Donna Maree Hanson, Author, Phd in Creative Writing

I am about to start my advanced editing course in second semester and a
crucial part of that is a major project. I want to do some fiction editing
for my major work, and so I am putting a call out for spec-fic novellas up to
50,000 words. I am not allowed to do my own writing, of course.

I am looking for something that appeals to me that would benefit from
editing, including structural editing, copy editing and then proofreading.
For instance, if it is too good then I can’t be of help and conversely if it
is really rough then it’s not ready. So I’m looking for something in the
middle of that.

I have had previous experience in editing, but this does not count for the
course unfortunately. I have assisted in editing Elsewhere, by CSFG
Publishing, I co-edited Encounters with Maxine McArthur by CSFG Publishing
and I edited The Grinding House by Kaaron Warren, also by CSFG Publishing. I
also edited Kered’s Crown by Kaaren Sutcliffe and published it with my
imprint and Johnny Phillips Werewolf Detective, short story collection by
Robbie Matthews, which earned an Aurealis nomination.

What I intend to do is look at the submissions and then choose a project to
work on. I would choose this on the basis of interest, the level of
challenge to me as an editor, and whether I think that an edit would improve
the work. As I said this is for my major work assessment, so all edits,
comments, emails between me and the author are to be submitted as evidence
of the project. I did have an offer of a novel from Maxine McArthur, but it
is rather well written and long (150,000) and I think that maybe I would not
be able to use my editor mojo (but thanks so much Maxine). I am still up for
being her beta reader though.

The process

What I would do for the chosen novella is do a read through and provide any
structural and other major commentary in an email to the author.

The author would then need to respond to that either through discussion or
through changes to the MS.

Then I would proceed to a copy edit, which is the nit picky part, which is
the grammar, spelling and picking up any consistency errors that have not
been addressed previously. I would also develop a style guide and this would
be used to ensure consistency in things like leaped versus leapt, no one
versus no-one or noone.

These would then be sent back to the author for taking up editorial changes.

Then after that is done , I would do a proofread and probably do a layout,
with the preliminary pages, copyright information etc, as if it was going to be
published. (proofreading is not my best skill…)

If you are interested please submit your novella to
donnamareehanson@gmail.com

Initially, I will open the submission until 29 June, unless I get so many I
have to call a halt. Or get none and have to go begging.

The chosen submitter gets to work on their novella with some input from a
trainee editor (me). I can’t guarantee you’ll get published at the end of it
but hopefully the novella will have benefited from the exercise and maybe
the author would too.

The chosen submitter would need to be able to commit to working on the edits
over the next 3-4 mouths. I get no marks for trying. I have to deliver the
end product.

By the way I love editing fiction. You are saving me from non-fiction if you
help me out.

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Well I spent the day unwriting Dragon Wine. Now I’m at the point where I need to do some extra thnking so I am veging out in front of Stargate the movie.

Word count is now 162,900. I’m about fifty pages in. I realize already that I’ll have to go back over what I’ve done to tweak scenes, up the tension and work on some characterization. This is is because I have tinkered with the main character’s motivation and I have to make sure I’ve done it right.
There is some good writing I’m going to cut as a result of the plot change. However I have to grin and bear it.

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Yesterday, I embarked on a project, which I have been putting off. The cutting back of Dragon Wine, what I think is my best project ever. I started Dragon Wine in 2005, back when my published author friends were writing big door stoppers. I sent the first 25,000 words off to Varuna and it made the long list in the MS development awards. That gave me an incentive to keep writing, which I did. I submitted another sample the next year, getting the MS to 60,000 words. Again it made the long list for the same award. I kept on then until I finished the draft and then made it to the short list. A year later it made the short list that went to Harper Collins. And it wasn’t chosen. I remember telling Peter Bishop, the creative director at Varuna Writers House, that the novel would not have been written without the encouragement of the award. I was then on a fellowship, a lovely two weeks at Varuna, also awarded for Dragon Wine.

When you get rejections it is often hard to stay focused and to believe in your work. I have had three top editors look at Dragon Wine, one has looked at it twice. Last year, I was able to chat to one of the editors and get some insight into what the issues might be. This feedback also matched some comments I received from an agent and some writer friends, who also had a look for me.

Basically times change. The story is fine, but there is a tad too much detail getting in the way of the action. The agent recommend I cut it back to about 120,000 words. That’s a big ask for an MS that’s at 167,000 words. I’ve toyed with splitting it, but I think I have a fundamental problem of too much verbage.

