The annual contest Revise and Resub (aka RevPit) is starting up and the window to enter is coming this week. I'm entering for the second time (first for this novel). One of my problems is that I'm pretty shy on twitter, so I haven't been interacting with the editors much. The other problem is that I usually only see threads many hours after they started and feel weird hopping on. So I thought I'd make a post with some ~vibes~ of my manuscript so if any RevPit editors check out my website, they may see this and get more of a sense of my novel without me having to manage the anxiety of Twitter interactions. 

Title: The New Neanderthals 
Genre: Adult sci-fi

Included tropes: 
Cinnamon roll love interest
Fake dating
Corrupted corporation
Fish out of water

Songs that capture a moment/emotion:
Human by Christina Perri
Start a War by Klergy & Valerie Broussard
Confident by Demi Lovato
Look What You Made Me Do by Taylor Swift
You Don't Own Me by Grace
Fight Song by Rachel Platten

Mood Board/Aesthetic:

If you're not doing RevPit and/or aren't a RevPit editor, then come back next week when I will have more of my usual content!

If you are doing RevPit, let's discuss in the comments! Have you done it before? Have you been braver on Twitter than I have?

Recently while querying, I've noticed more agents asking for optional things like links to mood boards, playlists, or Pinterest boards. There's even a whole pitch event on Twitter around mood boards. I thought I'd take some time to help anyone struggling to figure out what mood boards are in relation to writing projects and a couple (free!) resources to make them. 

What is a mood board? 
A mood board is a collage of images, which can include minimal punchy text, which conveys the mood (or as the youths say the vibes) of your story. This includes setting, tone, a sense of character(s), genre, and important visual elements/motifs. If including a quote, it should be short and encapsulate the theme of the novel. A mood board can be a Pinterest page, or you can arrange images into a collage that's a single JPEG using free sites like Canva. 

Why make a mood board?
A mood board is good for more than just pitching on Twitter or sending to the rare agent who asks for it in their Query Manager form. The mood board can help you as the author get back into your story between writing sessions. The process of creating one also forces you to think about the important elements, characters, and places in your story. If you've never thought about tone or theme, it may even bring one out of your subconscious. 

Where do images come from?
If you're making a mood board for just you, and never plan to use it for marketing (or perhaps even pitching) then don't worry too much about copy written images you find on google. Go ham. If you plan to use it for any type of marketing (or pitching) it's safer for you to stick to royalty free images. I like using Unspalsh, but there are other options as well.

If building your board in Pinterest, obviously you're only able to use that. The board then stays on Pinterest, which can be fine if using it only for yourself, but tough if your goal is to build one for a pitching event. 

You can layer text over an image in an editing site like Canva to create a  background to match your chosen quote. 

It may be a struggle to find exactly what you're using for, so change up search terms and feel free to get creative in finding the right matches for your project. Collect more images than you plan to use, then select your final choices later. 

How do I make them a collage?
If building a collage, you can use a free site like Canva. Choose a template that puts 5-9 images of various sizes together. Choose your template wisely, since it may dictate portrait vs landscape oriented images. 
If you're not a fan of online graphic design options, there's always good old fashioned Microsoft Paint.

What are some tips and tricks?
One major trick to a mood board is keeping your eye on color. You don't want a ton of competition, and you want it  to look cohesive, suggesting your story is cohesive. Choose no more then 3 main colors to include. Ideally, you'll have some muted tones and one that pops. The exception is if color is a huge part of your story, for example if it takes place during Holi, or if color is associated with specific nations (like Avatar: The Last Airbender.) 

Another tip is to focus one the main character(s) or setting, don't try to include every subplot, side character, or place. You want someone to walk away from your board with a general impression of your story with minimal words. Confusion is killer. 

Don't focus on finding perfect matches in the photos. You'll never find just the right stock model or angle or city for your fictional characters/world. Instead, go for the emotional impact of the image. 

Have fun with it! Even if using it for a pitch event or in case an agent asks for one, the mood board's main audience is you. 

