Writing

Freelance Editing: What You’re Actually Paying For

KWhipkey 1 Comment

The following is a guest post by fellow freelance editor Cait Spivey. Cait contacted me after my post on what it takes to be an editor, asking for my input on the topic below. Realizing how important her subject really is, I asked her to come and share it with all of you. So, without further ado, I’ll turn you over to Cait and her fantastic post on what you’re actually paying for when you hire a freelance editor.

Take it away, Cait!

 

Freelance Editing: What You’re Actually Paying For

 

By Cait Spivey

 
With self-publishing on the rise, more and more freelance editors are offering their services. Along with this increase, the internet has provided plenty of articles on how to find a good freelance editor, why you need one, why you don’t need one, what to do if things go badly, etc.

In the comments on those articles, there’s almost always someone who asks why freelance editors charge so much. Many editors charge a flat rate per word or page–for example, Bear and Black Dog, my company, charges $6/pg for a single editor working on a full manuscript edit. It can add up quickly, and writers often balk at the $1500+ price tag. (The Editorial Freelancer’s Association has a page detailing average rates for various levels of service, emphasizing that these are a rough guideline.)

That’s fair — it’s quite a bit of money. In having this discussion, though, I’m reminded of graphics that make the round of the internet from time to time with headers like:
 

PHOTOGRAPHERS
What you think you’re paying for v. What you’re actually paying for

 
You’ve seen them. They typically have two columns. The one on the left has one line with the bare minimum of the job (whether photographer, event musician, etc) and the one on the right goes into more detail.

I figured it was about time we went into a little more detail about why freelance editors charge what they charge, so I put my head together with some of my editor friends and came up with this list.
 

What you think you’re paying for:

 
Someone to read your manuscript and provide feedback
 

What you’re actually paying for:

 

Time spent on the manuscript itself

 
Yes, we do read your manuscript and provide feedback, but it’s not as simple as all that. As Kisa Whipkey, freelancer and Editorial Director at REUTS Publications, said in her post What it Takes to be an Editor: it’s not just about fixing grammar. Nor is it just providing reactions to the story, the way a beta reader does.

An editor’s job is to see the story both as a series of components and as a whole organism. We’re basically mad scientists, optimizing the whole by tinkering with the parts. This requires hours of reading, and re-reading, and absorbing, and experimenting. And it is all on a case-by-case basis. Yes, there are problems we see a lot and we do have skeleton solutions ready — but we fill those in with your characters, your story, your world, your goals.

As my business partner Ash says: “How long did you spend writing your book? How easy do you think it is to take that work apart and improve it?”

Every editing project has its own challenges, and the kind of dedicated, personal attention good editors provide takes time, often quite a lot. It can also be as draining as writing a book. Editing is neither robotic nor formulaic.
 

Time spent on you

 
We know some comments can be hard to hear. Believe me, we are incredibly aware. Most editors are interested in helping writers improve, which means that we spend a lot of time crafting comments that explain why we changed what we did or why we think such and such needs to go. We also strive to give those critiques in a friendly and helpful tone, and balance criticism with praise.

Some editors take a more tough-love approach than others. It’s important to find an editor whose critique style you’re comfortable with, whether you don’t mind harsher comments or whether sarcasm in an edit letter is not your thing at all. Many editors can adapt their tone to your preference if you let them know which end of the spectrum you’re on — doing so is all part of the time spent on you as a valued client.

Editors want to form relationships with their clients, because trust makes it a lot easier to work together on a manuscript. For those clients who are self-publishing, we hope to form the kind of bond that traditionally published authors often experience with their in-house editors, and facilitate a long-term working arrangement.
 

Time and money for undergrad or graduate training

 
Like most professionals these days, we went to college, and like most former college students, we spent — and are still paying back — a lot of money to do it. A lot of people assume college is a given expense these days, but let us not forget that it’s meant to be an investment, and one that will eventually be returned in wages, and then fed back into the economy as spending dollars. That cycle gets broken without a living wage, in any line of work.
 

Time and money spent on books, conferences, and further education

 
But education doesn’t end with academia. Our job is dependent on our knowledge of literary trends and we can’t do our job well if we stick our heads in the same old sand. We buy new books on writing techniques (we write new books on writing techniques), we attend conferences and connect with our colleagues, with agents, with booksellers and with writers. We take classes to expand and hone our skill set.

