Mary Martin, Ph.D.

Yes, Editors Will Change Your Book

I received a hilarious e-mail from a friend whom I've been consulting during his process of writing his book and getting an agent and a publisher.

He has a great deal that includes a movie, a television series, and a bunch of money (like, hundreds of thousands of dollars), and this is is first book and he's not even a writer.

Here's the e-mail:

I received the editors edits yesterday. My book is now in a mostly unrecognizable form. What had been a low brow, puerile, jejune adventure in ******** is now a thoughtful, mature story of life passage.

I suppose this is normal, or is it?

Yes, in fact it is normal. And you can fight it if you want. You might even win a couple of battles. But the editor's job is to use your manuscript to create (recreate) the book that is the most marketable. A team of people (not including the editor, often) crafts the sometimes-new angle (or voice) of your book, and the editor's job, like the film editor's job, is to cut the product to fit the vision of the director (publisher).

Though many people would respond: How on earth can you complain about anything when you have a deal like that, imagine if there were things about your book that someone tinkered with. A lot of things. Things on every page.

I hope that someday you're in a position to even have the opportunity for such a problem.

The Outline: A Double-Edged Sword

I've been busy with several projects, including my daily blog, Animal Person, which unfortunately takes precedence. But I'm back on track and there's an issue important to two jobs I'm currently working on: a documentary and a book. The issue is that an outline can be your best friend or your worst enemy.

In documentary filmmaking and nonfiction book writing, you can begin working with what you want to say. Perhaps you already know what your topic and your thesis is. The outline process, then, is about listing evidence/research/details/statistics that explain your topic and support your thesis. Your work, then, is about finding that evidence and then writing it (or filming it) and editing it. And you end where you began: with your thesis that you've just proven or illustrated.

The problem with the outline is that, depending on who's using it, there might be a propensity to stick to the outline and thereby prevent other interesting information or angles from emerging, as the priority is sticking to the outline. This can easily result in a great product, but it can also result in a product that could have had more depth or character or complexity. It could have been far more intriguing.

There's an uncertainty and often an anxiety of flying without a net when you toss your outline completely or at least veer from it. But that's usually when things are beginning to get really interesting.

I won't say that disregarding your outline is something everyone can do and then create a different, better project in the end. But I do think it's something everyone should try, because the more you do it, the better you get at coping with the feelings of insecurity (and often terror) that accompany letting your story tell itself and not imposing yourself on it so much by directing its every twist and turn.

Please note that letting your story emerge always takes longer than deciding what your story is in advance (in my experience). And if you're hiring people to help you, it costs more if you're putting the decision making into the hands of editors (as then their job is technically development, as well). But it usually results in a richer end product, and that makes the uncertainty, the headaches and the extra expense worthwhile.

On Bill Bryson's Dictionary for Writers and Editors

I just finished Bill Bryson's Dictionary for Writers and Editors, which, like his other books, is entertaining and helpful.

Reading it like a regular book (as opposed to a dictionary) isn't what I'd recommend, as if you spent hours at a time with it you could easily retain very little. What you'd come away with is: If I ever have a question about usage or spelling, I should consult Bill's book first.

With each letter (it is a dictionary, remember), you'll learn things you didn't know, clarify things you were fuzzy on, and realize some things you would've bet your net worth on are incorrect. There are also words, names and places you never heard of, and when you're finished reading at least you can say you've been introduced to them.

Here are some of my favorites:

