2nd and 3rd drafts

[GrammarGoddess]

Ok, so I've gotten a few stories from people to edit, and it's all going well, but I just edited a story that had serious problems with grammar and tense agreement. In the process of editing for that, I realized that more will appear when the author fixes the initial errors. So, my question is:

Is it appropriate to edit, but tell the author that the work is still going to be rough even after the initial edit? Is it appropriate to suggest a 2nd rough draft be written and edited before the author submits?

thanks,
--GG

 

[snooper]

... I just edited a story that had serious problems with grammar and tense agreement. In the process of editing for that, I realized that more will appear when the author fixes the initial errors. ...

I would tell the author what the problem is in more general terms, rather than pointing out particular changes. Then I would suggest a rewrite to fix the general problem, and only then would I give detailed comments.

Oh - and don't expect any thanks, or even a reply from the vast majority of authors you criticise.

 

[Weird Harold]

Ok, so I've gotten a few stories from people to edit, and it's all going well, but I just edited a story that had serious problems with grammar and tense agreement. In the process of editing for that, I realized that more will appear when the author fixes the initial errors. So, my question is:

Is it appropriate to edit, but tell the author that the work is still going to be rough even after the initial edit? Is it appropriate to suggest a 2nd rough draft be written and edited before the author submits?

thanks,
--GG

More thn once, I've spotted consistent trends in a story and rather than do a complete edit and fix all of the occurence of a consistent error sent the story back with a final comment after enough corrections to dmonstrate the problem nd how to fix it.

"this problem occurs throughout the story and you should able to correct the rest of it yourself and then send it back to me for another edit," generally got a good response and second draft that was much less time consuming to edit.

 

[GrammarGoddess]

"this problem occurs throughout the story and you should able to correct the rest of it yourself and then send it back to me for another edit," generally got a good response and second draft that was much less time consuming to edit.

That's nice! Courteous, and eliminates tedious correcting of annoying repetitive errors.

thanks!
--gg

 

[GrammarGoddess]

Oh - and don't expect any thanks, or even a reply from the vast majority of authors you criticise.

That's a good point. I have had thank yous from 2 authors, and that's it. The rest don't contact me again unless they have another story, so I don't know how they did. Good to know it's not just me.

Thank you for that idea. . .general terms for critique, and let the author make the specific corrections.

--gg

 

[Weird Harold]

That's nice! Courteous, and eliminates tedious correcting of annoying repetitive errors.

thanks!
--gg

That "annoying repetitive errors" is what burned me out on editing a couple of years ago and I still haven't recovered.

I did have to explain to a couple of clients the difference between a co-author and an editor. If I feel like I'm taking more time to correct a consistent problem than the client took to write the story, then it starts to feel like co-authoring instead of editing.

 

[snooper]

That "annoying repetitive errors" is what burned me out on editing a couple of years ago and I still haven't recovered. ...

The most infuriating is when you explain a problem (usually a silly one like its and it's) and the author comes back with another story some weeks later with exactly the same errors.

 

[Weird Harold]

The most infuriating is when you explain a problem (usually a silly one like its and it's) and the author comes back with another story some weeks later with exactly the same errors.

That doesn't bother me too much, because I have to corect that repetititive problem in my own work -- and still miss a lot of them.

The kind of thing that burned me out was things like punctuating dialogue -- a VERY easy thing to do properly and one with very few repeat offenders once it's explained.

But going through the SAME explantions of the SAME problems for every new client just got very old and boring.

Use shorter sentences and paragraphs, each change of speaker means a new paragraph, it's not necessary to tag every single bit of dialogue, don't over-control the action, and all of the other mistakes every new author makes were what burned me out.

I think the fact that I only had few repeat clients had a lot to do with the burn-out; I was constantly starting over from the beginning with new clients.

The lack of repeat customers had little to do with dissatisfaction but with the way I approach editing as a tutoring opportunity instead of just a mechanical correction of typos. I tried to make sure that every client knew what I changed/recommended, why I changed/recommended it, and how to avoid repeating the mistake -- and never forgot to comment on what I thought worked well. I didn't so much edit as teach self-editing.

 

[Winemaster]

was wondering if you can check out

I know I have bad grammar, what do you think?



https://forum.literotica.com/showthread.php?t=325294

 

[Halo_n_horns]

Ok, so I've gotten a few stories from people to edit, and it's all going well, but I just edited a story that had serious problems with grammar and tense agreement. In the process of editing for that, I realized that more will appear when the author fixes the initial errors. So, my question is:

Is it appropriate to edit, but tell the author that the work is still going to be rough even after the initial edit? Is it appropriate to suggest a 2nd rough draft be written and edited before the author submits?

thanks,
--GG

I've had a few stories where I edited just so far and then gave into the idea that there's some common sense things that the writer should do before he/she submits to an editor. Then I find a polite way to say it and return the piece to them without finishing the editing.

One or two have taken my advice in the worst possible way rather than viewing my words as constructive. For the most part the others have agreed with what I had to say and took care of the request(s) that I was making before returning the story to me.

Basically, it just seems that if the story writer cares enough about the story to use an editor, then he/she should also care enough to double check their own work before the editor gets it.

 

[GrammarGoddess]

Basically, it just seems that if the story writer cares enough about the story to use an editor, then he/she should also care enough to double check their own work before the editor gets it.

I was really spoiled. The first author to give me a story to read was a retired school teacher. He'd been correcting the standard errors (you're/your, there/their/they're, etc) for 3 decades, so It was really fun to edit his work--punctuation errors mostly. Now I see reading his stuff as kind of a fun break from the same old same old.

--gg