All that costs money.
 

Time watching the market and identifying trends

 

Market trends (i.e. what books are selling) are as important as style trends for an editor. If your goal is to self-publish, we need to be aware of where your book sits on the proverbial shelf and what company it’s in. If your goal is traditional publishing, where agents and acquisitions editors look for originality with extreme prejudice, we need to be able to help your book stand out from recent sales and best sellers.

This means subscriptions to Publisher’s Weekly and Publisher’s Marketplace. It also means tons of time devoted to reading new releases. There’s a reason editors tend to specialize in genres or categories. There’s not enough time in the world for us to be well-versed in the market of every genre or category.
 

Business Costs

 
This includes maintaining a website and paid advertising, as well as time spent marketing and networking. It also includes promotional materials, such as the free first five pages critiques my company gives away on Twitter every month. Then there’s the cost of professional memberships with organizations like the Editorial Freelancer’s Association.

On top of all of that: taxes. A substantial amount of freelance revenue goes back in taxes, since we’re responsible for tracking and paying them ourselves as opposed to having an employer handle it.
 

Equipment

 
We often don’t think of computers or software as professional equipment, but for many people, they are. The laptop I’m working on right now is nearly five years old, ancient as far as computers are concerned. If it craps out, I need to be able to go and purchase a replacement immediately, because my job depends on it.

Microsoft Word, used by most writers, is also not free despite its ubiquity.
 

The cost of living

 
My company is still less than a year old, which means that the majority of our fees go straight back into the business account to build our presence and cover those business costs I mentioned. But, eventually it will contribute meaningfully to my household income.

– – – – –

Here’s a break-down for an example job to illustrate how the high payment might be spread across all the factors I’ve just outlined.

Time spent on a manuscript can vary quite a lot depending on many factors, but for simplicity’s sake we’ll use averages. I average about six pages per hour on a manuscript. So if you have a 300 page book, that takes me about fifty hours. If you pay me $1800, that’s about $36 dollars an hour (gross, meaning before taxes).

But: I only spend two, maybe three hours a day sitting down working on a manuscript. The rest of my day is devoted to blog posts, marketing, communication and networking, market research, etc. My wage for those things comes out of the payment I receive for editing. My $70 bucks for two hours of editing is my wage for an eight hour work day (often longer), so it ends up being a lot closer to $9/hr. 

Don’t let the lump sum fool you — for the most part, freelance editors are hardly swimming in profits.

If you’re interested in a freelance editor’s services but can’t afford a full edit, don’t think that’s the end of it! I can only speak for myself and my company on this matter, but Bear and Black Dog is always very happy to work with writers on staggered payment schedules. As freelancers, we are incredibly flexible in this way.

**Note from Kisa: I, too, am willing to work with writers on staggered payment schedules. So never be afraid to ask if the lump sum is more than you can manage. 😉 **

– – – – –

Photo of Freelance Editor Cait Spivey Cait Spivey is an editor with Curiosity Quills Press and managing member of Bear and Black Dog Editing, LLC. As an editor, Cait pulls from her lifelong experience loving books to bring forth the best elements of every story in a way that grabs the reader and doesn’t let go. She wants to help books tug heartstrings. She wants to help books become heirlooms. She wants to help books get quoted on Tumblr. Contact her through her website or her Twitter @CaitSpivey.

What it Takes to be an Editor

KWhipkey 14 Comments

Now that I’m becoming more known in the literary community, I’ve had people approach me for advice on how to break into an editing career. They all have this bright-eyed illusion of what being an editor entails, envisioning (as I did) days filled with nothing but reading. Sounds glamorous, doesn’t it? Every book lover’s dream job. But let’s have a candid (and snarky!) discussion about the reality of being an editor. Because that pretty image in your head is nothing like the real thing.

A lot of people falsely believe that writing and editing are parallel careers. They’re not. They’re more like distant cousins than the sibling status everyone thinks. If you enjoy the process of creation, editing is not for you. If you love reading, devouring books like life-saving sustenance, editing is not for you. And if you like entertainment that keeps your brain active and stimulated for hours, editing is not for you. If, however, you love puzzles, methodical routines, and helping others, then maybe you’re fit to be an editor.