Example Mood Board
Let's do an example for something everyone is familiar with: Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (aka the original). I searched for images as if Star Wars doesn't already exist, so no cheating by searching for droids, stormtroopers, etc. Let's pretend this is a whole new concept and none of those are options so that you SFFH writers know how to get the concept of your vivid fictional creations across without having to do visual effects yourself. (Or you can commission an artist.)

Some stock images I searched for were: space, desert, red laser, hair buns, moon, explosion, black hallway, robotics, fighter plane. Many more terms generated nothing useful including glowstick, duel, robe, telekinesis, epic, hope, and hero.
Here's what I collected:

You can see there's a lot of red, blue, black, and white. Since the blues are pretty soft, I can get away with using all four colors if red is the one that pops. I wanted to make sure it's clear Star Wars is SciFi, so I kept the robot and stars, and lost the fighter plane. I kept the explosion to show action, and the guy looking up at the moon to show Luke's desire to go on an adventure--that's a mood right there. Either the hallway or the moon would be good to put a quote over, but I felt the moon a little more. I cut Leia's hair buns, because while accurate to the story, they didn't fit the adventure vibes of the other images. The red Star sign glows like a lightsaber, but it didn't get across the idea of a lightsaber, and the word star might be too on the nose. So it didn't make my final cut either.

​I went to Canva and searched for collage templates. I chose one that had 7 images, uploaded my images, and arranged them. I decided to place my two red images in opposite corners, for balance. I also searched for iconic quotes from Episode IV, and chose "That's no moon..." because it had an ominous, dangerous, and clearly SciFi feel. The other images ended up where they did purely based on orientation that the template dictated, and I'm okay with that. Last, I changed the background to black, because it looked better to me. Your mood board is all about your taste, so follow your gut.

Here's my example mood board:

Does it convey Star Wars: A New Hope perfectly? No. It's missing a ton of characters, events, and technology. Does it capture the idea of a SciFi story about a guy wanting and then having an adventure, which includes some twists? I think so.

Obviously, this isn't something I was deeply invested in making perfect, so when I make one for my own stories, they tend to have a little more nuance/insight to them. However, I hope you found this mood board tutorial helpful or inspirational and maybe you're tempted to go make one for your own project. 


Have you made a mood board for your writing? Was it helpful, or was it a major challenge? Do you have more resources for other writers making their own boards? Let's discuss in the comments!

As the year draws to a close, I thought I’d go back through my e-reader and see how much I’ve read. I know my reading took off in July with the start of my new commute (all public transit, reading was safe). This doesn’t count the five unpublished novels I beta read and the countless sections of bigger works I read for my writing groups.
 
For the Podcast:
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid         Historical Fiction
The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal                                Science Fiction (Alt-History)
Mexican Gothic by Silvia Morena Garcia                                            Horror (Gothic/Historical)
Outlawed by Anna North                                                                     Western (Alt-History)
Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult                                                     Contemporary (Legal Procedural)
 
Writing Craft Related:
Take of Your Pants by Libbie Hawker
Deep POV by Marcy Kennedy  (My Review)
The Anatomy of Story by John Truby (My Review)
The Rural Setting Thesaurus by Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi (My review)
The Emotional Wound Thesaurus by Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi
The Occupation Thesaurus by Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi (My review)
 
 
For Fun: (age category is adult unless otherwise stated)
Chain of Iron by Cassandra Clare                                                       YA Fantasy (Historical)
Chain of Gold by Cassandra Clare                                                      YA Fantasy (Historical)
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown                               Non-Fiction (Historical)
The Fated Sky by Mary Robinette Kowal                                            Science Fiction (Alt-History)  
The Relentless Moon by Mary Robinette Kowal                                 Science Fiction (Alt-History) (my review of the series)
Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir                                                            Science Fiction (Near-Future/Space) (my review)
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood                                              Contemporary Rom-Com (my review)
The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin                                                          Secondary-World Fantasy
The Obelisk Gate by N.K. Jemisin                                                         Secondary-World Fantasy
The Stone Sky by N.K. Jemisin                                                              Secondary-World Fantasy (my review of the series)
The Last Neanderthal by Claire Cameron                                            Contemporary/Historical Fiction (my review)
Speak the Ocean by Rebecca Enzor                                                    Contemporary Fantasy (my review)
The Traitor’s Kingdom by Erin Beaty                                                    Secondary-World Fantasy (my review of the series)
The Rise of Kyoshi by F.C. Lee                                                              Secondary-World Fantasy (IP) (my review)
The Shadow of Kyoshi by F.C. Lee                                                       Secondary World Fantasy (IP)
Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno Garcia                           Historical Fantasy (Mythology)
The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab                              Contemporary/Historical Fantasy
The Impossible Contract by K.A. Doore                                               Secondary-World Fantasy
Domesticating Dragons by Dan Kobolt                                                Science Fiction (Near-Future/Biopunk)
The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett                                                      Historical Fiction
Dismal Dreams by Red Lagoe                                                              Horror Anthology

