Example of Editing feedback (Substantive Editing)
Example Feedback for a Sci-Fi Fantasy novel: ‘Imagine’
In the developmental/structural stage
There is a great deal to talk about with this book, but I want to start with all the good things, so you can hold onto them while reading. I know how hard it is to receive feedback and constructive criticism, and I will understand the urge to feel angry, upset or completely disillusioned with the feedback I give, but I want you to read all the good things first and know that this is a great piece of work, and one that with some more work, will be something quite incredible, and makes me feel very excited. I feel honoured to be here in the early days of its construction. (I say this unknowing how long you have worked on this, and how many others may or may not have seen it, so I hope that sentence does not exasperate you!) All my edits are optional, and suggestions, or what works for me – which is not you, and you might feel that in some instances I am wrong, and I have no problem with that, and would not be remotely offended by it.
So I will begin with:
What I liked about this novel, and your writing.
I sit here trying to think of one place to start as there is so much I liked. You have a particular flair for horror and dark scenes, which I love. You enable the reader to feel it, see it and connect with it. You suspend the sense of reality well, and keep the reader compelled to keep on reading. Collecting this story together, while keeping the reader intrigued and not giving it all away too soon, is no mean feat. I struggle to sit here and keep the entire thing in my head, without focusing on specific scenes. The high quality of your writing enables this. Never doubt your ability here.
Let’s move onto the next heading, as I have more good things to say here:
Character development:
What I like:
You develop Arthur well, and Ashleigh with him. I have a very clear picture of Arthur – having an Autistic son myself, I wondered if he might have this, although I think the trauma of his childhood (unrevealed until the end, but nicely hinted at in the middle) would also explain this controlled way of handling the world. Ashleigh works well with him, as she is almost like an opposite to him, enabling the reader to know him better, while showing us her character. I really liked Dan too, I could see him clearly, but I fell down a little when Sandy joined him.
What’s missing:
Being that Dan and Sandy are two significant characters in this story, who show us other things going on, on the flipside to Arthur and Ashleigh, their relationship with each other seemed lacking to me. I couldn’t connect with Sandy. When she arrived in the novel I wasn’t sure if it was just another snippet of another person experiencing what was going on, and with her being shot (or so I thought) I was happy with that. But then she was saved by Dan and they went into another imagined world – that whole section was confusing (as you will see in my track change notes). Neither in the car scene nor in the café during their conversation did I feel a connection between them that would warrant their later relationship. I felt that could be changed and given more depth: In the café/car - they could discuss who they thought the man was – which they didn’t do – and more about what they thought was going on. They could have questioned the lady about why everything in the café was free (also didn’t happen, but would have been logical, no?). They also could have flirted more too, maybe because Dan had saved Sandy, and/or because Dan had had little contact with women (spending time in his fantasy world), but it would have made their kissing in the corridor scene less out of the blue, and given future scenes of their feelings for each other, more depth and round Sandy off a little more.
And discussing the man (Arty) who had tried to kill Sandy and then killed that man on the roundabout, might have been a good place to give us clues as to why, in the Hotel Figment, they attacked Arthur and Ashley – maybe Sandy describing the man (Arty) in a way, which reflected what we knew of Arthur … although whether the reader would pick up on it would be hard. But don’t get me wrong, I liked this turn of events, it really turned this round. But these topics could be discussed in the café scene.
But now I am moving onto changes in the storyline. Let’s discuss this further.
Storyline:
What worked for me:
I love the whole ‘is this a dream or isn’t it’ sense to many of the pieces, mostly from Arthur’s perspective. I think you built this well. I liked the different snippets of what was happening to other people, to give us a broader view of this not just affecting one person. I like how you held on a lot to reveal at the end, about Ashleigh, about what had happened to Arthur – that worked well. I like Arthur being our constant and being inside his head. And the introduction of Dan slightly later after Arthur had been established as the key main character.
What didn’t work for me:
The development of Sandy and Dan as a couple, and really their point in this. We have Ashleigh being Arthur’s sister, but why Sandy and Dan? Were they just stronger than other people? Able to see out of the box? You could development more from Dan’s understanding in the space ship, where the other people didn’t know how they got there – show us how he makes sense of it, as he is jumping from one place to another seeming to know what to do, while for Arthur it was a slower process – and he had help from Sophie. Dipping in and out of Dan earlier on might help. Somehow establish a different way of writing Dan and Sandy’s pieces from the other snippets, to define them – even using Italics for the snippets, or a chapter heading to denote the separation.
Hardest thing when you are trying to hold THIS much in your head, is to try and see it through the readers eyes, and think about how the reader will read it. Are you saying enough? Are you saying too much? I totally get that you don’t want to give too much away, but always ask yourself: does this scene move the story along? Does this add to the story? By all means develop the characters through scene and dialogue interaction (I mean, how else would we do it?), but go back after and ask, does this add to the story or is it just me working out who these characters are?
Structure:
You told me you needed me to focus on the structure, and I can understand that, as there is SO much of this story. The biggest problem for me was the intermissions: I felt they broke the pace, broke the story, and detached the reader from the characters and story.
The first one I tolerated, because I understood that you were trying to give an overview of what was happening, but for me you could have used those events in snippets – maybe, smaller and smaller cameo’s of events, speeding up as it escalated – a dragon one would have been cool! You could also have a character event which encompasses this overview. There were a lot of horror, bloody scenes in the opening snippets; there was only one that covered a Unicorn. We (the reader) could have done with more fantasy based ones, even happy ones – which you only gave us a glimpse of in the second interval.