I’ve playing with this MS for so long now. I’ve looked at rhythm and flow and embroidered the world to fill it out and make it real. But I think in doing that I’ve over set the balance and, also, as I said the world has moved on. Now, there’s a demand for more action, tension and pace. Sure there are those that still like rich worlds and vast epics…but that’s a lot harder to crack as a new writer. So I’m here now cutting away.

So I will periodically update progress.
My start word count was 167, 200 currently at 164, 158 .

Last night I ripped out the prologue. The agent gave me a wonderful crit of that. ‘A piece of shite that info dumps all over the shop and makes me not care’, is my paraphrase.

I think I wrote that prologue to address an issue in the first chapter that someone else raised, instead of addressing the issue directly. Woe is me.

So I wrote a very short prologue that I can live without. I will go back to it, maybe delete it when I’m through.

I cut a substantial part of the opening, getting rid of any smidgen of back story, instead weaving in a bit of setting and context for the opening. This was a very good move I think. That lost me about 3000 words.

Today I am fileting the text. You could say I’m deleting every second line. You’d be surprised how close to reality that is. I look at the paragraph and then I think, if you lose that sentence what will that do to the meaning. Why nothing. Snip. I’ve also deleted a few paragraphs that I think I can live without and if I can’t I can put them back in as I do have the original.

A few months back, I thought up a small plot change that gets my character moving much more quickly and addresses a motivation issue which I referred to earlier. That will require a bit more cutting and reworking and I’m quite looking forward to that.

Another bad habit, I guess you could call it is, using a whole chapter when introducing or moving to a new character point of view. All I’ve managed to do is add more detail, so I can go back and trim these and not make them chapters at all but scene breaks. I still keep the character and their point of view, but I’m not stretching it out to fill up space and make it a whole chapter.

As for any other insights, other than trimming detail, I don’t know until I get there. However, I should be in a good position to work on the sequel, which is already at 158,000 words (and not quite finished). I already know I have an excess of dead bodies in the opening scenes. Chaff I say. Burn it. Get rid of it.

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In late January this year I decided to renovate a few things. It  took two weeks to get the money from the bank but boy it has taken time to spend it. I booked this kitchen transformation thing in March and it’s just happened now. Why am I posting it here? What possible link does it have to my writing? Well in cleaning out the kitchen and the cupboards I realised that I have spent more time writing in the last 18 months than I have cleaning. And once the kitchen is restocked and reorganised, it will kick off a round of reorganising and cleaning that will severely impact on my writing. The culmination will be the redoing of my study with new desk and more bookshelves. I may even, god forbid, cull some books!

So after killing myself and probably Matthew too, we ended up with a clean old kitchen.

Old kitchen with broken drawers removed

Some more shots

Old stove and shiny fridge (after all the magnets were removed and notes and stuff

The ol' kitchen sink

Some during the process snaps.

Near end of day one. New drawers

Gutted pantry

some granite and new doors

New kitchen emerges…so the gas hob has a part missing so we can’t use it yet and the sink is not connected because there was a part missing there too. A few bits of trim to fix but I think it looks lovely.

New gas hob and granite splash back

Oven and bench top

New bench top and drawers

New pantry with drawers

Actually I wanted the drawers on the inside but I kind of like them there.

New pantry with drawers

New kitchen sink

James and the pot holder

There is James very happy and swearing to me he will keep the new kitchen clean. Well I do like reading fantasy.

Anyway I’m hoping that the new kitchen will inspire me to greater heights in cooking, cleaning and writing.

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I know this is rather tardy but I’ve been busy with stuff!

On 21 May Matthew and I travelled to Sydney to attend the Aurealis Awards. I wasn’t nominated or anything. I attend because I like to support the industry and my friends and since Brisbane made it into a gala event, well why the hell not. Lots of fun. Dressing up. Meeting people, catching up with friends and glimpses of authors and editors.

We stayed at the Vibe hotel, which is opposite Milson’s point. The hotel receptionist said it was a ten minute walk to the venue. Well it took double that all up hill and Matthew nearly expired. We arrived hot, sweaty, thirsty and late. However, it was packed and a great gala event. Well done Sydney. (for context Sydney took over from Brisbane this year).

So a few photos. I didn’t take that many.

A view of the ceiling. The venue was a lovely old theatre.

Ceiling at the Aurealis Awards

Then after the ceremony I caught up with Tansy Rayner Roberts who took out best fantasy novel with Power and Majesty. It’s an awesome read.

Tansy Rayner Roberts with her Aurealis Award

Then I bumped into Thoraiya Dyer, who also won for her short story, Yowie, which she said she only wrote because Alisa Krasnostein rejected two of her previous stories for Sprawl.