I have one more I'm hoping to read over the holidays:
Runaway by Emmett J Hall                                                                  Historical Fiction


Anything I read sound interesting to you? Check them out at your local library, indie bookstore, or wherever you get your books.  I have reviews up for many, but not all, so this post helped me realize I have a ton more books I can talk about! 
What did you read this year that you loved? Let's discuss in the comments!

I recently finished The Broken Earth trilogy by N.K. Jemisin which consists of The Fifth Season, The Obelisk Gate, and the Stone Sky. They came out in 2015, ’16, and ’17 respectively. It’s an adult series that is either fantasy or science fantasy, depending on how you look at it.
 
The series takes place in a world called the Stillness. It’s debatable if this is a crazy far future earth or an alternative, similar planet. The main character is Essun, an orogene. Orogenes are kind of like Earth benders from Avatar: The Last Airbender, but with a few more specifics happening. Orogene work requires energy, so such a person could freeze those around them or steal that energy from, say, an earthquake. They are also highly disliked (ie murdered in public) by the rest of the world, but they come in handy when a Season comes. A Season is when there’s basically an apocalyptic level event such as powerful earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.
 
The plot begins when Essun returns home from work one day to find her orogene son murdered by her (non-orogene) husband, and both her husband and orogrene daughter have disappeared. Then, a Season begins. Her goal is to find her daughter before her husband hurts the innocent girl, but that’s a hell of a task at the end of the world.
 
There’s so much to love about this series, and obviously many people agree. Each book in the series won the Hugo Award (one of the biggest awards in SFF) for Best Book—she’s the first author to ever do that three-peat (in row!) with a series. The Stone Sky also won the Locus and Nebula awards, and both of the first two books in the series were nominated for those awards as well.
 
Going into this series, my expectations were sky high. And you know what? I struggled to get into it. Chapter one was an info dump. One POV was second person (which I really hate). I wasn’t sure I was going to like this series that everyone gushed about. Lucky for me, I have a lengthy, boring commute so I kept reading. It took about halfway through The Fifth Season (book 1) for me to really get in the groove of the story. After that, I bought the second and third book and devoured the series.
 
I recommend this series to adults who grew up loving Avatar: The Last Airbender, fans of magic that’s on the harder side (ie it’s explained and has some logic vs soft, which is very mysterious), and readers who want a (badass) mother as the MC. It is also great for writers looking for an example of deep world building. It’s not for anyone who doesn’t like high fantasy or cannot handle info dumps ever. If you can press through the first chapter and have faith, you’ll be fine. It may also not be for anyone who may have painful memories triggered by violent child loss, child abuse, or gaslighting.
 
Have you read this series too? What other books/series by N.K. Jemisin do you recommend? Have you tried her Master Class? Let’s discuss in the comments!

It’s been a while since my last trope discussion, so I thought it was time for another! This week I researched a super popular trope, secret identities. Get it? Super. Like super heroes.
 
Where Did This Start?
 
I started by reading about secret identities on TV Tropes. There are about thirty-two related tropes, including someone falling in love with the hero identity, or loving the hero and hating the secret identity (or vice versa), and more. So many tropes that the original idea of secret identities must be incredibly old.

