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Do You Need a Developmental Edit? With Sue Brown-Moore – Full Transcript

Intro:

Well, hey there, Writer. Welcome to The Resilient Writers Radio Show. I'm your host, Rhonda Douglas. And this is the podcast for writers who want to create and sustain a writing life they love. 

Because let's face it, the writing life has its ups and downs, and we want to not just write, but also to be able to enjoy the process so that we'll spend more time with our butt-in-chair getting those words on the page. 

This podcast is for writers who love books and everything that goes into the making of them. For writers who want to learn and grow in their craft and improve their writing skills. Writers who want to finish their books and get them out into the world so their ideal readers can enjoy them. Writers who want to spend more time in that flow state. 

Writers who want to connect with other writers to celebrate and be in community, in this crazy roller coaster ride, we call the writing life. We are resilient writers. We're writing for the rest of our lives and we're having a good time doing it. So welcome, Writer. I'm so glad you're here. Let's jump right into today's show. 

Rhonda:

Well, hey there, Writer. Welcome back to another episode of The Resilient Writers Radio Show. And I'm excited today to be speaking with Sue Brown-Moore. 

Sue is a fiction book coach. She's a story smith. She works particularly with romance authors and she does a lot of developmental editing. So we are gonna dive into talking about editing and developmental editing in particular today. So welcome Sue – so glad you're here. 

Sue:

Well, thank you, Rhonda. I am really excited to be here and talk about developmental editing because it is my jam. First of all, I love it so much. But also it is really just the heart. of the story. Like if you're gonna have one kind of editor, well, okay, it's gotta be a copy editor. You gotta have a copy editor. 

But if you need a story editor, man, developmental can really take your story from, I'm not really sure this is great to, I am so proud of this and I cannot wait to release it. 

Rhonda:

So let's define developmental editing. Like what kind of areas would we be getting into with our story if we send it off for a developmental edit?

Sue:

Developmental is all about the story. It's not about the words at the line level and it's not about the style on the page. It is about what happens in the story and whether or not what happens in the story is what will hit your target audience and really resonate with them. 

So a developmental editor has to understand who you are as a writer, like what you want to do, what kind of stories you wanna create. And they also have to understand who your target audience is.

And not just your general target audience, like romance writers or sci-fi, oh sorry, romance readers or sci-fi readers. But like, I want to reach readers who love Regency romance and these specific tropes.

Because the more you can specialize with the developmental editor, the more they can help you reach that specific target audience. So it's really all just about shaping the story to really hit with your audience.

Rhonda:

Okay, and what's your view on when to engage a developmental editor? Should I be working with the developmental editor in a way where like I write 50 pages, I send them to you? 

Or do I want to have a completed draft? What do you think is the best way to go about that? 

Sue:

That is such a good question. And I would say that the answer really depends on you and the editor that you want to work with. 

So for example, when I did developmental editing, which I recently retired from to focus on coaching and teaching...

But when I was doing manuscript edits, I only did full manuscript edits. So I would only take on a project if somebody said, okay, this is done. Like, I don't want any scenes stubbed out. I don't want you to have a little chapter that's like sex scene here. No, I want the full story because I'm gonna see it for the first time once. And I do my best work on the first read. 

But that's me, right? So not all people work that way. So if you were a writer who wants to do everything like all the way and then get that full feedback. That's your kind of editor. 

But if you're somebody who's like, I'm gonna write a chapter and then I want feedback on that chapter, there are editors who do developmental editing who do that too. 

Rhonda:

Okay. I think I've kind of gotten to a place where I think it's possible to get feedback too early. You know what I mean? Especially if you're new to writing because someone will say seven positive things, one negative thing.

And of course we only hear the negative thing and it shuts us down for a while. So I love the approach where you finish your own story and it's as good as you can make it. And then you get a developmental editor to give you feedback. 

So what's the difference between a developmental edit and engaging with a developmental editor and a manuscript evaluation? Are they the same thing?

