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Forest Brothers

The perils of many edits

Well, I have finished the run through of the editorial comments made by my prospective publisher for Forest Brothers and – yup, she was right in 99% of cases! There is a serious problem when you edit your own work. You know the story. The action and dialogue has come from your mind, and it is to your mind you return to check it for errors.

After a while you can get blind to some mistakes. Technology can help you with spellcheck and some structure, but not always. Even now, some wayward commas and quotation marks were found in the returned manuscript. God knows what version this one is.

The secret is to do many edits using different methods. I always start by hand-writing my stories. The typing up is the first edit. the read-through is the second. There then should follow a reading out loud to yourself. Don’t be shy! It shows up how breathless your prose may or may not be for one thing.

I found transferring the prose to an e-reader helped also, the presentation on the screen seemed to make it slightly different.

Finally, if you belong to a forum or a Writers club that is healthy enough to give out constructive crit, use it. (and repay the complement to others) Third party feedback is essential.

Onwards and upwards

By Geraint Roberts

Stuck in a limbo and desperate to do something meaningful, what to do? That is where writing began for me. A creative way of expressing myself and a chance to harness my wondering imagination. I close my eyes and I'm there. Wish I'd picked 'there' as a warm sunny day on a sandy beach, with the waves gently lapping on the shore...but I have to let the story load in my mind, then watch it unfold, wherever it may be. Currently I'm on a windy bridge, or a Devon beach, or a Cornish ti mine, or a submarine, or looking towards a Hebridean port...

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