• admit to is nearly always wrong. You admit a misdeed; you do not admit to it (5).
• aggravate. Strictly, means to make a bad situation worse. If you walk on a broken leg, you may aggravate the injury. People can never be aggravates, only circumstances (7).
• bereft. To be bereft of something is not to lack it but to be dispossessed of it, to lose it. A spinster is not bereft of a husband, but a widow is. (The word is the past participle of bereave.) (37)
• center around. Center indicates a point, and a point cannot encircle anything. Make it "center on" or "revolve around" (64).
• different. Often used unnecessarily, as in "It is found in more than 250 different types of plants." In such constructions it can nearly always be deleted without loss (96).
• effete does not mean effeminate and weak, as it is often used. It means exhausted and barren. An effete poet is not necessarily foppish, but rather someone whose creative impulses are spent (108).
• gamy. Not -ey (135).
• high jinks ( two words) is the usual spelling, though some dictionaries also accept hijinks. The derivation is unknown, but it is not related (or to be confused with) jinx as in bad luck. The word can be used as either singular or plural (159).
• if and when. Almost always unnecessary. Choose one or the other (170).
• jamb. Not jam. A doorpost or similar (183).
• lacy. Not -ey (197).
• major, as in a "major initiative," "major embarrassment," "major undertaking," and so on, remains a severely overworked words, and this brings a kind of tofu quality to much writing, giving it bulk but little additional flavor. Nearly always it is worth the effort of trying to think of a more precise or expressive term (214).
• nauseous is an adjective describing something that causes nausea ("a nauseous substance"). To feel sick is to be nauseated (237).
• originally is often needlessly inserted into sentences where it conveys no additional information, as here: "The plans were originally drawn up as long ago as 1972" (Observer) (250).
• replete is not merely full but overfull, stuffed (291).
• schadenfreude. (Ger.) Deriving pleasure from the misfortunes of others; pronounced shah-den-froy-duh (302).
• thinking to oneself, as in "I thought to myself: 'We're lost,'" is always tautological; there is no one else to whom one can think. Delete "to myself." Similarly vacuous is "in my mind" in constructions like "I could picture in my mind where the offices had been" (331).
• vocal cords. Not chords. Vocal cords are so called because of their shape and structure, not because of their tonal qualities (354).

I don't know about you, but I'm fairly good at eliminating excess verbiage when writing (because I usually edit), but when I read Bryson's book, I realize that my speech is a disaster!

What is "Voice?"

I've written a book about my experiences with animals who have died shortly after they've met my acquaintance. After over 100 animal deaths, and about the same number of animals who didn't die after meeting me, I came to certain conclusions about the place of animals in our lives. These conclusions are far from what mainstream Americans believe, and I understand that my book is a tough sell and needs someone with a unique set of traits to champion it.

One of those traits, unfortunately, is an appreciation of the macabre and a sense of humor and irony. And those come through in the "voice" of the book, which two agents have told me they found, shall we say, not to their liking.

Now, I can easily write something in a different voice, but I am a bit dark and twisted by nature. Furthermore, what the world doesn't need is another sweet book about a person whose relationship with a dog or cat makes them realize that there just might be something more to nonhumans than instincts and reflexes.

Voice is very subjective, and though there are many criticisms that you shouldn't take seriously, voice isn't one of them. Your voice is the personality--the person--behind the writing. And when someone doesn't like the voice of your writing they're sort of saying they don't like you--the way you present yourself in your work.

If you're a journalist, voice should be something no one notices, as you're reporting and your personality shouldn't be noticeable. But if you provide commentary--think Andy Rooney--people will react to what you say, but they might react more to how you say it. Your diction, syntax, tone, inflection and pauses tell your listener a lot about you and how you see the world. And the same is true of your writing.

If an agent or publisher doesn't like the voice of your work, it shouldn't be entirely surprising as you should choose agents and publishers wisely, based on whether they have appreciated writing or topics similar to yours in the past. If your work has a distinctive voice that you know isn't for everyone, here's my advice: Your topic is secondary to voice when you're searching for agents and publishers (unless you change the voice, which I can do with a rewrite of about a month, and it will be far more acceptable for most people, but that's not the book I want to write). For instance, though it's important to find someone who wants to read about animals, it's more important to find someone who appreciates quirky or dark voices.

What's the most distinguishing quality of your book? Is it the topic, the genre, the voice? Whatever it is, find someone who appreciates that quality, and assuming your writing is great, the rest should fall into place eventually.

On the Lack of "Fairness" in Publishing

A friend just received a $200,000 advance on a book that is about something timely and has a significant celebrity and beautiful-people component to it, and let's just say it's not what one might call serious literature (nor is it meant to be). Another friend commented on how "unfair" that was.

