OK got feedback from senior editor. Need to do one more round of revisions. But the feedback was she went over two chapters and pointed out where there poor transitions, and lack of clarity and so on.
And then she told me go through the rest of the book and find where the same problems were through out. And OK poor transitions I can find. But would it be unreasonable to ask her to go through the rest of the book and point out anything she finds unclear? Because while I understand that stuff that is clear to me might be unclear to a reader, it occurs to me that pointing out where this is happening is something an editor might do. Am I misunderstanding the role of an editor?
OH and total congrats to Barb! Been a bit distracted.
Congratulations Barb! That's awesome!
Go you Amy! Running out of books is a great problem to have.
But would it be unreasonable to ask her to go through the rest of the book and point out anything she finds unclear?
An editor should be editing your entire book, not a representative sample. She should absolutely be pointing out which parts she finds unclear, or thinks might be unclear to a reader.
Given the conversation in Natter (on Plan B), Maggie Steifvater's two recent blog posts about the publishing industry and writerly jealousy are really timely.
The second one is the one I linked -- the first one is linked within the post.
Some comments by JZ on her parish have inspired a bit of flash fiction.
The Cats and the Birdhouse.
There was once a mighty birdhouse built by One who greatly cared for his sparrows. And that birdhouse contained an endless source of sustenance that never ran out. And the sparrows visited it daily and were thereby nourished. But, cats soon noted the great sparrow gathering and made their homes there and preyed upon the sparrows and declared themselves Princes of the birdhouse.
And most of the sparrows soon took it for granted that a birdhouse should be surrounded by cats. After all it was a special birdhouse built by one who greatly cared for them. So they continued to feed there generation after generation. Both the sparrows and the cats ate their fill.
Occasionally a sparrow would say that it was not right that Princes of the birdhouse should prey upon those the birdhouse was built to nourish. But even those sparrows continued to flock there; for they were brave sparrows would not be driven away from a place built for them. Then one day an especially wise sparrow gathered the other sparrows unto her and said: "Let us seek nourishment somewhere else. For, lo, these many generations, the birdhouse has ceased to be a bird feeder and served as a cat feeder."
I'm getting back into writing Cog after life got me a bit derailed. I just finished chapter 23 and I'm at 57,000 words. I wanted to end up around 75,000 words. Looking at the amount of plot left, it seems like I should be in the ballpark. I think I'd be happy anywhere in the range of 70,000 - 80,000 words.
I pretty much know everything that's going to happen from here to the end, I just have to have time to write it.
Yeah, it's harder to carve out time with the job search, and with it being summer.
You'll find time, though.