Indeed, it is. You can see secret identities in fairy tales, like Cinderella (at the ball, though in most versions this identity doesn't get a name) and Beauty and the Beast (the secretly beautiful witch who turns the prince into a beast), and Mulan (in the army). TV Tropes cited a medieval Scottish story, Roswall and Lillian, as an example in which a steward steals Prince Roswall’s identity and plans to marry Princess Lillian. Roswall, of course, succeeds in getting the Princess in the end when his secret identity (which is his original one: a prince) is revealed. Even in Greek myths, gods would hide their identities and interact with humans. Technically speaking, secret or hidden identities are such an old concept in storytelling that we can’t quite pinpoint a true origin.

What about a secret identity for unsanctioned acts of heroism? That’s more specific. One could argue Robin Hood was almost there, but since it was clear to everyone involved that he was Robin of Loxley, his identity doesn’t qualify as secret. Let’s look at some others:

Superman (aka Clark Kent) made his first appearance in a short story, The Reign of Superman, in 1933, published in a science fiction magazine. Most people know him better from his second appearance, which was in 1938 in Action Comics #1 from DC Comics.

Zorro (aka Diego Vega) made his first appearance in 1919 in a series of magazine instalments later brought together as the novel The Curse of Capistrano by Johnston McCulley. Zorro got his first movie in 1920 (a silent one, but it still counts!)

The Scarlet Pimpernel (aka Sir Percy Blakeney) appeared in a play named for the hero in 1903 (and novel in 1905) by Baroness Emma Orczy. The Scarlet Pimpernel saved aristocrats from being beheaded by mobs after the French Revolution made that seem pretty fashionable. His public persona is a rich, stylish, but seemingly useless man that no one would suspect of being a swordsman. Is saving rich people terribly heroic? I suppose it would be to the rich people. At least the concept is right for my purposes here.
 
At 1903, The Scarlet Pimpernel is the first clear example of a character consistently using a secret identity to perform acts that are heroic. I was surprised to learn this secret hero genre was pretty much solidified in the literary world by a woman author. Hats off to the Baroness!
 
Why Have Secret Identities?
 
After that deep dive, I asked myself why did these characters hide their identities? Modern heroes do it to avoid their enemies and/or protect their loved ones. Older heroes did this as well, though there was often an air of vigilantism to those stories, where the secret identity would suffer legal consequences if they were found out. Other, less vigilante-focused instances of secret identities also protected characters from social consequences (Cinderella, Mulan) or allowed more freedom (Mulan, Zeus). Still others weren’t the character’s choice (Roswall). Plenty of character motivations available to meld or co-opt for your own story.
 
Should Your Characters Have Secret Identities?
 
It’s all dependent on your plot with this one. A super hero book may obviously require a clear secret identity to be effective. However, going undercover in a crime novel, using a fake ID in a contemporary novel, or masquerading a monster as human in a horror could all also qualify as secret identities. The most important thing is to be sure your reader can follow with what’s going on. If you don’t clearly connect identity 1 to identity 2, your reader may not know who’s behind the metaphorical (or real) mask and get completely lost. While a TV or movie has the actor, or at least their voice, to help guide the audience, you have to be more deliberate. One trick is to ensure you don’t introduce an entire team at once, but build it slowly to allow the reader to remember who is who.

 
That’s it for this trope discussion. Who is your favorite hero with a secret identity? Have you written any secret or false identities in your work? Let’s discuss in the comments!

Here are some sources for more reading on this topic:
TV Tropes article about Secret Identities
Wikipedia article summarizing The Scarlet Pimpernel
​Wikipedia article summarizing Zorro
​Wikipedia article about Action Comics #1
More about Baroness Emma Orczy

Content warning: incest, infant death

I don't typically do so many book reviews in a row, but in five weeks of commuting, I've read five books. Nearly six. So, you'll be getting book reviews for a while. I'll do my best to switch it up next week!

The Last Neanderthal by Claire Cameron is an adult dual POV book. The first is one of the last living Neanderthals (we’ll call it 40,000 years ago) and the second is approximately modern day.