Thoraiya Dyer

I also caught up with Joanne Anderton, up coming author with novel Debris to be published by Angry Robot .

Joanne Anderton

It was rather a crush. I bumped into Richard Harland and got a snap of him and his new steampunk brooch.

Richard Harland, author of Worldshaker and Liberator

and that steampunk thing

Richard's steampunk brooch

I caught up with a lot of people but didn’t take snaps as the official photographer Cat Sparks was taking shots of everyone. You’ll find her Flickr stream here

I bumped into Jenny Blackford down from Newcastle.

Jenny Blackford

I hung with Tehani Wesley, Tracey O’Hara, Nicole R Murphy and then caught a shot of Helen Merrick and Cat Sparks.

Helen Merrick and Cat Sparks

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I’ve been reading a bit with an editing eye recently and realise how important the dialogue can be in a story. Not just the dialogue in the first three chapters but the dialogue on page 110 and 315. That is, it is important all the way through.

There is no point in being lazy when writing and revising, saying to yourself that ‘It will do’ or the ‘meaning is clear’. Because if it is flat then it brings the story down. If the dialogue is just to pass the time then it is boring. Also, dialogue is not just about question and answer, it is meant to reveal something about the character. For example, their mood, their intellect, their truthfulness, their relationships. You must bring in their body language. Think of how much silence can say.
You might think that is odd, using silence in dialogue and even in the written word but it does work. I owe that tip to Cate Kennedy, an wonderful and talented Australian writer (contemporary literary). By silence I mean non answers and what is not said. I am filching from Cate here, but at the time she said she filched the example from a student of hers so here goes.

“We need to talk.”
“About what?”
“Us.”
“What us?”

With just this bit of dialogue you can see a lot from what is said and what is unsaid. I find it quite powerful. If only I could be so innovative in my dialogue. I keep striving for it though.

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It’s been a good 20 years since I went to university, so it has been an interesting experience doing a post-graduate certificate in Professional Writing (Editing) and the University of Canberra. For me it has been like putting my toe in the water, seeing whether me and study mix.

The first subject was Introduction to Editing. No real choice here as there are only 4 subjects all told. I guess if I like the certificate I can try for the Graduate Diploma and then maybe a Masters. It really depends what I can get out of it and the cost, of course. Not cheap to do post graduate study.

The certificate will be useful for work. I write reports but also edit them. I could, in theory, help out with editing other reports when required. Mind you audit reports well they are not much fun and do take a lot to write and edit.

Next semester is Advanced Editing and requires a decent-sized editing project from start to finish. I’m still trying to figure out what I would like to do. I think I’d like to do fiction.

So this course has been interesting. Some parts were easy for me. I’ve edited a couple of collections, an anthology and a novel. I’ve laid out books, organised printing and launched them. So I have a bit of grounding in the industry and the course covered some of that. We covered substantive editing, copy editing and proofreading. We covered the various roles of the publishing team and freelance editing. We had editing exercises, some of which were challenging. Most of them were very interesting in that we had to think about what the text was to convey.

I found the major assignment tough. It was an editing project with a couple of written pieces such as the letter to the publisher with the approach and thoughts on the work to be done and a letter to the author as well as the mark up of the piece. The other exercise was developing a style guide. I chose Hammer and Bolter, the Black Library’s ezine. That was kind of cool and the class really responded well to the presentation.

Today we had the final exam. I thought it was reasonably tough, mostly because it was not what I was expecting. I had been swatting hyphens and correct words and grammar and there wasn’t any of that. I forgot to mention about the enforcement of the style guide in the answer to what is copy editing. Darn it. Very important thing to miss out, seeing half the learning was about that. I completed the test with some time to go over a few things and pick up more proofreading bits and reorganise the mark up on the major piece in the exam.

I think I passed the test. Of course I’m hoping I aced it but you know…I have to wait and see. My marks so far have been good. I do know that I have issues with proofreading. I lost marks in my assignments for stupid errors I made and didn’t pick up when I did my read through.

I’m free now to write, read, knit and veg in front of DVDs, well until next semester. Look out revision because here I come.

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Reading is a very good way to learn the craft of writing, particularly if you notice something and analyse it. This is not always easy when you are enjoying yourself in reading a book. However, after awhile something jumps out at you as being quite nifty and it is worth the time to consider it.

This happened to me while reading Zoo City by Lauren Beukes. Okay so this book won the Arthur C Clarke award this year. It goes without saying that there is some good stuff in this novel and my example is only a very small part of it.

One particularly thing, which I will call technique or story craft, jumped out at me, probably because my partner, who is also a writer, suggested something similar to me in my rewrite/revision on my current MS.