The truth is, editing’s hard. It’s monotonous, dull, repetitive, and there is absolutely no glory in it. It’s messy, annoying, and time-consuming. And it uses absolutely none of your creative juices. It’s analytical, more than anything, relying on thought processes normally associated with math and logic, rather than those involved with writing. It requires a completely different skill set, and, contrary to popular belief, good writers do not necessarily make good editors. And vice versa.

The literary world is the only one I know of that doesn’t clearly differentiate between its specialized skills, lumping them into one single category — wordsmith. No one would expect a dentist to be able to perform heart surgery, so why can’t we figure out that editing and writing aren’t the same thing? Yes, they’re both grounded in a love for words. And both do conform to the rules of the English language (most of the time). But that’s pretty much where the similarities stop.

So what does it take to be an editor? Let’s find out.
 

Requirement #1: No Life (Workaholic)

 
You know those nights and weekends, holidays, family and friends? Kiss them all goodbye. If you want to be an editor, you better be a workaholic, because otherwise, you’ll be buried up to your eyeballs before you can blink. And don’t think that’s temporary. Oh no, you will never again have a moment to yourself. Your inbox will be filled to the breaking point every time you log in. Your morning run, every meal you eat, and even long car trips will become reading time. And sleep? Yeah, you’d probably get more of that if you’d popped out that baby your mom’s been nagging you to have.

Every single second of every day from the moment you get your first assignment will be filled with something. And if, God forbid, you take so much as an afternoon off, you’ll spend the next two weeks trying to climb back on top of the mountain.

Editors have one of the highest burn-out rates of any job on the market. If you survive past two years, you’re considered hard-core. Because none of us get to do what everyone somehow assumes we do: sit in our offices, leisurely sipping coffee and reading to our heart’s content. In fact, if we get to read at all during the day, it’s probably at home, or crammed into the fifteen empty minutes between tasks. The majority of an editor’s day actually consists of answering emails, planning out structural edits, line edits, project management, more emails and then more line edits. Reading’s at the bottom of the list, unfortunately.

So if you’re an anti-social, agoraphobic insomniac with a workaholic tendency, editing will be the perfect job for you. The rest of us have to learn how to juggle life and work. And sadly, life almost always loses.
 

Requirement #2: OCD (Detail-Oriented)

 
Editing is highly detail-oriented. It’s slow and tedious, and during the course of a single project, you’ll read each chapter so many times you could nearly recite the thing verbatim by the end. So being slightly OCD helps.

There’s a strange (as in sick) sense of satisfaction to be found in surgically removing and altering the smallest things (things normal humans don’t notice) in a sentence. As an editor, you don’t just gloss over everything, you hone it, until there’s absolutely no better way that statement could be phrased. There’s not an ounce of fluff left in the entire manuscript, and, by George, you made sure that thing sings! How long did it take you to do it? Here’s the kicker: about 6-8 months (that includes the amount of time spent back and forth in revisions with the actual author. Because, you know, editors don’t actually write the books). And how long does it take a reader to read those beautifully honed words? About a week, if you’re lucky. I actually watched someone breeze through a project I’d slaved on for nearly a year in a single afternoon!

The point here is that editors are a strange breed of OCD (ahem, I mean detail-oriented) individuals who hold themselves and their authors to a crazy standard of perfect, and will accept nothing less. If you’re not willing to read a manuscript 52 times, invest upwards of 6 months of your life into someone else’s work, then walk away. You’re not one of us.
 

Requirement #3: Skills (Not Just Grammar, Folks)

 
This should be a no-brainer. Clearly, an editor needs skills, right? But which skills?

