It has been a fascinating process. We have 10 other
authors (I make up the 11th) in this anthology. Some of them I know
well and have made comments on their stories in the past, others I know but
have not had reason to pass them comments, and some are totally new to me. Everyone
had their foibles – one might have double spaces after full stops, another
might have mixed up character names (I suspect they changed their character’s
name part way through), another might need help with commas, another might have
a number of repeat words, or long paragraphs and so on. Some authors made way
more changes than I asked for, some just made the specific changes I wanted.
Each one was different – I hadn’t expected them to
be that different.
However, what was the most fun was doing the
content edit, eg, looking at the plot and suggesting changes, particularly as
sci-fi is my favourite genre as a reader and viewer. I will give you an example
of a hole in the plot from my own story The Sonic Dilda’tor – I noticed
I had indicated early on in the story that the heroine (an alien from a very
sensual planet) needed the semen from her partner in order to orgasm. But later
in the story I had her climaxing after using the said dilda’tor! Oh dear. How
did I get around that one? Hmm. You’ll have to read it to see. (I also
discovered I had her opening her legs and using it on her genitals so added a
link to indicate she was commando underneath her dress!).
For the others it was clarifying the relationships,
the locations and the world building, eg, the physical and sexual characteristics
of their characters (particularly if they have aliens in their story), how
technical things work in their futuristic world, how aliens and humans
communicate with each other, etc.
What I will say is that the authors all made my
work easy as they were very well written in the first place (admittedly I
rejected those that were not so well written). I tried to edit the way I like
to be edited: edits suggested not demanded; other than punctuation and spelling
errors, not making any changes directly into the manuscript without
consultation; and stating what worked well as what didn’t otherwise it feels
like you are bashing the author over the head and the email from the editor
becomes something from which you recoil!
What I also didn’t expect was to feel a sense of
connection, almost ownership, with these stories even though I didn’t conceive
or write them and wonder if the people who have edited my stories in the past have felt the same way?
If I’ve learnt anything, though, it’s that I’m a
perfectionist and control freak wanting to make every last repeat word not
repeated and so on (actually, I did know this before but it cemented it!) but I
hope the authors enjoyed the process (some have commented that they think I’m a
great editor *aww, blush*) and I want to thank each and every one for
their efforts.
The anthology will be published on 10 NOVEMBER!
The anthology will be published on 10 NOVEMBER!
I found the process ridiculously painless, so I thank you for that. Looking forward to the anthology (makes note on calendar)
ReplyDelete