Introducing “Ask Victoria” — Editorial Column in the Upcoming WU Newsletter
By Victoria Mixon | January 13, 2012 |
Therese and Kath here to introduce the newest member of the WU team. You’ve seen independent editor Victoria Mixon here before. We love her for her ability to plumb the depths of craft knowledge, her commitment to making hard-to-understand concepts understandable, and her personality. So when she offered to provide a column to us for the upcoming WU newsletter–a column full of craft and editorial questions provided by our readers, and answered in advice-column style–we couldn’t resist. We thought it could be a good idea to give you a taste of what she’ll be offering readers in her “Ask Victoria” column for us, so that’s what today’s post is all about.
A big thanks to the WU Facebook Community for sending questions to Victoria; she’ll be using several of them moving forward. You can submit questions too, by leaving them for Victoria here in comments. Enjoy!
Dear Victoria, Column One
Dear Victoria,
Aside from meticulous proofreading, how can we, as writers, make your job easier?
Signed,
Hungry for Knowledge (AKA Kristin Pedroja)
Dear Hungry (AKA Kristin),
The best thing you can do, as a writer, is be open to the extraordinary complexity, scope, and sheer hard labor of writing a novel. Random typos aren’t a problem. But you must set your ego tenderly aside and bring to your editor your deep and abiding passion for this manuscript and this craft.
Although I’ve worked with dozens of clients, I’ve never seen a manuscript that didn’t need a lot of work. And these are final drafts! Novels that clients have brought to me secretly thinking, ‘She’s going to catch a few typos and tell me she stands in awe.’ I know this because they tell me about it later, laughing after they’ve learned just how much more there is to the story they want to tell—how much deeper and more satisfying this work is than they ever dreamed, but how much more complicated.
In three years, I’ve only had one client ever respond really badly to the Developmental Letter I sent, and that was someone whose goals for their novel conflicted head-on and with great vigor with the goals of publishers and—more importantly—readers. I was nice to them about it. I’m always nice. But unless you’ve already been published and/or worked in publishing, you probably don’t entirely know what a difficult job it is to make readers addicted to reading, publishers wild to publish.
At first it can seem like too much to ask that you perform that huge job, especially when you’re already staggering from the work of producing all those words in the first place. So getting advice might not always feel terrific. Initially, it can feel quite overwhelming.
And that’s okay! You’re addicting to writing, so writing is what you do. It’s wonderful work! It’s a fabulous life. And it’s not intuitive, how to step out of the role of writer into the role of a scientist who studies readers and the novels they have made canonical over the decades, or into the shoes of a literary therapist whose work is to teach writers to understand stories from the reader’s (quite specific) perspective, with all its hidden expectations.
I can absolutely assure you that your initial sense of overwhelm will transform magically into ever-growing, passionate enthusiasm, so long as you keep your focus on the work and the joy of learning and communicate freely with your editor. All those effusive praises from clients that I put up on my blog? All from writers who’ve been through the fires.
Choose an independent editor you really like, someone you can trust. . .and then trust them. If they’re hurtful about how they give their advice, you know, walk away. But so long as it’s clear they’re working always for the success of your novel and from a fund of extensive knowledge, and they’re nice to you and encouraging of your skills and potential, and they let you know they understand how hard it is to write a novel and, especially, to get edited—be open.
That editor is your angel.
Best,
Victoria
Have questions for Victoria? Leave them here in comments, and you may see them answered in an upcoming edition of the WU Newsletter.
Victoria Mixon has been a professional writer and editor for more than thirty years and now works as an independent editor through her blog, A. Victoria Mixon, Editor. Most recently she is the author of Art & Craft of Writing: Secret Advice for Writers. She is also the author of The Art & Craft of Fiction: A Practitioner’s Manual, and The Art & Craft of Story: 2nd Practitioner’s Manual, as well as co-author of Children and the Internet: A Zen Guide for Parents and Educators. Always on the look-out for quality editing clients, she can be found on Google+ and Twitter.
Oh so exciting, to have you on board for the newsletter, Victoria. I think I am as ready as I’ll ever be to walk through the fires. I’ve been close enough to feel the heat, enough to know that it’ll be painful for a time. But I know I want to–as Jim Morrison put it–“break on through to the other side.”
I would say welcome to the WU community, but you were already here. So I’ll just say thanks for a great opening salvo! I’m looking forward to more!
Great inaugural effort, Victoria. Your advice is sound and well-said. I look forward to your column!
Excellent, succinct advice. I have written quite a bit in my life, but just now am considering the whole ‘pro’ realm of it, so this was quite helpful. Thanks so much.
I’m a huge believer in independent editing. And I’d be disappointed if an editor failed to provide big picture feedback. Put more bluntly: If your editor is doing nothing but catching typos, I think you need to reassess your relationship.
YAY, VICTORIA!!! Welcome to the WU team! :D
Ha! I’m so secretly wanting any future editor to hand me back my manuscript with nothing but a smile. But I know that’s not going to happen, and reading what you’ve written here, I’m actually kind of excited for whatever editing suggestions may come my way!
“I can absolutely assure you that your initial sense of overwhelm will transform magically into ever-growing, passionate enthusiasm, so long as you keep your focus on the work and the joy of learning and communicate freely with your editor.”