There’s an assumption out there that editing consists of one thing — fixing grammar. Editors are all a bunch of pompous English professors who couldn’t sell their own writing, and so, bitterly hand down judgement on everyone’s inability to follow the rules of the English language. In short, we’re grammar Nazis, and that’s it. That assumption is incorrect. And why so many writers get taken advantage of by shoddy editors who do nothing but fix superficial punctuation and spelling mistakes. (**Ducks from the impending barrage of hatred.**)

A real editor does so much more than fix your grammar. They’ll do that too, but more importantly, they’ll fix your story in its entirety. From plot holes, character development, and timeline re-sequencing, to sentence smoothing, and fact/detail cross-referencing, an editor is a master storyteller. Not only do they fully understand the various narrative methods and their uses, but they do all this without compromising the writer’s voice. They’re chameleons, morphing into a version of the author and enhancing that person’s style so that no trace of the editor is visible to the outside world. (I mentioned there was no glory in editing, right? All the applause and accolades go solely to the author — as they should. You don’t exist to the world of readers.)

True editors can hold an entire book in their heads, shifting and reorganizing the narrative threads as needed. And the really good ones can do this with multiple projects at once. It’s a rare skill, and one that will instantly mark a professional from an amateur. This is the thing that the writers-turned-editors can’t compete with. What the grammar Nazis can’t ever hope to provide. This is the true skill of an editor. So the question is, does this sound like you? If yes, then congratulations, you’re an editor. If what I’ve said sounds like mumbo-jumbo or makes you cringe even the tiniest bit, then adios! You’re better off doing something else.
 

Requirement #4: Passion (Passion Trumps the Suckage)

 
This is the last requirement for becoming an editor, but I’d dare say it’s the most important one. Why? Because passion is what makes it all worthwhile; it’s what trumps all the suckage. As you can see, editing is kind of a sucky job. I mean, for some of us, it’s a calling, and we love it through and through. But to the outside world, it looks brutal, horrible, and leaves you wondering why, in God’s name, anyone would ever want to do it. The answer is pretty simple though: passion. Passion for storytelling, for books, and for the people who write them. If you don’t have this, you’ll never make it as an editor. You might survive for a little while. You may even enjoy it at first. But eventually, the incessant schedule will wear you down and you’ll walk away.

How do you know if you have it? The passion? I’m not sure. I don’t think there’s a quantifiable way to tell. But I’ll leave you with this to ponder:

Writers often talk about how writing is the best part of their day. How it’s a cathartic release, a joy. For them, the creation process is the most beautiful thing. But for an editor, a 100% born-to-be editor, it’s not. That joy will come from the part of the process every writer loathes. Where writers find relaxation pouring words onto a page, you’ll find it in rearranging those words. Where they find joy breathing life into new stories, you’ll find it in fixing them. To you, the best part will be feeling all those intricate puzzle pieces click into place, and then watching, like a proud teacher, as your author and their book graduate to take their place in the world of success.

It’s not a job for everyone, but if you have the skills and the passion, (if you can’t imagine yourself doing anything else,) then it just might be for you. I’m definitely 100% editor. Are you?

A Writer’s Resolutions: 2014 Edition

KWhipkey 4 Comments

I’m back! Did you miss me? 😉

Last year, I wrote a post about resolutions. This year, I’ve decided to continue that tradition and start an annual feature where I’ll detail my goals for the coming year, and look back on what I accomplished (or didn’t, more likely) from the previous list. I’m not talking about the usual suspects — the “I want to lose weight” (although, that is high on my list this year), “I want to be debt free” (a girl can dream right?), “I want to marry a prince and live on a floating island in the clouds” type of resolutions. No, I’m talking about the specific list that all writers make.

If you write, chances are this one features prominently: “I want to be published”. But like I pointed out in last year’s post, that has about as much chance of success as marrying that prince with the floating island. You need to be more specific than that. When you break a resolution into the individual steps you’ll need to accomplish it, it starts to look more real. To prove a point, I tried my own advice and created these resolutions for 2013:
 

Writing Resolutions 2013

 

  • Finish the rough draft of Unmoving
  • Upload Chapters of Unmoving every two weeks to Wattpad & Authonomy
  • Revise and Re-publish The Bardach, Spinning & Confessions via Createspace/Amazon KDP
  • Compile brief synopses of all plot bunnies
  • Write, Edit & Publish one new short story

 
How did I stack up? Well, I didn’t. According to that list, I accomplished exactly . . . nothing. Unmoving still isn’t finished (in fact, I technically haven’t written on it since July), it’s not featured on Wattpad or Authonomy (yet), my short stories languish somewhere in forgotten-land, and the only new thing I wrote was 1/16th of a novel that’s probably the worst quality ever thanks to Camp Nano. But that doesn’t mean the resolutions themselves were bad. It just means that I suck at following my own advice. 😉

