10 Editing Hacks for Non-fiction Writers – Part 2: It’s All In the Detail
Is it possible to edit your own work if ‘attention to detial detail’ ain’t your thing?
Yes! It’s all a question of using the right tools…
(another’s work) – and your own!
Editing is writing
The bestselling author Holly Bourne recently posted a photograph of the complete first draft of her new novel on Instagram. A cause for celebration? No. A confession of ‘shame and disappointment’. In the photo, Holly’s manuscript appears to be bleeding; covered with her own edits and rewrites, barely a sentence has been left untouched by vivid red ink.
I was struck by Holly’s account of the complex emotions she feels every time she embarks on this essential part of her work. In the caption, she reveals that she is always embarrassed to discover that she hasn’t ‘magically become a genius who can bash out flawless first drafts’ and that she finds the process of interrogating her writing to be painful and humbling, no matter how many times she does it.
But here’s the thing: Holly has come to understand – as all good writers must – that self-editing isn’t an optional, supplementary stage of writing. It is writing. It is in the edits, in stripping away all that is superfluous, self-indulgent or unclear, that truth begins to emerge.
The Repair Shop
In the first part of this blog, we looked at five strategies to help non-fiction writers tackle ‘big picture’ issues around content and structure. As promised, we’re back today to look at the more detailed, intricate stage of editing. Having ripped your work apart at the seams and then roughly tacked the remaining pieces back together, it’s now time to go back in to repair the damage with a more delicate hand. A sharp needle, some fine embroidery thread and one of those magnifying eye-glass thingies are our (imaginary) tools for this stage of the work. Precision, accuracy and style are our watchwords.
Before you begin, step away from the manuscript if you can. Your brain will be buzzing with all those big ideas you just bullied into submission, and you will now need to adjust your focus – squint, if you will* – in order to consider your work in more granular detail. A short break will give your mind, and your eyes, some much-needed respite.
Right. Rested and raring to go? Here are five more practical, easy-to-follow tips and resources for editing your own work, including a few nifty cheats and short-cuts (let’s call them ‘creative workarounds’, shall we?) which I sincerely hope will make this all feel a bit less daunting.
*Not literally. Editing is hard enough on the eyes as it is.
6. Spelling is fun!
I before E except after C? Who knows?! The English language is baffling, even to those who profess to know what they’re doing. So there’s no shame in making use of every (reputable) resource you can, from the basic spell-check function on your computer to more sophisticated tools like Grammarly. Grammarly’s free plan is pretty intuitive and reliable, especially when it comes to highlighting wordy sentences and redundant phrasing. Do be aware that it defaults to American-English – you can change it to British-English, should you wish to, in the settings.
The trick with any of these programmes is to avoid slipping into autopilot and blindly accepting every suggested correction. As clever as these bits of software might be, remember that they are not actually ‘reading’ your writing for sense. (Case in point: Grammarly is desperate for me to change ‘in consistency’ to ‘inconsistency’ in the next section, which of course wouldn’t be right in the context of the sentence.) So, always double-check how the sentence reads with the change in place – if it doesn't feel right, even if you’re not sure why, then check with another source. If you still can’t figure out what to do, seek an alternative way of saying the same thing!
I recommend running a spell-check of some description more than once as you work on the manuscript – perhaps once at the beginning of this stage of editing, and once right before you finalise the piece.
Here’s a useful list of Grammarly alternatives.
7. Consistency is key
Most editors are pragmatists at heart. I might have been taught to follow a certain style, but I'm generally more interested in consistency within a document (see?) than I am in slavishly following strict style guides. It's fine if you’re wedded to an Oxford comma (she said through gritted teeth) but make sure you apply them consistently throughout your document. Don’t switch back and forth between realize and realise, or have someone real-ize that they need to organ-ise something. If you’ve used a comma in 3,000 on page 2, don’t switch to 3000 on page 56.
In short: pick a style and stick to it. Make a note of your decisions and then be strict about following your own rules.
(Of course, if you’re writing for someone who does have a strict house style, you’ll most likely have to like it or lump it.)
8. Go with the flow
When we talk about good writing, we often talk about ‘flow’. We all want our writing to flow beautifully, like a flowy river flowing serenely to the sea. But a preoccupation with ‘flow’ can sometimes result in overworked sentences that are polished to within an inch of their life, with no hard edges for the reader to bump into. Pleasant, but perhaps lacking a little je ne sais quoi. Sometimes, hard edges can be a very handy way of snagging a reader’s attention.
Try to think about flow in terms of rhythm – or a river that might meander gently in some parts but gush violently in others. There’s a much-cited quote by the writer Gary Provost that you may be familiar with, in which he contrasts a paragraph made up entirely of five-word sentences with one comprised of sentences of various lengths and complexity. It’s immediately apparent which is the more engaging. (You can read the full quote here.) As you’re considering your work on a sentence level, try to ensure that you have a good mixture of short, staccato sentences in among your wordier, more extravagant offerings. OK? Good.
And a word of warning: if you’ve used a thesaurus to help broaden your vocabulary or avoid repetition (and there’s nothing wrong with that), keep an eye out when editing for any words that are over-elaborate and muddle your meaning. If you had to look a word up in the dictionary, chances are you reader might too.
9. Repetition, repetition, repetition…
Spotting repetition in your own writing can be hard, so here's a game-changing hack I just discovered: you can paste your writing into a free word-cloud generator to see which words you use the most.
Inevitably, the cloud will highlight words that you can’t help but repeat, like ‘and’ and ‘said’, but take some time to look more closely and see if there’s anything notable that you’re perhaps guilty of overusing. Make a list, then use Ctrl-F to check the document itself and make adjustments where necessary, looking in particular for instances where the word is used more than once in close proximity.
I particularly like this one, which also produces an itemised list of words with the number of times they’re used. In this piece, I’ve used the word ‘writing’ 12 times and the word ‘editing’ 6 times. Not surprising, perhaps, but a helpful prompt to go check how and where I’ve used both words.
10. Double-check, then check again
Accuracy is vital, so make sure to double-check any data in your text – dates, figures, etc. – as well as any unusual spellings. Make sure you have used the correct accents on foreign words and be scrupulous in confirming their spelling.
Where possible, go back to your original sources and check you didn’t introduce any errors when incorporating research into your document. If you can, check your facts with multiple reputable sources – don’t just rely on Wikipedia – and ensure everything is properly referenced.
If you are writing about current events, it’s always worth checking the latest best practice for the spelling and styling of foreign names or complex acronyms. The Guardian’s style guide is a useful starting point – Kyiv, not Kiev, for example.
If you are unsure about the correct language to use when describing race, gender, sexuality or disability – or indeed, if you are unsure about how language has evolved and are worried about ‘saying the wrong thing’ – then it is always best to look to organisations which represent and champion those groups for the preferred terminology. Take your lead from the communities you are writing about. Don't just wing it.
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When you have polished your work to the point where you’re really happy with it, try – as hard as you can – not to tinker with it. And if you can’t resist, be aware that a change in one paragraph can have consequences elsewhere, so read through the document (or the relevant section, if that’s not practical) to ensure you’ve not inadvertently introduced an inconsistency or formatting mishap. Maybe run the spell-check one last time…?
And then… let it go. The hardest part. And perhaps the subject for another blog, one day.
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