it's own thing. My last project went through at least four printed proofs after all the editing was 'done'.

I hope that's an interesting glimpse into how the editing process works. If you'd like to see the end results of some of my writing and editing, I have two anthologies that have been published, and you can find them both at my Amazon Author Page - I have pieces in each as an author, and I edited both.