2013 was actually riddled with writing-related achievements, they just weren’t the ones I expected. I’m now the Editorial Director for REUTS Publications; I’ve reviewed so many amazing (and unpublished) manuscripts I’ve lost count; I’ve been involved in numerous writing contests, Twitter events, and saw a couple of the books I helped edit reach publication; I’ve made invaluable connections with others in the industry, many of whom I now view as friends; and most importantly, I created a way to share Unmoving while it’s still being written! So 2013 was by no means a dull year on the creativity front. In fact, I think it was the busiest I’ve ever been. And I loved every minute of it!

Where does that leave me as we head into 2014? Optimistic as always. The new year sparkles with possibility, and I’m nothing if not superb at creating to-do lists. (It’s the finishing them part I’m not so great at.) So, in true New Year’s fashion, here’s my ambitious list for the coming year:
 

Writing Resolutions 2014

 

  • Finish Unmoving (Kind of inevitable now, since I have a bi-weekly deadline to keep my hiney motivated.)
  • Revise and Re-publish The Bardach, Spinning & Confessions via Createspace/Amazon KDP (Yep, I’m recycling, what of it?)
  • Compile brief synopses of all plot bunnies (I really need to get this one done. Some of those little buggers are starting to escape!)
  • Write, Edit & Publish one new short story (Really not sure why I failed at this one. It’s not an insanely difficult thing to do . . .)
  • Quit The Dreaded Day Job so I can focus on editing & writing full time (Probably not likely, but I’m shooting for the stars. They say if you write it down, it’ll happen. So hear that, writing gods? Make it happen!)

 
There’s a plethora of other things I could add to that list, but then I’d start straying from the realistic goals to the ones I know I’ll never complete. 5 seems to be a comfortable level of possible for me, anything beyond that and I may as well crumple the whole thing up and chuck it now. I’d love to say that I’ll finish more than one novel, that I’ll write a new short story every week, or that I’ll manage to do any of the other things full-time writers do. But the reality is that none of that can happen until I achieve resolution #5. Thankfully, I do see that happening in my near future, thanks to the support of my freelance clients (you guys rock!) and my work with REUTS. Will it happen this year, though? That remains to be seen. 😉

Okay, it’s your turn! What feat of writing greatness do you want to accomplish this year? And how did you do with your resolutions from last?

(P.S. Thank you to everyone who entered my 2013 Holiday Giveaway. Your support made it, by far, the most successful giveaway I’ve ever done. Unfortunately, there can only be 3 winners though. So please give a big round of congratulations to those lucky people: Alexandra Perchanidou, Carly Drake, & Rachel Oestreich! You’ll be receiving a paperback copy of Echoes of Balance by Cally Ryanne. To everyone else, don’t worry, there will be more chances to win something awesome coming May 2014. So stick around! I’ll try to make it worth your while. 😉 )

A Double Dose of Awesome: Author Interview & Holiday Giveaway

KWhipkey 1 Comment

It’s that time of year again. Trees are dressed like girls going to prom, boxes accumulate like snow, and I disappear for a few weeks. That’s right, it’s Christmas! And because I said it would be an annual occurrence, (and really, I just like giving you stuff) that also means it’s time to announce this year’s Holiday Giveaway. But first, I have an extra bonus. The lovely Cally Ryanne, author of Echoes of Balance, has agreed to stop by and give us some insight on what it’s like to be a new author, what her publication journey was like, and what you should expect from her debut novel.

I featured Echoes of Balance a few weeks ago under my From the Editor’s Desk series, so if you’re curious about the book, hop on over there. Otherwise, I’ll let Cally tell you about it herself. 😉

~

 
1. First, thank you for joining us today and congratulations on the release of your debut novel! Tell us a little about it; what kind of experience should readers expect?
 
