Tuesday, January 16, 2007

My Second Round



So I had a phone meeting today with my editor at Scholastic. I hate to call it a 'meeting' because we always wind up chatting about random other stuff, but it was also business, so I guess that's what to call it.

She is sending my MS back across the pond with more edits, and I really appreciate this because from what I understand having an editor being so thorough is a really special thing. It's so interesting really. You would think it would be the opposite, like you would feel that there was nothing good about your work because they keep having something to say about it. But the fact that she wants to put this much work into my little book, well that is a huge compliment.

It's not always easy to come face to face with edits, but knowing how much she cares about the project does make the medicine go down a bit easier.

Now I just have to wait for the manuscript to appear on this side of the Atlantic. And then to edit.

That is so long as I can read her notes, written, she mentioned to me, in pencil.

6 comments:

ORION said...

I am going through this same thing. What I love about my editor is that she always puts notes on what she especially loves! It also helps me to edit my other manuscripts.

Talia said...

Even when there are changes I still think it's exciting to be on the journey to being published. Of course it helps if you can see the sense in the editing comments.

Good luck

Ghost Girl (aka, Mary Ann) said...

How exciting! It really is wonderful to have a thorough editor, as long as her edits makes sense! I would definitely take it as a compliment that she is working so hard to get your manuscript shining. I'm still waiting for editorial requests on my Cricket article. (BTW--thanks for your kind words about my picture!)

Happy Editing!

J m mcdermott said...

My editor uses comments in Microsoft Word's "Track Changes" feature. Then, I can run down the side.

Biggest complement, to me: large swathes of twenty, thirty, or forty pages with no little boxes on the right margin.

I recommend suggesting the track changes feature in the future with other editors (if they can stand the computer screen read). E-mail is quick. Comment boxes always have excellent, legible handwriting.

Tia Nevitt said...

j m mcdermott:

That makes it so easy, doesn't it? Congratulations on finding an efficient, tech-saavy agent!

Adrienne said...

Wow, jmm, that is definitely a big step from my editor's pencil method. Sounds really cool actually and quite similar to what my parents do when they edit my stuff.

Yes my parents edit my stuff before I send it off to my editor. But they do really know what they are doing. They are awesome.