Developmental Edits and Perspective

Developmental Edits

One of the first things I do when I receive developmental edits from my editor is read them through, then set them aside.

You see, developmental edits are different from the line edits or copy edits. They come from a different perspective and address the larger scope of my manuscript. My editor is incredibly thorough about looking at my main character(s) (MCs) and my key supporting characters (SCs), making notes on how they develop through the course of my story and giving suggestions for where they could be developed more or potentially, where things might have been overstated.  She also does a thorough overview of my plot, pointing out any potential holes and alerting me to places where something might not have come through clearly. My beta readers do a great job of finding the places in my story with awkward plot development, so my editor usually only has minor notes on those.

Best of all, she clearly points out places for improvement and provides suggestions for what she means, but she never tells me HOW to fix it. She leaves it up to me, as the writer, to take her comments and fly with them. I never feel as if my manuscript has been hijacked or that she didn't "get" my story.

With such a positive working relationship with my editor, is it any wonder that I can receive those developmental edits in a calm manner? (Okay, confession: I get the email and *squee*, read through them the first time with big blinky eyes and nod wisely, THEN put them aside to let the concepts percolate.)

And then I step away from the technology and print them out.

Developmental Edits

Yup. I save them for the plane ride or the quiet hour at Barnes & Noble. Trusty sticky notes and pen in hand, I go through them again and start making notes, brainstorming and doodling. The doodling part is important for the creative process, trust me.

I decide how I'm going to tweak the plot. Maybe I'll insert a scene or two to strengthen the development of a particular character, go into a bit more backstory to give the reader insight. Or maybe I'll go through an existing scene and run an undercurrent of tension through it to build up to a later plot reveal. Maybe I'll rewrite a scene altogether because it's just plain blah and didn't work. >_<

Regardless, this part of my process is risky. What if I forget my Important Folder somewhere? Lost it? Spill water all over it? OMG. So, I'm very eager to incorporate those notes in a revision round. Thus, I get to my revisions with a fire under my butt in order to have them safely worked into my story while they're fresh in my head and still in hand.

Insane? Probably. Effective? For me, definitely.