Thank YOU for featuring me, editing Echoes (y’all — Kisa is a phenomenal editor), and making this book an awesome first experience. Really. 🙂

(Note from Kisa: Aww, thanks Cally! That means a lot. <3)

Echoes is about Chloe Moraine, the youngest of the Naimei, an ancient line of beings charged with keeping the universe in balance. But she wasn’t always sold on this particular responsibility; following their Ways can be boring, and so, for a long while, she set off to be a vampire hunter, to do something that felt more immediate and important. It’s not until her family receives warning that Pan and Damonos, the original demons and premiere forces of chaos, are set to return that Chloe resumes her Naimei duties, and then she does so with a conflicting view of the world: things can’t all be as black and white as the Ways would have the Naimei believe.

When the Ways, themselves, begin to fail, Chloe is approached by Josef, an unnervingly charming vampire who seems to know more about the Originals than anyone outside the Naimei fold should. It seems as if her best bet to save the world is to trust him, but doing so will lead her to a darker side of the supernatural than she’s ever seen, and may alienate her family in the process.

I think the experience readers should expect is immersive. The book has been a long time coming — there’s a lot to Chloe and her world beyond just this story. Get ready. 🙂
 

Chloe Moraine, high school superhero by day, universe balancer and occasional vampire hunter by night. — Echoes of Balance, 2013

 
2. This is the first in a trilogy, isn’t it? Anything you can tell us about the next book?
 
It totes is the first in a trilogy! Echoes stays pretty focused on Chloe’s life in the immediate right now, and the things she’s (mostly) used to experiencing. It’s her world, as far as Echoes is concerned. Book two — literally, that’s what the document is called right now, I’m so terrible at titles — expands a lot of Chloe’s borders, so to speak. There are new places, and a lot of new characters. Her world starts expanding — quickly — and she sort of has to deal with the fall out of that, along with all the decisions she’s made in book one.

Also, as it stands now, the first word (prologue aside) is Ducante. Man, I just love that guy. Can’t get enough of him.

(Note from Kisa: Awesome! Ducante was one of my favorite characters. Nothing like a snarky, bar-tending demon to complete things, you know? 😉 )
 

Meeting a vampire at a bar was certainly not the most dangerous thing she could do. But it was far from the least. — Echoes of Balance, 2013

 
3. This story is clearly one that’s very dear to you. Please tell us a little about your road to publication. What steps did you take? How did you ensure the story you love is the one that readers can now hold?
 
If we go back to the Way Back, the first step to publication was to totally “murder my darlings”. Chloe & company have been around for some time, and they’ve had lots of starts to their stories. That’s what happens when you think you can write novels in like, middle school. Plot holes, bad writing, plots that didn’t lead anywhere, and none of them fit, really. So eventually, there had to be a time where the pallet was cleansed — all these things I’d been building and thinking about and the what if this happened’s had to get out to make room for something real and solid and logical, but still true to the characters. Because, in the end, they were what mattered most to me.

Then I wrote and wrote and wrote forever, reworked and edited, got sick of editing, edited some more, agonized over a query letter, and then sent that query letter out to ten thousand people. Then got rejected by ten thousand people, put the book on hold for awhile, and repeated that last process again a few more times.

And, FYI, when you actually do get accepted, you have to go back to that write/edit/get sick of looking at your own words process all over again. It’s a blastity blast.
 

He was handsome . . . with chiseled features that screamed there was an aspiring actor resumé with his name on it somewhere. — Echoes of Balance, 2013

 
4. You chose to publish with a new, indie publisher instead of following the popular trend of self-publishing. What has that experience been like? Would you recommend working with a smaller press? (And please answer honestly. I promise I won’t hold anything you say against you.)
 
So, I feel like I should stress that my experience was definitely different than people working with big publishers (because duh) and probably a little different than most people working with indie publishers (because new). I was actually approached by Ashley, one of the REUTS founders, on a writing site and encouraged to submit my then mostly-finished-and-edited manuscript, and I’m the first book (!) to come out of REUTS.

That being said, I had never really seriously considered self publishing. I was sort of the exhausted mom that really needed it to be summer so her kid could go away to camp for awhile. I loved my manuscript, but I just didn’t have it in me to do everything that’s needed to self publish successfully, so that it was actually polished and professional looking and not just something that was stuck up on Amazon at 3 a.m. I figured if no one would accept me now, I would just keep writing and try again in a few years, or something, and if that didn’t work, I’d have to self publish when I actually had time to devote to it. (Which isn’t really an option when you’ve just graduated college, moved to a new city and started a new job.)