Put simply, this is interweaving dialogue and action to vary delivery, convey other things other than just the words passing between the characters. If you think about it. It becomes rather tedious if all through your novel you have people nodding, sighing, standing up, pacing, sitting down…all real actions but very  mundane when piled up over the course of 100,000 words. When the characters are doing something else that can lift the dialogue out of its daily grind. I recall Valerie Parv giving some advice at a romance writing workshop. something along the lines of taking something ordinary, like a kiss or a marriage proposal and putting it somewhere different. A proposal at a restaurant is very run of the mill, make it the parking lot and straight away there is something interesting going on.

So I am going to relate the scene from Zoo City, which is a high end example of this feathering technique. This is because Beukes is doing a lot here with this scene.

The set up is that the main character Zinzi December has been tasked to find a teenager. She needs to talk to the twin brother, who being a teenager (and a pop star)  isn’t interested and is also playing a computer game. Seeing the situation as it is this is what she does:

“This is two player, right?”

“Yeah, but-”

“Killing aliens with S’bu Radebe. That’s profile gold. Credo will love it.”

‘They’re Cthul’mites actually.”

“Whatever. They all bleed the same.”

From the player screen, I select the huge black guy character with Mike Tyson tattoos on his face and whipblades mounted in his forearms. Nice to see game designers keeping up the stereotypes.

“You any good?” S’bu give me a sideways glance.

“Fucking terrible. It’s all you.”

“Oh great.”  But he cracks the slightest of smiles.

…..

Zinzi mentions she doesn’t want a beer because she doesn’t want to go into rehab in discussion with some of the other characters.

Then…

My health is dwindling, one point at a time. I’m down to 22 per cent. “So which rehab did you go to?”

“Listen, just ‘cos we’re both in recovery doesn’t make us best friends or nothing.”

“I did mine in prison. Involuntary.”

This is a cut up version of the actual text. Things are happening here on many levels. Beukes makes it interesting. It’s not just question answer. There’s action externally and internally. By playing a computer game with S’bu, Beukes is able to relate a lot of things about him. He’s not really interested in what is going on around him. He’s suspicious, distrusting and a typical teenager in many ways. The game playing, the game character’s health is signifying the amount of time she has to crack S’bu, to manage to strike a chord with him. As they play she dances around, taking the edges lightly. He’s fencing with her not engaging. His mates get some beer and her opening comes up. Just as she is running out of time/health she nails him. After this scene, he sits up takes notice, asks questions.

By feathering in the dialogue with the action, Beukes has been able to convey a deeply enriched scene.

Prior to reading this book, Matthew Farrer, my partner took a look at my prologue. He made a suggestion about feathering some thoughts into paragraph and how that might work. I was down on myself , thinking I’m not smart, I don’t think of these things myself. Now, particularly seeing it elsewhere, I recognise it for what it is: a technique, something clever you can do to craft your writing.

Here is my before and after example.

Before:

He smiled to himself as he tucked into his dinner of roast beef, crispy Yorkshire pudding and baked potatoes. His friend, Miss Blake, reportedly ran a very strict school. He had no doubt that all of Miss Hardcastle’s wayward ways would be curbed and that a nice marriageable young lady would be produced at the end of four years or so. He considered his role of guardian well and truly in hand as he sat by the hearth, sipping some very nice port and smoking a cheroot.

After:

He smiled to himself as he tucked into his roast beef. His friend, Miss Blake, ran a very strict school. He cut into the crispy Yorkshire pudding. All of Miss Hardcastle’s wayward habits would be curbed and a nice marriageable young lady would be produced at the end of four years or so. By the time he finished off the baked potato and soaked up the last of the gravy, he considered his role of guardian well in hand.

Here Matthew suggested the feathering the eating with the thinking. I also trimmed a bit. I think it works better. He cuts up and disposes of his meal, while he mentally cuts up and disposes of his ward.

I have since found some other scenes where I do this. I don’t want to over do it. So another little trick in the craft of writing.

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I’ve been on a bit of retreat, trying to get that revision done. I told myself at first that I didn’t have a goal. Then I thought I would get half way through, which I did. However, that is just the first run through. Annoying as it seems I’m not done with it. I try to be one of those who write very close to final draft, but I find I am not. I don’t seem to be able to frame everything at the same time. For example, I’ll write an action scene and map it all out. I have to go back then to add the character, the thoughts, emotions etc. Checking the punctuation too often is done last. I put commas in and I pull them out. I rearrange sentences. Often  I find when I’m drafting I do the dialogue and I get so into it, they end up being talking heads so I have to go back and add the action, the scene etc.