Wonderful and hopeful. Glad you’re officially on the WU team, Victoria! I look forward to learning a ton from you.
Can’t wait to read more of your columns! Today’s made me smile because I’m currently rewriting a book that I thought was ‘perfect’ two years ago. Ackk! It still needed so much work and I’m sure it still does. I’m slowly unearthing the gold!
Excellent advice. I look forward to reading more of your columns as I trudge through the first draft of my novel.
You guys, I’m so pleased to be here! Thank you, Therese and Kath, for inviting me. And thank you, the rest of you, for the incredibly warm welcome!
If you have questions for the column, please feel free to load up the comments section with them here. They can be as general or specific as you like:
What’s the most important element of a plot?
What’s it really like to go through the publishing process?
How do I choose between ‘that’ and ‘which’?
What if it turns out I don’t like my protagonist? [specifics here]
I’ve backed my protagonist into an impossible corner—[specifics here]—now how do I end my story?
I’m looking forward to being a part of the WU team and getting to know all of you!
I love the advice column style and am looking forward to reading more of these!
Little freaked out that you’ve never seen a manuscript that didn’t need a LOT of work, but at the same time it makes me feel better about my own–it’s always good to know that nothing else was perfect on the first or third or nth draft, and it’s not just me struggling to write something perfect.
Love this! What a great addition to WU.
Such a nice article! I’ve found the idea of the advice column style genial. And Victoria seems to be a really nice person, can’t wait to read something from her.
We’re so excited to have you on board, Victoria. We know you’re going to be great!
I love the idea of this column, and I’ve got a question (thrusts hand into air and waves it wildly a la Hermione Granger)!
Okay, so I understand that the protag of a novel must undergo change/must ‘arc’/must come through a different person at the end of the story. I can handle that with my protag, but it’s with mapping out the arcs of the other characters that I’m running up against challenges. So every character needs to ‘arc’: well, is there a handy way to map out or express this change visually that would help me get clear about all these arcs? It is a lot to juggle, and a lot to sustain through the writing (and rewriting) of a MS.
Thank you Victoria, any advice would be welcome!
Thank you for the question, Allison. It’s a fabulous one!
And it’s going in the Ask Victoria in-box right now. :)
I love that you are part of WU now, Victoria! I have been following you for a while and each and every time I read one of your posts, I find myself nodding my head and taking mental notes.
I look forward to seeing all the answers you provide here as well!
Hi Victoria, and thank you for answering my question! It makes me think about how some of my favorite books were shaped by a collaboration between editor and writer (Fitzgerald and Perkins springs to mind). What a joy, to share a passion for a story, and to see it morph into something beautiful.
Really looking forward to your future columns. Thanks again.
Oh, Kristin, would you believe I am right now reading Maxwell Perkins: Editor of Genius? Fascinating stuff! Yes, he did a lot of work for Fitzgerald (and Hemingway), but what I didn’t know is that the author he edited most deeply was Thomas Wolfe. Wolfe originally brought him a 300-page manuscript. How’s that for a challenge! Perkins turned it into Look Homeward, Angel.
He also helped his writers by coming up with ideas for books. Rowling’s classic The Yearling was based on an idea of Perkins’.
I love this post. I was one of those writers you mention . . . someone who thinks her manuscript is perfect! And agent-ready! And the independent editor will throw down his pen and say, “You don’t need me!”
Ha. I hired a guy who gave my book a major overhaul. He was blunt, honest, and RIGHT. It just took me a while to see his rightness. I remember one of his comments (it was on the EIGHTH page of a chapter). He wrote, “This is the first interesting sentence I’ve read in this chapter.”
Ouch. But I also knew he liked the book and believed in its potential so while the feedback was tough to hear, I trusted him.
Thanks, Victoria, for the post, and for reminding us that a great book has many professionals behind it.
Ah, Sarah, I’m glad you were happy with his edit! But I would never write that to a writer. My own writerly feelings are too tender.
I’m actually a big wimp myself.
How great to have your as a contributor to WU! This is so exciting. And I love the idea of an advice column. I look forward to reading the questions and your answers.
Patti
I’m thrilled you are here, Victoria! This is a very timely post for me. Thanks a million.
Love the new series! Looking forward to learning/reading more!
Victoria,
Welcome to the WU team. I’ve always enjoyed reading your advice on your website. Thanks for sharing your expertise with this wonderful group.
Thanks, WU-ters, for your collective generosity! This is my favorite blog for writing.
Dear Victoria,
I am going thru my (very) roughdraft of my first novel. In the middle third of the story I started using a 3rd person, “limited” POV in scenes that don’t include my female MC. My male MC has a secret that makes for a big plot-twist later. I didn’t want to tell the story in his POV–keeping the suprise under wraps seems impossible (and like cheating) if I use 1st person with him. Otherwise, I use 1st person (my MC’s POV) to tell the story.
I like my MC’s “voice” and I don’t want to lose that feel in the story. Is it okay to switch back and forth as long as I make it clear whose head we’re in? (I tried not to end that sentence with a preposition but I gave up. And, there I go again.)
Thanks,
Emily
Thanks for the question, Emily! It’s shooping right into the Ask Victoria file this minute.
Oh, and the whole preposition thing? A red herring. That rule actually refers to Latin, which has a very different syntax from English. Don’t worry about it.
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