As many of you know, I am now working as an editor for a small publishing house. I am loving this job more than agenting, more than consulting, I really enjoy it. One thing I find, though, is that there are some pieces of advice I seem to give over and over. I thought that I’d make a page, and add to it later, if necessary, with suggestions I commonly make. I can point writers here and hopefully they will understand. So, if you have questions, let me know and I’ll make things clear. I know the list will grow.

Formatting

First of all, I want to talk about formatting your manuscript. And no, I don’t mean .02368 in margin detail. These things I see over and over again. And it’s not a problem that they exist, but you, the author, should know how to do these things in your future manuscripts, because they exist to make your life easier. (Most of my authors write in Word or a comp program, and I edit in Word, so this the method I’m using to explain.)

Another thing you don’t want to do manually is enter your header/footer or page numbers. I add my header to the top right with my title/last name, and I put the page numbers on the bottom right.

A few odd notes for your manuscript:

1|Spell out numbers under 100.

2| If you are writing a.m. or p.m. you must use a numeral

3| Inner dialogue (direct thoughts), dreams, visions, things the character reads (basically, anything that happens in the character’s head), or the character speaking directly to the reader, all go in italics.

4| This one is very important, and I see it done wrong on many occasions. The speaker of a piece of dialogue MUST be the subject of the dialogue OR action tag that follows it.

Each line of dialogue above has either a dialogue tag (Denotes who’s speaking with “said” or “asked.”), or an action tag (also denotes the speaker but gives an action rather than assign the speaker only). For an in-depth look at tags, click here. Make sure each speaker has their own line to respond. Never have two characters speaking in the same paragraph.

Craft

My writing advice, having done this a few times now, is to make something similar to an outline first. I call it a “sceneology.” I decide what “scenes” I want in the book and list them in order of how I want them to occur. It can be as simple as “She wrecks the car and meets Tim,” to a fully fleshed out concept with details. I write each “scene” descriptor on an index card and put them in a ring together. (You can get ringed note cards already made at the office supply store.) You can take out things and add or reorder your cards as often as you want. And then, when I know I have a good story with rising action, and a climax, and no plot holes, I sit down and flip to the first card, then write that scene. When it’s done, I flip to the next card and write that scene, and so on. It’s so much easier to write and to get creative when you don’t have to think of the plot. You know it’s all ready, you just have to write out your scenes. This helps me so much. I encourage you to try it. Just tell yourself, today I am going to plot, and make some note cards. When it gets down to the writing and you have a whole ring of scenes to write, you just tell yourself, today I write one scene…

Here’s my advice on chapter hooks: Each chapter is often seen as a scene. When you start the book, you want to start in action. Say a scene has four parts: 1-the beginning, 2-the action starts, 3-climax, 4- resolution. When you start a book, you start at number 2. Most authors finish that scene with 3 and 4, and then end the chapter at that natural breaking point. BUT I say then, instead of quitting, you begin the next scene, and just when it gets interesting–BAM!–end the chapter. The reader, already invested in that scene, cannot stop reading, because they need to know what happens. See, people have a need to finish the chapter before they stop reading, but they have an equally strong need to finish the scene before they stop. So, they say, “I’ll stop at the end of this chapter,” but then they can’t. When that scene finally ends, they are well into the next chapter, and they can’t stop. They say, “Okay at the NEXT chapter I’ll stop.” But as long as you keep on writing 2, 3, 4, 1, they can’t put the book down. You don’t even have to write chapter hooks because the reader can’t stop themselves from continuing.

My latest books all have the reviewers saying, “I couldn’t put it down…” And that is why. That’s the ultimate compliment to an author: “I read till 2am!” So, resist that desire to end the scene and the chapter in the same place. :^D

When writing character actions, this comes up often. A head “shake” is from side to side, generally a “no” answer. A “nod” is up and down and denotes a “yes” answer. Some authors will say that a character “shakes” their head in a yes answer. Or that they “nod” their head from side to side. In my head, I see a person touching their left ear to left shoulder and then right ear to right shoulder and back again. It’s comical, but I know that isn’t the intention. So go with “shakes their head” for no, or “nods” for yes.

You may find in your writing that you include “begins to” when a character does something, and that only works if someone is supposed to begin an action that will be stopped in the middle. Otherwise, just make them DO the activity. He doesn’t begin to drive off. He drives off.

You may or may not have heard of “Chekov’s Gun” theory. It states that if there is a gun on the mantle in act one, it had better go off by act three. Meaning, do not add exciting or threatening things to the story, just for the shock value. If you put a gun in there, it had better be because someone is going to use it. Don’t introduce characters in the beginning that will have no bearing on the story from the first chapter on. They don’t have to appear again, but there must be a lasting reason why they were important enough to be there. Maybe they light a fire in the protagonist, which is what carries them throughout the story or begins their journey in some way.

I admit I am hardest on the first few pages. I often tell my authors, do not be dismayed by the amount of comments on the first few pages, the rest of the manuscript generally has fewer comments. Those first pages are the most important in your book. You don’t want to lose a reader at any time, but if you lose them at the beginning, they never even get started. But if you get a chance to look over these suggestions and make fixes to your own manuscript before having it edited, all the better.

Dashes do NOT have a space between words–in fact, just hit the dash twice and keep going.

If you’ve been a writer for more than five minutes, you’ve heard the phrase, “Show, don’t tell.” This one simply means that you never want to TELL the reader how the character feels but show them. For example, you wouldn’t say, “She felt terrified.” Instead, you would use words that describe that fear, that tell us how that fear is affecting the character.

i.e. “Sweat beaded along her hairline and the back of her neck prickled like a hundred tiny needles in her skin, the acid in her stomach crawled up her throat and her whole body trembled in fear.”

Anytime you find yourself telling the reader about something, stop and ask yourself if this could be described more specifically. That goes for situations as well. Rather than saying the room was “dark and cold,” this is where your writing chops come into play.

You might say, “She couldn’t see anything in the inky shadows, merely ominous shapes looming around her. The temperature caused her fingertips to numb, and the shells of her ears tingled with early frostbite. She blew on her hands to warm them, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the darkness.”