Here's my advice: If you think about the publishing business in terms of fairness, you'll drive yourself to fits of rage. Publishing is a business and, generally speaking, its goal is to profit from the sale of books (and rights and ancillary products, etc...). If a large mainstream publisher has a choice between signing an author with a sexy book that will appeal to enormous numbers of women (we are the ones buying most of the books), or a more artful book with a more narrow appeal, who do you think is getting a book deal?

Now, small and independent publishers often have missions that do not begin with: Make as much money and appeal to the most people as possible.

If your niche-y idea, well-written of course, is rejected by large publishers, that's probably because a large publisher isn't the right place for your book. If you want a huge publishing house to sign you, you have to offer it a huge publishing house-kind of book, including a great platform.

Do yourself a favor and eliminate the word "fair" from your vocabulary. Think instead in terms of matching your work with the right publisher and doing your part to demonstrate you have what it takes to work with that publisher.

What Are You Waiting For? Write!

I've received several e-mails (you can reach me at mary@marymartin.net) from people who know, deep down, that they are writers, but who haven't tried to write anything (for publication or otherwise), and haven't tried to get a job that involves writing.

I have nothing to say other than: What are you waiting for? Do you need permission? And if so, from whom? Is some person in your life supposed to acknowledge your writer-ness, after which time you'll find it acceptable to write? Do you feel like if your job involves writing that doesn't make you a real writer (I suffered from that one for years)? Is it that the sheer quantity of writers in the world is so intimidating that you can't possibly imagine anything good coming of you beginning to write (when there are already millions of writers)?

First, let me say that you're not writing for anyone else, unless your job is to write. And if you are actually getting paid to write, you should consider yourself lucky because for every job you do and get paid for, there are writers who would agree to do the same job without pay, just for the experience.

If you are writing for yourself, you aren't in competition with anyone else. It doesn't matter how many romance novelists there are. If what's screaming to get out of you is a romance novel, What are you waiting for? Write!

An exercise I'm fond of doing with my clients is The Excuse List. List all of the reasons you haven't begun (or finished) writing whatever it is you want to write. Then, play devil's advocate with yourself and address each of your excuses. I promise you, it will be very easy to debunk all of the myths you've created for yourself that allow you to not pursue what you say you want to pursue.

Confront all of your excuses and, next to each one, write the objection to your excuse that makes it look ludicrous (that's how it usually happens). No one else is watching. Be honest with yourself and put all of your excuses to rest, once and for all (or at least for today). Finally, ask yourself: Am I able to devote 20 minutes to writing today? No? How about 10? Whatever number you come up with, write for that period of time, today. Then tomorrow write for that period of time, as well. If you can't, ask yourself why not? Repeating The Excuse List exercise will take at least a couple of minutes. Wouldn't you rather use that time to write?

What Are You Waiting For? Write!

Some of My Favorite Writing Books

Whether writing is a hobby, a passion or a career for you, it would behoove you to read about writing. I was recently asked to list some of my favorite books about writing, grammar, punctuation and style. Without further ado . . .

• Lapsing Into a Comma and The Elephants of Style by Bill Walsh (who has a great blog at TheSlot.com.
• The First Five Pages and A Dash of Style by Noah Lukeman.
• Woe is I by Patricia T. Conner (who has some great grammar myths here).
• On Writing Well by William Zinsser.
• Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott.
• Eats, Shoots & Leaves by Lynne Truss.

The dominant theme in most of these book is that they're funny, and I like to laugh. There's a decent amount of overlap in the material, but considering repetition is the mother of mastery, the overlap can't hurt and is likely to help.

On Style Guides

If your job is to write or edit, chances are you have been given a style guide to help you make important decisions such as which words should be capitalized in a title or headline.

Or whether to hyphenate if you're writing in industry that could easily be overrun by hyphens, such as the financial services industry (or financial-services industry, wherein you'll find estate-planning attorney or estate planning attorney and wealth-management specialist or wealth management specialist).