Sue:

It really depends on who you're working with. So within the fiction industry, within publishing, there are a lot of different definitions, different kinds of editing and even different types of editing. 

So I might be looking for a line editor, but somebody might be like, oh, well, that's actually copy, right? So within developmental editing, the same thing is true. 

For some people, a developmental edit is like a high level, you know, give me your five page story overview, and I'm going to give you a breakdown of that. I think that's a lot harder because a lot of people are not good at writing that kind of overview, especially if you're a pantser. Right? 

Rhonda:

The summary, yeah. 

Sue:

Yeah, the summaries can be really hard. And if you're not really good at that, then that style is not gonna be good for you. 

And then there's also people who do like different intensities of developmental edits. So my style when I did edits was really intense, really long, I would write anywhere between, I think my shortest was six pages, but 20 to 60 page manuscript evaluations which was basically a report that was like, here is a breakdown of all the various things. 

We talked about pacing, scene level, character development, plot specific plot pieces, tropes, all the things that I knew the audience is gonna care about that I saw in the story. And I had sort of a checklist that I looked for. 

But there are some people that will simply give you just a bullet, you know, five or six bullet points and that's it. So it really depends on what you need as a writer and what the person that you are working with wants to give you. So you wanna find that perfect partnership.

Rhonda:

Right. I think that's so important. I've talked to a couple of folks recently from my First Book Finish program who decided to engage editors and it went wrong. You know, like what the editor gave them was not what they thought they were getting. 

So do you have any advice for us based on your experience of being an editor of how to effectively hire an editor so that you get what you, what you're looking for? 

Sue:

Yeah. Word of mouth is your best tool. That is your best friend. So if you have somebody in a critique group of yours or a writing group of yours or somebody that you respect who has a similar style to you as a writer, and they've had a really good experience with someone, have a conversation with that person. 

A lot of developmental editors offer free consults. So there's a couple different ways that you can kind of get a sample with an editor. One is they will actually do a sample edit. I used to do these in the beginning. Sometimes they're paid, sometimes they're free.

I don't really think that they are as effective as having a conversation with the editor because first of all, developmental editing is about the whole story. The whole story. And when you give somebody a sample, they're only seeing a small piece. 

And often that piece that we get is like the first three chapters. And if you enter any kind of writing contest, you have polished those first three chapters until they shine, right? So they're gonna look really good and it's not really a good representation of what the editor can do for you.

But if you have a conversation with someone, like sometimes it's a free consultation for 30 minutes, or you can even pay for an hour of their time, I call them story consultations. And they can really demonstrate the style that they offer in the feedback. So you'll understand, like, do I even resonate with this person on a personal level, right? 

Like, do I like them? Do I seem knowledgeable about what I wanna do? And in that conversation, you'll probably actually get, hopefully if they're right fit for you, you'll get some little points that you can start working on even before the edit starts. 

Rhonda:

Yeah, I think it's really important to find the right editor, not just any editor or the cheapest editor you could find, right? 

So do you think it's possible to do a developmental edit of your own work? Because I've seen people say yay to this and some people say no and some say maybe. What do you think? 

Sue:

I think yes, you can. However, it should not be your only developmental edit. I think that you should, as an author, edit your own work from a critical perspective. 

And the best way to do that is to set it aside. Like you finish it, hit the end, go all the way through. Set it aside. Give yourself at least a week. Six weeks is better. Two months is better, right? Longer is better, but not too long that you've lost the thread. 

Finish it, put it aside, do something else. Let your brain check out and get healthy again, because it's a lot of stress to write a book, right? And then go back to it and reread it as if you are the audience, the person that you want to read your book. Make notes. 

As you learn your style and you understand what kind of story you want to write, you're probably gonna have a checklist that you can sort of go through and say, okay, did I do this? Did it do this? What do I not want it to do, right? 

So yes, I absolutely think authors should do this and you need to build time into your publishing schedule to give yourself that space because it is going to take you might find you have to do some rewrites after you look at your own work and you need space for that or you're stressed out right ?