This time I struggled with my frustration. I wanted to get it done and done right. Yet I had to own that I was really trying to rush things, being impatient, when what I needed was to take my time and consider what I am doing. This also leads to laziness. If it reads okay I’ll leave it alone. That’s just naughty I reckon. I’m so focused on making it to the end that I am not paying attention where I should. So I will plod along now and get things done in a focused, but considered manner. I go back to work tomorrow so I don’t have the luxury I had over the last week or so. This weekend is rather busy and I have to study for my editing exam.

My problem is that I love first drafts. I love being free to immerse myself in the story. Second and later drafts require thinking, hard work, perseverance, better writing and crafting of the story. So I wrote a story down but crafting it makes it better. It is making a scene edgier, scarier, grittier. Or it is making that dialogue sing rather than clunk, clever and elegant instead of a grunting mass of words.

Editing I find has processes like writing too. There’s the substantive or structural edit where things are moved around, re-sequenced to make the story flow, reorder it. Then there is the copy edit, fixing up the grammatical stuff, changing words, deleting things, fixing continuity errors. Finally, there is the proofread, which picks up everything (or tries to), making sure the sentences are complete and make sense, making sure all the editorial changes are correct, checking facts. For some proofreaders it takes a few run throughs to pick it all up. Myself, when I am working on a report, particularly the copy and proof stages, I will concentrate of different things on each run through such as headings, footnotes, then the tables and and the figures. When I think about it that way I don’t feel as bad about how many times I have to work on a draft. It sort of seems natural

So I should stop writing about it and get back to it.

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Yesterday, as I mentioned we went off to the Hyatt to have high tea. Both Nicole (website) and I are partial to high tea. She outdid me by dressing up for the event.

The venue is rather classy. It is a buffet style affair, with little sandwiches, such as cucumber or smoked salmon and hot savories. The sweets were enough to boggle the eyes and overextend the stomach. I realise now that I should have taken a photo of the spread.

I like high tea in those individual tiered plates (again Nicole and I want to race out and buy one), but the buffet was wonderful. I have been thinking to host a shabby chic high-tea myself for some time. I’ve been buying Royal Albert teacups for the purpose (the chic), all mis-matched to make it shabby.

Matthew, Nicole, Erana (my daughter) and James (my son), went along together. The idea for the gig actually came from Matthew’s parents, who couldn’t make it. (we are going back next week for theirs).

Starting from 2.30 and at $35 per head, it is a lovely way to spend the afternoon. I have a few photos but some of the better ones are on my daughter’s camera.

It wasn’t crowded or anything and the adults were offered a glass of champagne, which was quite nice. We sat and sipped, chatting for a bit. Then I said to James to go to the buffet and start.

We all dug in and once we ordered our teas and coffees, the champagne glass was removed. I started with a finger sandwich of smoked salmon and Nicole put a cucumber one on my plate. Then I tried a egg/cucumber mayonnaise thing and tried a tomato/capsicum puff pastry and a vegetarian quiche. I think I went back for seconds but had just the egg/cucumber combo and another little quiche.

Then there was the sweets. On display were brightly-coloured macarons. I am very partial to those so I tried a green one, which was a bit disappointing. It had no flavour. James said I shouldn’t have had it because it was obviously all food colouring. Sigh. (the wisdom of youth).

I cut a slice of bread and butter pudding (warm) and poured custard and a dollop of cream on it. It was amazing. However, as much as I wanted to try the pavlova, the mudcake, the lemon meringue, the meringue with cream, the brownies and other stuff, I could not.

Here is a picture of the ceiling detail. I did not have the nerve to take a photo of the footman in their costumes.

Ceiling at the Hyatt Canberra (built 1924)

I ordered English Breakfast tea but was accidently given Earl Grey. However, they happily changed it and there was no marring of my enjoyment.

Me with tea

You see I forgot to stick my pinky out. Oh dear!

Here is a photo of Nicole and me with our bubbly! See how nicely dressed she is. Put me to shame for not getting into the spirit of things.

Nicole and me and bubbly

Matthew bought me a lovely gift ( a request)- a shiny red Ipad cover. Here’s me with James.

Me, James and pressie

Here is a picture of Nicole’s dessert plate. Not sure if that was her first or second helping…

No sign of weight watchers here

I don’t have a photo of me and Matthew yet. I have to wait for Erana to send me one of hers. Here is Erana and Nicole posing for another camera I think.

Nicole and Erana

The last photo for the moment is the awful group shot. All of us look slightly weird in it. Until I find a better…here goes.

An awful group shot.

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