Or how to punctuate and capitalize the information in bullets.

If you're ever unsure about, for instance, whether you should put a period after the information in a bullet point, here's a tip: Ask if there's a style guide for your work. All publications either follow a style guide or have one of their own (e.g., the New York Times Manual of Style is for the obvious, while most other journalists will follow the Associated Press' Stylebook). Depending on the field, you may have be governed by the Chicago Manual of Style, the APA (American Psychological Association, and it's not just for psychologists) style, or the MLA (Modern Language Association).

If you're writing for yourself, hoping to be published someday, write in the style of the field and genre that you'll soon be a part of. If you're writing for someone, let's say a small company, who doesn't have a stylebook, you should at least always be consistent when it comes to style. Make sure all of your bullets have the same format, punctuation and capitalization. If you use hyphens, make sure you use them in the same way throughout the document.

And if you want to try to make a couple extra bucks (I've done this, by the way), ask your client/employer if you can (for a fee, of course) create a style guide to prevent future streams of questions by allegedly nitpicking writers and editors.

What? You Don't Have A Blog?

A baby boomer client of mine has a great business card and a fabulous logo she paid thousands of dollars for. She also has a website, thank heavens, which gives her another place to show everyone how fabulous her logo is.

But she doesn't have a blog.

Now, that might be fine if her website was interactive and she was constantly in touch with her clients and the site had some kind of mechanism for communication back and forth--not to mention a built-in reason to communicate.

But that's not quite her reality (at least not today, but by next week I'm hoping her reality will change).

Twenty years ago, you needed a great business card and a great logo to be up and running and get the word around about your services. Ten years ago, though you needed a business card, it should have had your website address and e-mail on it. That's what made you cutting edge.

Now, if you're a writer or offering writing or editing services, you'd best have a blog. Why? So you can communicate--daily if necessary--with your audience and/or clients. In this impersonal, global world, they want that vehicle that allows them to feel like you're in their living room. They want the possibility for intimacy.

And if you want to nurture your relationships with them, you need to work on your end, just like in any other relationship. You need to be in touch with them.

People work with people they like and trust. People buy from people they like and trust. Someone might even buy your book despite the fact that the subject matter doesn't interest them--because they like you and trust you.

Part of building rapport in 2008 is maintaining a blog or at least adding an interactive component to your website AND letting your audience know they have a reason to return to it weekly. After all, you can have a complex interactive site, but if no one knows that your site is anything but a showcase for who you are and what you do, it won't help you.

Your goal is for your website and your blog to work for you. To drive you business. To increase your exposure. To build relationships, if for no other reason than to connect with like-minded individuals.

On Outlines for Agents and Publishers

When submitting an outline to an agent or publisher, I refer to my mantra: Give them exactly what they want.

A friend recently asked me to help him with his outline and asked if he was doing it correctly, to which I replied: That depends on what they asked for.

Agents and publishers have "Submission Guidelines" on their sites (and sometimes the guidance is: Unfortunately, we don't accept unsolicited manuscripts. Sometimes they don't even accept queries. But if there is indeed guidance about what to submit, you ought to follow it. And if that means customizing each submission for the person who asked for it, so be it. You customize query letters, don't you? (Now, by "customize," I don't mean you change the gist of your work. But you might change your pitch to that individual based on their tastes or what they have worked on recently.)

Regarding outlines, they are usually of the annotated-table-of-contents variety. This means they want each chapter listed, with a description of the chapter (not the subject). In other words, what happens in the chapter? It begins with A, moves to B, C is introduced, and it ends with D. Note also that there's a formula for how much you should write about each chapter: One sentence for each page (approximately). So a 15-page chapter will be described in 15 sentences. That gives the reader an idea of the length of each section, whether it is written or not.

If, however, the agent or publisher asks for a different variety of outline, you'll create and send an appropriate one. But if you haven't visited their website, you won't know that they have a preference. And in 2008, when it is extremely difficult to get published unless you're a celebrity or you have a well-stocked platform, you need all the help you can get. And that begins with submitting the appropriate material.