Rhonda:

Right, okay and do you think that when it comes to the developmental edit specifically, is there a difference between whether or not you're going to pursue traditional publishing or indie publishing in how you think about that and approach that for your own book?

Sue:

Yes. And I would say there's a couple levels to that. That's a great question, which has layers. Right. Okay. 

And so the top layer of that is the first question to ask yourself is, do I want to manage my own publication or do I want someone else to manage my publication?

And that's, that opens up a whole other can of worms, right? Like that, that's like other considerations, right? But let's say that you, you think, okay, I really want to be traditional publisher, so depending on the type of writer you are, you might be the type of person who's like, I'm gonna write this story in the way I wanna write it, and this is the story I wanna tell, and that's it, hard stop, right? 

So in that case, you are looking for a publisher who specializes in publishing the stories that match what you write. Because if you don't, they're gonna try to change your story, or they're gonna reject you. 

Now, if you're like, okay, I don't care about the format, I just wanna get published, I just wanna have a publisher. I want my name on a pretty cover that's in hardback, in a store, on the shelf, which is pretty much a trad thing these days. 

In that case, you have to be a little more flexible in the stories that you write, which means you need to understand which publisher you want to work with and research what they publish. 

Figure out what line is the best fit for you, look into who the editors are for that line, who acquire books for that line, and then really… like understand what they are looking for.

What are the common elements in these stories? Why do readers love them? How can you bring your brand to that story in a way that is unique? How can you make their line the same, but different, but better, right? 

And that's a really tough thing to do, but if you have, if you're the kind of writer who is ideal for traditional publishing, this is really gonna be right in your sweet spot. 

Rhonda:

Okay. And so then I'm doing my developmental edit either myself before I reach out to the publisher or I'm engaging someone in the book creation process, but it's well before at the developmental level, well before I reach out to a publisher, right? 

Sue:

It can be. So it depends on the kind of submission that you're doing. So there's at least two different ways you can do it. 

One is you can have a full manuscript ready and you can submit a proposal basically saying, here's the story I wrote and here's the basics and here's why I think it's a good fit for your line. 

The other way you can do it is you can write on spec. So you can be like, hey, I saw that you have a call for this kind of story and I have a great idea for that kind of story. Here's the way, here's the idea for the story that I have. And here's how I think it really hits what you're looking for. In that case, you're gonna be writing it after it gets approved. 

Rhonda:

Oh, okay.

Sue:

So it kind of depends on what kind of writer you are. 

Rhonda:

The story structure is already approved. And then you write it. 

Sue:

Yeah. It would have to be because with a traditional publisher, they have the structure for those stories pretty much set. Like if you look at the line, the cohesiveness of a published line of books, they're all similar in specific weights. 

So word count, right? Like they're either 50K or 100K or 90K. There's like a range there that they commit to printing. There is a style for the cover that all the covers are going to have that style. 

There is a general target audience niche atmosphere tone field within those stories. Like the emotion that the reader expects is going to be the same because that's what the publisher promises to the reader. So those things are part of the structure of the story. And that is part of what your developmental edit needs to cover to hit those things. 

Rhonda:

Right. So when it comes to publishing…Let's just stick with romance, right? So when it comes to writing and publishing romance today, if someone came to you and said, I've got this great idea, I've got a fabulous romance novel, and I don't know if I would rather go traditional or indie, what do you think is the best option? 

Like is it highly dependent on the story? Is it dependent on the author? Or like, should everybody give Indie a try? And...You know, like how do you feel about that? 

Sue:

Yeah, that's a really good question. And I think ultimately not a very satisfying answer, but the best answer is it's specific to the writer. And the reason I say that is because trad is, well, trad's not for everyone and indie's not for everyone. You know, how, as a person, how much management of process do you like to do? 

Because if you are somebody who wants full control over everything and you like the details and you're totally fine doing all your marketing and doing all your scheduling and like figuring out your cover and your comps and all that stuff, then you are an ideal fit for indie. 