The main POV belongs to the Neanderthal, Girl, who, as the title suggests, becomes the last Neanderthal, or at least one of the last. And you know that fact as her family dies off in various accidents. She is left with one adopted sibling, who you realize pretty quickly is not a Neanderthal. She must take care of him as they attempt to find other Neanderthals.

The second POV is a modern researcher, Rose, who races against her pregnancy to finish a digging up a Neanderthal skeleton. Her chapters were few and far between, but showed the problems that modern women still face in the workplace, especially academia. Rose also had marital strains with her long-distance husband.

I had a couple problems with the book. The Neanderthal chapters went a little too far on the altered linguistics for my taste.  There was also little dialogue, which the author gave evidence for, but it made it a less enjoyable read. I also did not appreciate the incest scenes. Yes, it probably happened as that species died off. No, I don’t want to be entertained by it. Rose’s modern POV didn’t get enough page space, even though it was interesting. I supremely disliked Rose’s relationship with her husband.

The book covered the discoveries about Neanderthals (through its pub date, 2017) very well. It felt more realistic to my understanding than other pieces of media I won’t name. It also seemed to do justice to the realities of an archaeological dig and the slow pace.

Overall, it was fine. It felt realistic, but maybe too much so with the incest. Readers who are interested in ancient humans or archaeology may enjoy it. It would probably appeal to fans of Clan of the Cave Bear (lots of parallels between the two). It is not for you if incest or infant death is triggering or not your taste. It’s also not for you if you want high action or a quick pace.
 
Have you read The Last Neanderthal? Did you enjoy it? What other Neanderthal books are worth reading? Let’s discuss in the comments!

This week I read Speak the Ocean by Rebecca Enzor. I’d seen her on Twitter before, but what got me to read her book was her interview on Queries, Qualms, and Quirks, a podcast by Sarah Nicolas. That interview gave me a better idea of what the book was about and I realized it would be a great comp title for my WIP!
 
Speak the Ocean is a dual POV adult contemporary fantasy novel about human Finn and mermaid Erie. Finn works at Oceanica, basically a mermaid-themed Sea World complete with mermaid shows ala Shamu. Erie is a mermaid princess in the Seadom where Mer have been disappearing for years and no one knows why. Of course, the reader knows why: Oceanica has been hunting them for their shows and research. Mer are very poorly treated at Oceanica. They also tend to be very dangerous, as evidenced by the opening scene where Finn has to euthanize one who killed their trainer. When Mer die, they turn into sea foam, like the classic versions of The Little Mermaid (pre-Disney). However, Erie is captured next and Finn is made her trainer, his first opportunity to train instead of just cleaning tanks. His assistant is Jen, who has a much more tender heart than other employees and she advocates for treating Erie better than other Mer, a strategy which leads to Finn bonding with Erie. Eventually Finn faces a choice: keep Erie trapped forever and boost his career at the expense of a sentient creature, or somehow free Erie.
 
It’s a little bit Black Fish, a little Free Willy, and a Little Mermaid. While I thought most of the events were predictable (possibly because I’ve been studying plot so much recently) there were still moments of surprise. I tried to read this only on my commute, but I just had to finish it at home yesterday. I thought it was well balanced between the POVs and Enzor did a great job of writing from Erie’s POV without the reader being as confused as Erie was about the world around her. I also liked that the stakes were extremely personal, not world-ending, which feels a bit rare in fantasy at the moment.
 
On the downside, Erie’s POV did cause some problems for me because her narration used words that she then was confused about hearing from the humans. Yes, I realize she was thinking in ocean words, not air words, but it still threw me off at first. I was also confused about how Finn actually felt about Erie. I wasn’t sure if he really loved her romantically or like how you love a pet. Especially confusing because of his fraught relationship with Jen.
 
Overall, I recommend this book for anyone who loves mermaids, contemporary fantasy, or even scientific ethics problems, like Jurassic Park. There’s a smattering of romance, too. It’s not for you if you can’t handle blood or on the page sex scenes.
 
Have you read Speak the Ocean? What did you think? Let’s discuss!

