Many of you may not know but my traditional career is in marketing. Specifically, I work on getting requirements for software from the customer and then make sure that the desired outcome of the software doesn’t change as it goes through the design process (requirements are what the customer wants the software to do). Now, as code is developed and lumped on top of other code (all of those updates you get are code getting lumped on top of code), it can get messy so a decision is made and people go in and refactor what was previously written. They streamline it, shorten it, and make the commands more intuitive. This leads to faster APIs, programs, interfaces, and all that jazz. However, no one pays for refactoring, and it is something that can only be done once you have written more code.
Perhaps it is because I am around it all day, but I found refactoring code to be a nice metaphor for editing (in that you can only do it effectively when you have moved on to write more work as you are too close to your previous work, but I digress). The editing processes isn’t to make a book read faster, or smoother, it is to achieve what you want to achieve when you sat down to write it. That means, if you were going for a horror book, and it isn’t very horrifying, you can drop in some more trap doors. Or if you are reading and notice that the characters jump from one location to another location, without explanation, now you can add that explanation. For me, that is cleaning up the story which I have fully written in my head, a notebook, or on a poster board, and making it understandable at the level I understand it. That usually means, more writing once I come back to it.
Normally, I do a refactoring run on my books once I have finished the next manuscript. The reason is simple, to get away from my own work. When I begin work on my next manuscript, I am beginning a new writing style to best fit the story/ideas/and characters I plan to write. This means I am throwing out how I was writing and working on a new format. Not only that, the entire plot, story, and characters are different from the previous book so I am slowly logging the previous book in my memory and bringing a new story to the forefront. Why is this important?
It is simple, it allows me to see what a reader will see. Gaps become much more noticeable as I go through the editing process after spending a bunch of time in my newest book. The character’s voice is scrutinized more. Catalytic actions are put under the microscope and confirmed that their chemical parts will behave in the way I have deduced. Grammar edits are easier to spot since this is no longer my baby (my new book has usurped this book’s claims to be my child). And so forth.
Which brings me to Death by Comedy or as it is now known Ashley Pepin’s Mistake. After a full editing session, the books sub plot is much more visible, the writing has been cleaned up to help differentiate between the multiple narrators (I left it ambiguous at times because you don’t need to know who is speaking), and the manuscript has been submitted to a potential publishing arm (Kindle Singles as this is a novella in length, and they are the only people who actively pursue novellas). In about six weeks, I will know if it has been accepted.