Editing one’s own work is acknowledged as being the most difficult task of all. We have become close to what we’ve written, slaved over it, worried it almost to death, and it seems there’s nothing more we can do. Some writers trot off this draft to a professional assessment service (most will be urged to revise), or go directly to a publisher (one in about four thousand will receive an offer of publication). For the rest of us it’s back to the hard slog.

Don’t attempt to edit your work immediately. The longer you leave it, the better your editing will be. Allow family members to read your work, for the more critics you have, the more quickly discrepancies will come to the surface. But find someone outside family to take an unbiased look at your work. In this respect, writer’s groups can sometimes be helpful.

AI tools can be very useful, but they are not foolproof. I tend to find that they have a strong American bias. No matter how many times I set my language in Microsoft Word documents or tell ChatGPT or Bing to use British Australian English spelling, punctuation, grammar and cultural wording, it seems to frequently forget this. I am an advocate for using a real human editor, such as myself, multiple rounds of self-editing and AI tools. Most publishers will do the same. The more checks that can be done, the less errors will remain in your work.

Look for these common faults and try to eliminate them.

Too many adjectives and adverbs. (The writing is flowery.) Too many relative pronouns. (The writing is laboured.) Ask yourself: can I do without this adjective, this adverb, this pronoun?

Have I avoided authorial intrusion in a fiction?

Lack of variation in sentence structure. A long, complex sentence should be followed by a short, simple sentence.

Check that sentences are not linked with a comma, when a conjunction or semi-colon would be appropriate, or when it would be better to stop, and start again with a new sentence.

Then ask yourself these questions:

• Is the title attention-grabbing? Could I find a more relevant one?
• Have I brought the reader quickly enough to the main action or theme of my story?
• Have I tried to show instead of just telling?
• Have I given too many little details? Have I repeated information for no apparent reason? (Note: There are times when it is necessary to seed in certain information more than once if that detail is vital to plot outcomes. A reader may set a book aside for a time, and forget some pertinent clue, such as a narrative ‘hook’.)
• Have I made sufficient use of dialogue? Have I ‘tested’ the dialogue by reading it aloud?
• And have I applied good practices in syntax and usage as set out in this book?

‘It is perfectly okay to write garbage —
as long as you edit brilliantly.’

—C.J. Cherryb

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