If I’m super honest, the first time I emailed Ashley, I was stupid nervous that this was just going to be some prank or grandiose dream of authors-who-wanted-to-publish-other-authors that wasn’t really going to go anywhere. But, a little over a year later, and there are real paperback copies of my fully edited book. And it’s awesome.

I’m a fan of indie and a big fan of smaller presses in general, and working with them is great. There’s a lot of personal attention, everyone involved in the press is queued into what’s happening, they really care about helping you and being new, and small, and indie, they’re totally open to being experimental and adaptive. Some things to consider, though, is that small presses — and new small presses, at that — don’t necessarily have the same experience as bigger names. REUTS is awesome, but I can see how you could easily get other presses who think they know what they’re doing but really don’t (my initial panic when Ashley emailed me). So, I guess, tread with caution if you seek a new operation to publish with. Also, consider what you want out of publishing — I just wanted to be able to share my story, but some people want to be able to walk into Barnes and Noble and see their book on the New and Now table. Different publishers have different resources that can give you different things!
 

Night was several hours off, and she didn’t have time to play host to a pseudo-corpse. — Echoes of Balance, 2013

 
5. Could you please describe what actually happens during the publication process? What should authors expect after they sign a contract?
 
Let’s start with what you should not expect:

That your book magically goes away to some factory-land that puffs out rainbows, and comes out the other side this polished, beautiful thing ready to head to booksellers everywhere.

Don’t expect that.

As soon as you sign the contract, you start in on your book proper. Finding a title that fits (this might be a personal problem — I’m pretty awful at titles), making cover decisions, starting the process of editing. I was lucky enough to be able to edit right in my Google Doc, (instant feedback, whoo!) but that also meant coming home from work and having thirty to fifty comments I needed to address on top of normal life. It can be a lot. And you’re going to keep having to tweak, cut, change, rewrite, and add to this thing you thought was great because, duh, someone wanted to publish it. But just because someone wants to publish you doesn’t mean your book is perfect. Yet.
 

She knew nothing of high school beyond the basic conventions, structure, & potential for heaping amounts of teenage angst. — Echoes of Balance, 2013

 
6. What’s been your favorite part?
 
I actually love getting edits. They’re tiring and sometimes I’m just like, ugh, I can’t look at this, but it’s also awesome to see comments from someone else who is as critical of and as invested in your story as you.
 
7. And lastly, what advice would you give to other aspiring authors out there?
 
Gut check your expectations. That being said, keep on keeping on!
 

Why did vampires always incorporate puns into their conversation? Did they try, or did it just happen? — Echoes of Balance, 2013

 

~

Thank you, Cally! 🙂

To find out more about Echoes, The Ways Trilogy, and Cally, be sure to visit her author website, or connect with her on Twitter: @callyryanne.  And, of course, Echoes of Balance is out now! So head to your favorite online retailer or meander over to REUTS Publications to pick up a copy.

Which leaves us with only one more piece of business: the Holiday Giveaway. In honor of Cally’s achievement and the first release from REUTS (which I might have had a small part in), I decided to give away 3 copies of Echoes of Balance. Yep, 3 lucky people can score one of the beautiful paperback editions for free! (Why 3? Who knows. That seems to be my magic number.) Ready to enter? Click here!The drawing will be held on New Year’s Day, and the winners will be announced that following Friday (1/3/14).

Until then, I wish you all a safe and happy holiday and I’ll see you in the new year! 🙂

The Anatomy of a Successful Short Story

KWhipkey 2 Comments

Short stories. Some people love them, others can’t stand them. But no one can deny they’re an entirely different creature from novels.

This week, I’ve been judging entries for the ProjectREUTSway competition held during the month of November. Buried amid 144 short stories, I started to think about what exactly makes one “successful”. I think most of you know by now that I, myself, published 3, so this is a topic that hits very close to home. It’s also one I’ve never really stopped to think about. Until now. Because, let’s face it, short stories are strange. Similar to novels and yet completely dissimilar, they require a certain — almost magic — recipe to really shine. I don’t believe in the undefinable though, (at least not when it comes to writing) so let’s see if we can’t identify the exact ingredients that make short stories such a unique form of storytelling.