If you are somebody who's like, I do not want to do half the stuff on this list. I am not a project planner, right? But I know I'm a damn good storyteller and I know I'm a good fit for this publisher, then maybe trad is better for you. So it really is about who you are as a person, as a writer, what makes you happy in the process? And what makes you really unhappy. 

And then look at the two different sides and see what they have to offer you. And neither one of them might be a perfect fit, right? You might find that you're hybrid. Maybe you do a little bit of both. But it's important to know what your yes, please moments are and what your no never things are because those are gonna help you make that decision. 

Rhonda:

Wow, yeah. I think thinking about the “no nevers” are really important and also just getting really realistic about how trad publishing works, how indie publishing works. 

Like if you've been dreaming of a certain cover for your book, understand that in traditional publishing, you may not get any say in your cover at all. And if that really matters to you, then you've got some insight into making a choice there. So yeah. 

So let me ask you about, so I know you have a program that is all about basically self editing, how you can become your own developmental editor. It's called How to Pre-Edit Your Manuscript. Can you tell me a little bit about that? 

Sue:

Yeah, absolutely. So when I made the switch to coaching and educating from doing manuscript revisions and evaluations, the reason I did that, there was a long list of them. 

But one of the main reasons I did that is I was seeing the same problems in most of the stories I edited, even from people who were experienced writers. 

And I thought, okay, there's gotta be a way for me to help more people figure this out. And the reason that you should pre-edit your story, and when I say pre-edit, I mean, you do the work that a developmental editor is gonna do at its core, like the very basic evaluation technique. You do that for yourself. 

That way, when you work with that editor, you are getting the most out of your time, your money, your emotional energy. That editor is getting the best possible story that you can give them, a story that you know is not fundamentally broken. 

Because if their first feedback to you that you paid $2,000 for is, you have to rewrite the story because you missed the point. Like you're gonna be sad, right? So the purpose of creating is to not have that happen to you. 

So I teach in this free 30 minute webinar, how to do the basic things, look for the basic things that I look for. And there's two different ways you can do it. 

One is if you are somebody who is an intuitive writer and you just like, you cannot plan a story to save your life, then this webinar will teach you how to, what to look for once you finish your story or once you get to a point where you're like, okay, now I wanna see how it's going. Let me do a check, right? It's gonna give you a checklist. 

And then if you are somebody who's like, okay, no, no, no, I need some way to know where I'm writing toward, like I need some direction, give me an endpoint, right? This is going to lay out the things that you need to do before you start writing, just that thought process before you start writing so that you know that the core of that story is healthy. And it's a nice security blanket to have. 

Rhonda:

Yeah, absolutely. I think it's very discouraging to get to the end of a draft, only to discover that, you know, the draft doesn't respect some of the fundamental principles of storytelling.

So, okay, so I'm gonna put a link in the show notes to where folks can grab the How to Pre-Edit Your Manuscript. So that's available for free for 10 days, right? 

So the minute you click on it and sign up, you've got 10 days to watch it for free and it's only 30 minutes. So you can totally do that in that amount of time. That's so great. Yeah, fabulous. 

So when it comes to finalizing a manuscript and getting it ready, either for indie or for traditional publishing, once you've made that choice, you've gotten a developmental editor, you've taken that feedback on, and we kind of jokingly said, oh, you need a copy editor. 

But is there anything else you need? Because I think sometimes it gets very off-putting. People do try to see how much they can do themselves because $2,000 here, $1,000 there, it starts to add up. You need a book cover if you're indie publishing. There's so much that you need. So where would you prioritize the spending of resources on editing? 

Sue:

Well, you absolutely need other eyes on your story and those eyes don't have to be paid. Now I do recommend developmental editing even for like bestselling authors because you are so close to your own work that you can't, you sometimes cannot see big problems.

And I always say this about myself too, like even editors need editors. Like I am a trained copy editor. I know how to line edit. I'm a developmental editor. And even so I have my own editors and coaches that I work with, right? 