I’m in the editing phase of my book, which is always the longest, and I’m soliciting feedback from many sources. And then getting all that feedback. I’ve written about critique groups and how to critique, but never explained my methods for what happens next. It can be overwhelming to receive a lot of feedback at once and some people will set that aside and not use it out of a sense of dread. Here’s my method for tackling feedback.
 
Step 1: Take Notes During the Critique
If you are doing a live critique, take notes as people talk. Even if they will send you an annotated document later, they might say something spontaneous that you don’t want to lose.

You can decide if you want to write down who says what, if that matters to you. For example, if someone who shares the character’s identity says “I’d change X about how you portray Y about this character” I make sure to write down who said that so I give their opinion extra weight.

If people repeat the same comment, I add a little x2 or x3 to a comment to save time. When I see this, I know this is something I need to change.

If people disagree, I write who was on what side (ex. John said he likes this character but Betty hated him). This allows me to later say, aha so Betty hated this character and this other element, I wonder if fixing that element then changes her opinion on the character. Most of the time though, it may just come down to people's opinions and knowing who said what won't really matter.

I also take notes if someone says something that sparks an idea in my mind. I’ll mark this with “note from me” so I don’t later think someone else was being rather forward with ideas.
 

Step 2: Consolidate Your Notes
I take all the notes I receive and transfer them into one document. I use track changes and comments in Word and will edit the document with ALL of the edits sent to me, regardless of if I agree or not. This is not the time to judge comments, only copy them. I add my notes from the live critique to the relevant scenes/chapters so I don’t have to scroll to the bottom of the document. In the end, I usually have a very marked up document, but at least it’s only one. 


Step 3: Prepare Your Mindset
One thing people have a hard time with when receiving feedback is how it feels emotionally. It can feel like people hate your writing or you as a person or both. You need to go into your edits with the following mindset: everything everyone has written is only to help you. This needs to be your mantra. I realize there are bad actors out there who will send hate through the internet, and that's a risk you take. However, especially if you take my advice about trying live (or virtually-live) groups, you'll find that other writers really want to help.  Everything everyone has written is only to help you. They are trying to help you make this book better and every edit choose to take is doing that. One more time before you dive into edits: everything everyone has written is only to help you.
 

Step 4: Make the Edits
While I receive my edits in Word, I write in Scrivener. This is because I love Scrivener for novels in general, but it has the added bonus of forcing me to think about every single edit rather than just hitting the accept button.
I work linearly through the document, and will save big edits (such as over used words throughout or all of the dialogue needing tweaking, etc.) for the end. The exception is if I’m re-writing a significant portion of the scene, that is something I’ll do first, then edit anything that carried over.

Here’s the sticky point for some people: how do you decide which edits to take? To me, it depends on the category of edits:

1. Grammar/spelling/other objective errors: These are corrections you should obviously take. If you question if grammar feedback is right (does a comma really go there?) you can do a quick google for that particular comma situation.
2. Plot/character edits: This includes plot holes, which you should probably fix. Although you don’t need to fix it exactly how the critique may suggest. This category may include feedback like “does this character really need to be X identity?” which is completely subjective, and in my experience, you’re likely not to take that kind of note. (If you're a member of a marginalized group and someone says this about your character of the same marginalized group, this is not a great situation. It does happen though, which sucks. Use your judgement about how safe you feel in that space.) This category could include pointing out character inconsistency in action or dialogue, which you should fix. You get the idea. This category can be obvious yes, obvious no, or something in between.
3. Points of confusion: Any time a reader says something along the lines of “I have no idea what this means” or “I have no idea what’s happening” believe them. If they stated this in the live critique, you have a chance to ask for clarification, i.e. “where did I lose you?” If it’s over email, I recommend emailing back and asking that same question. Sometimes people forget what was said earlier in the book and to you it’s so obvious what’s going on, since you’ve been writing this for a while. But to a reader, a phrase from five chapters ago might be too obscure and need a stronger call back. On the other hand, maybe your reader accidentally glossed over the sentence immediately before their confusion and no one else missed that. Either way, points of confusion require a little digging on your part.
4. Word choice: Sometimes people will want to swap in a word and it’s totally up to you if you want to take that note or not. However, if everyone says one word you chose doesn’t fit, believe them. For example, in a recent critique I had the word wonder. It was one word of 6,000 words being critiqued and yet every person (8!) in the group highlighted it and said it sounded wrong. So, I believed them! You can bet that word got changed to one of the many suggested options.
5. Reality check: This is when someone says “that’s wrong, in reality…” People tend to only mention this if they’re familiar with the field. I’ve had people point out errors in my hunting scene (I’ve never hunted), a boardroom scene (I’ve never been a CEO), and with a hand injury scene (I’ve never had a cast or hurt my hand). This is invaluable feedback from either experts or experienced people and I will always incorporate it as much as I can. However, don’t forget you’re writing fiction. If someone says “that’s not how vampires work” you can absolutely say no to that, if your vampires work differently. Or if someone says “that’s not how gravity works” you can say this is science fiction and that's the point. As long as you follow your internal rules, you can shirk reality sometimes.
6. Grab bag: The last category of edits. This is where the rest of the random little things go. If it seems like good advice, take it. If you aren’t sure, play with it. If you don’t like the edit, ignore it. 