The second interval concerned me as I realised the first was not a one off. A note for myself read: Are these intermissions for the reader or for the author? Sometimes I wondered if you used them as a way to get the story overview in your mind. By this interval you had established Arthur/Ashleigh and Dan/Sandy, and we were following their story. The snippets had stopped, so introducing John I thought we had a new character joining us – but then he turned out to be a snippet. And you tried to give us an example of a positive snippet with the little girl that would have worked at the beginning of the novel, as would have John’s.
The third interval – in all honesty it made me want to stop reading. I did not understand why this was not shown through the characters eyes. (remember the old writing adage? Show, not tell?) And yet, when the good guys came streaming through the door to defend the characters, we saw them through their eyes. I also felt the balance was incorrect: great swathes (pages) of detail of all the bad guy creatures, but just a few paragraphs for the good guys. This imbalance also shows up in the snippets. It might be something to consider – not that I mind because I am a horror reader, and you write it very well!
The novel would work much better without the intermissions – don’t delete them, just remove them to another document, and then use the information differently. Add to the snippets, show pieces through the characters.
I see three defined stages to this book:
First third: Introducing Arthur, the stream of snippets, establishing the conflict – all the things going wrong.
Second third: Introducing Dan and Sandy – separately and then together, and their adventures – establishing this bad guy killing people. While we flick to Arthur and the introduction/development of Ashleigh and what is going on with them.
Last third: Brings them together in the Hotel Figment, and the bringing things to a head, ending with the reveal about how this all came about – ending with the epilogue.
What needs clarity:
I think we need an earlier interweaving of Arthur’s past – the event from his childhood (parents death), and the existence of a sister could have been put in earlier, or hinted at earlier.
I think we need more questions about the bad guy, and who is behind this, from all the characters. There is not enough ‘why’ in this story – you as the author might know, but the reader needs more glimpses of this, to keep them interested, to keep a point running through the story. A thread through the story is crucial – a question that keeps the reader engaged.
An opportunity missed, which I did discuss above, is the scene with Dan and Sandy both in the car and in the cafe. My personal notes said: Would we really see them make the connections this way? I think they would question the bad guy more. And why Dan was attacked by an Orc? And the other people in the space ship also not knowing what was going on … use those things to get to the conclusions they are drawing. When they talk in the car (after the café) about ‘they’ – people ‘doing this’, but there had been no discussion about an external force or power responsible up to that point. They had only just come up with the idea it is from their own imaginations. These would be perfect places to develop the story and give the reader more clarity.
Technical editing:
Now your writing is very ‘clean’, meaning in some sections there was little, if nothing, to edit, and the quality is not in question at all, but every now and then there were sections where I had to reword to make sense of some things. You will see in the track changes, but I have added a few things worth bearing in mind here, for future writing.
Word repetition, both in description and general narrative. I am a bit of a stickler for this, so those are highlighted. It’s tricky to see as a writer (like my overuse of the word ‘tricky’ ) For example: you used ‘obsequious’ three times to describe the same character.
Question all your ‘just’s, ‘only’s, ‘at least’s, and your ‘that’ and ‘which’s. Also filler words, like ‘sooner’ or emphasis words, including ‘instead’. You like to use ‘which’ and ‘of which’ a lot, so it’s worth becoming conscious of this when writing. Break long sentences too, to keep tension and raise the pace – this will also reduce your ‘and’s. Remember ‘and’ is more invisible than ‘then’. There was a lot of ‘nodding’ going on in a couple of sections. Need to change it up. These are the fiddly annoying bits of writing, trying to describe movement, while trying to get from one scene to another. Also watch overusing pronouns such as ‘his’, ‘her’, ‘he’, ‘she’, etc. in the same sentence/paragraph.
Don’t be afraid to use prepositions at the end of sentences, they are allowed. It is actually not grammatically incorrect. http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2011/11/grammar-myths-prepositions/ - it will also reduce you use of other words like ‘of which’ or ‘from which’, which were abundant. Also ‘which was’ could be taken out often, as it only pacifies the sentence.
Not often, but there was occasional headhopping – in the scenes with Dan and Sandy. (meaning jumping from inside one character’s head into another, either in the same paragraph or chapter). I have highlighted the few instances there were; they are easy to alter.
Using big words (or literary words) every now and then can throw the reader off and break tension in fast pace sections. There is not a significant amount of them in the novel, which makes them stand out more and easy to trip up on. It could also just be my lack of vocabulary ( ), but I have highlighted when I found them intrusive and recommended alternative, simpler words.
Marketing/Genre
You asked me about this too. Horror/Fantasy is where I would place this. The scenes are graphic and disturbing in most instances, and it is fantasy in the dream, other worldly, yet all in the head – but not – element. See, I can’t even describe it straight! LOL But I would definitely put it in that ‘box’, especially if looking for representation or pitching – if you plan to go that way.
I enjoyed reading Imagine, and I think you have a great novel here. When going through this novel, my biggest tip is: Remember your flash writing, only keep what is necessary. If you would like to have a chat about this, I am available on skype. You can PM me and we can set up a time. However many times you need. And thanks for giving me the opportunity to read/edit this for you.