Short stories are often considered a novelist’s training wheels; the idea being that someone can learn the basics of storytelling through short stories and then graduate into novels. But that’s not exactly what happens. Because, in reality, they require two different skill sets to pull off well. A short story is not a truncated novel, nor is a novel an elongated, rambling short story. Rarely can the concept for one be turned successfully into the other. And yet people still try. Why? Because short stories have been given a bad rap. Novels take all the glory, leaving short stories to rot in creative writing jail like fiction offenders. They’re looked down on as an inferior form of narrative, an eighth grade diploma to the novel’s PHD. After all, the only difference between them is length, right?

Wrong.

There are three things a successful short story must have: brevity, focus, and telling. Yes, you heard me, telling. But before you get your knickers in a bunch, let me explain further.
 

1. Brevity

 
Novelists are taught the value of brevity. But even the most refined novels still sprawl, meandering through details and settings and other things short story authors simply can’t afford. Literally every word matters in a short story. No detail is extraneous. If we mention the light blue collar on a random cat, you can bet that collar is important somehow.

The same holds true for the words themselves. Novelists are allowed to write sentences like this:

She paused, grabbing the handle of the stainless steel refrigerator and pulling it open with a subtle flick of her wrist.

(Hey, no comments on the quality. Clearly, I know that sentence is atrocious. I’m proving a point. 😉 )

That’s 21 words to say this:

She opened the refrigerator door.

Yes, that may be a bit exaggerated, but you see what I mean, I hope. When you only have maybe 5000 words of space, every letter has to serve a purpose. Successful short stories know this, and the language/storytelling is as finely honed as a scalpel. If it doesn’t somehow move the plot along, impart valuable information or absolutely have to exist, it doesn’t.
 

2. Focus

 
I’m a firm believer that every story should have a message, a reason for existing. But maybe that’s because I started out as a short story author. Whenever I come up with an idea, I identify the core message first, before the setting, characters, or even plot. For example, The Bardach is a story about identity, Spinning is about fate, and Confessions is about losing faith. Even Unmoving has a focal point. At its core, its about compassion. This type of focused narrative is one of the more notable differences between a short story and a novel.

Short stories are single-minded. Like a starving man spotting food, they keep their eyes on the prize. None of this wandering off into detours, flashbacks, subplots or other shenanigans that novels get away with. Nope, they have one message, one plot, one climatic moment that everything points to. And, interestingly enough, short stories are typically driven by an event, rather than a character. The focus is on the action, not the person doing it.

How does this translate into our recipe for success? Well, you’ll be able to feel the underlying drive in a really good short story. You’ll walk away from it remembering the message, not necessarily the characters. So make darn sure you know what you’re saying, both literally and subtextually.
 

3. Telling

 
All right. I know this is the one you were waiting for. After all the times “show, don’t tell” has been beaten into your head, you simply can’t believe I’d actually stand here and advocate telling, can you? Well, I’m not really.

See, the thing is, showing is still 100% better than telling. But, telling is allowed in a short story. Due to the limited amount of time you have to impart your narrative, there’s really no way around it. You don’t have the luxury of wasting thousands of words, or even hundreds, showing us the back-story. Nor can you illustrate anything directly outside the timeline of the main event, regardless how important it may be. So that only leaves one option — telling. You should still avoid the dreaded info-dump if you can, but slipping in the occasional line of summary, or a paragraph of back-story, won’t automatically earn you peer derision. Well, most of the time, anyway.

Successful short story authors are masters of knowing when to tell and when to show. (Which, by the way, I am not. Just wanted to clarify that in case anyone thought I was going to be cocky and throw myself on that list.) They give you just enough information — typically in the form of telling — to make their worlds/characters feel as fleshed out as a novel’s, but not so much that you really notice. They cover a lot of ground in a really short amount of time, making this the hardest skill on the list. It actually requires mastery of the other two to pull off, which is why I listed it last.

And there you have it; the anatomy of a successful short story. Learn how to control these three elements and your short fiction will stand out in a pile like little beacons. And let’s all try to stop viewing short stories as the lesser form of fiction. They’re not inferior. Just different.