 
The nice thing about getting critiques is that no one watches you make the edits. Don’t feel guilty for saying no to a comment, and don’t feel like you’re a bad writer for taking one. The key to editing is humility: we're all human, we all make mistakes, and we can fix those mistakes.


Step 5: Final Polish
Once I’ve finished transferring in my edits, I send it through an AI grammar checker. Mine is ProWritingAid, but I’ve heard good things about lots of other programs. Which program I use is not a hill I’d die on. This is just a final polish and helps me catch some smaller, subtler errors. Usually these are errors generated by the process of editing itself. It also helps me make sure I’m not too pronoun heavy, that my sentences vary in length, etc. I recommend these programs as a final polish, but not an initial one. You need humans for that!
 

Editing Resources:
There are a ton of editing resources out there. Checklists for individual chapters, beat sheets for entire plot lines, etc. If you find yourself returning to the same problems, keep some of those resources nearby. I like to keep The Emotion Thesaurus handy because I consistently don’t show enough emotion with my characters.
 


That’s my feedback wrangling process. Did it help you? Do you have your own method you’d like to share? Let’s discuss in the comments!

Sorry for the May hiatus. The month really took over and I got lost in the fray. Back to my regularly scheduled blog posts!

I keep my house relatively clean, but I always have a few nooks and crannies where I store whole bunch of stuff. Junk drawers and closet shelves and plastic drawer sets that look organized when shut, but God forbid you open them. I cleaned one such space this weekend: a set of plastic drawers I’ve had since college.

This involved two drawers of college and grad school file-folders and notebooks and a hodge-podge of random items. (Including, thankfully, a second key to my car that I’ve been looking for for about a year.) One such random item was a spiral bound “text book” from the only creative writing class I took in college. I still remember being pissed I had to pay nearly twenty bucks for what my prof called a “packet.” It’s 213 pages (front and back printed) so in hindsight twenty bucks isn’t bad for college materials.

This tome is more than half short stories I had to analyze. Sorry to those stories, I probably didn’t analyze any of them properly. Theme was never my strong suit in school. Though now I might be able to get a better grip on it, since I’ve been reading a lot of writing craft books recently. Anyway, the second part of this packet is writing advice. I opened it expecting it to be some sort of “I’m a Writing God and here are my Rules!” Instead, the first section says there are rules, but you need to learn them before you break them; and when you break them it better be on purpose. Pleased, I decided to peruse the rest.

There are sections on plot, including how to come up with a plot or get out of being stuck, character, a lot on showing and telling (with great examples and details on when to tell instead), and even revision tips. This thing has a lot boiled into a small space. And yes, we also had to buy Burroway’s Writing Fiction, which I also kept. Based on how little I highlighted, I think we only read one chapter for class. I will definitely be revisiting this packet. I put it on my writing craft shelf, even though it’s spiral bound and battered from bouncing around in my old backpack. But hey, don’t just a book—or packet—by its card-stock cover.
 

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Did you keep any materials from high school, college, or grad school that you’ve kept and used? Let’s discuss in the comments.