So it is really about getting outside yourself and understanding what are the gaps that I know are in my process, if you are experienced and who can best help me overcome those, whether or not those are paid services. 

And then if you are not experienced enough to know what those gaps are, then give a developmental editor a try; you definitely need a copy editor. You should never skip a copy editor. I mean, like a hard line, whenever someone says, what is, if I can only afford one editor, who should I have? 

Now I wanna say developmental, but the answer really is copy because copy is ultra important for many reasons, but I don't have time to go on by myself. 

Rhonda:

Yeah, no, totally. Yeah. So you mentioned non paid options. So can we replace the developmental editor with beta readers or a critique group. What do you think? What are the relative places of those options? 

Sue:

Yeah. And again, I'm gonna say that it's really specific to the writer if you know yourself. So if you are just starting out and you're not sure, then work with the developmental editor, find somebody you really click with and give that one try. 

If you do that one try and you're like, oh no, I don't need that. I actually understand my writing well enough that I can probably, I'm such a good intuitive writer I don't need a full developmental edit. That is okay. It's not, the same process is not perfect for every person, right? 

But you don't know that until you try it. And sometimes the first person you work with is not gonna be the best fit for you. And you'll kind of get a feel for whether or not you even like this type of service. And if you do, maybe you need a different person for it. 

Assuming that you're, whether or not you have a paid developmental editor, you should still have peer feedback of some sort and reader feedback of some sort. So one of the things on the peer side is critique partners. This can be really hard for a lot of people because finding critique partners who fit you is so dang hard, right? 

So even if that's not an option for you, you should at least have beta readers. Beta readers are not reviewers and they are not editors. It is a very specific type of reader that represents exactly who you want to enjoy your stories. 

Rhonda:

Ooh, I love that. Right. So it's not just anybody. It's not like, oh, my aunt, you know, she reads sci-fi. So let me give her my romance novel. No, no, no, no. 

Sue:

Yeah, you're looking for people who are so enthusiastic about your stories that they wanna read them for free and they wanna read them early. These are your super fans. 

So if you're already an established author, you may already have an author group. You may already have, like you can even reach out to people on review sites who are reviewers already who are looking to do beta reading. 

Sometimes they charge for it. Sometimes they don't. It's typically less expensive if it's charged. It's less expensive than editing because beta readers are readers. They are not editors. Their job is not to tell you technically what is wrong with it.

They're going to hit it from an emotional perspective. They're going to say things like, this part didn't feel right. I did not like that character. This felt weird. Right. It's very emotionally based.

It is your job as the author to understand what they're trying to tell you to interpret that language. Whereas with an editor, the editor is gonna say, the pacing is wrong here because X, Y, Z, and the reason the pacing is wrong, or the pacing being wrong is affecting this emotional response. 

Like they're gonna find the problem, they're gonna diagnose it, and they're gonna give you solutions. A beta reader is just gonna say, I think there's a problem here, but I don't know why.

Rhonda:

I skipped a bunch of this. Yeah, I found myself skipping the middle, yeah. All right, well, that is so, so helpful. 

Thank you so much, Sue. I feel like it's a big area of confusion for folks. What is a developmental edit? Why would I even need one? And can't I just do it myself? So we've said, yes, there's a whole part of this that you can do it yourself. And how to pre-edit your manuscript will get you there. But there's also just a ton of value in engaging someone to do that with you as a partner in writing your book. 

So thank you so much for walking us through this and we'll give everyone all the info in the show notes to where they can find you. Thanks so much. 

Sue:

Yeah, thanks so much for having me. I'm looking forward to seeing how everybody learns to pre-edit their manuscript. Such a great skill. 

Outro:

Thanks so much for hanging out with me today and for listening all the way to the end. I hope you enjoyed today's episode of The Resilient Writers Radio Show. While you're here, I would really appreciate it if you'd consider leaving a rating and review of the show. You can do that in whatever app you're using to listen to the show right now, and it just takes a few minutes. 

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