The Joy of Editing

Ever since I hung out my editing shingle late last year, I have been fortunate to have a nice flow of work coming in--not a flood, but more than a trickle. Just enough to keep me busy. And I'm enjoying it immensely. I've always had a knack for spelling, punctuation and grammar, and I enjoy getting it right, but it goes beyond that. 

I get to help people bring their dreams to life.

Several of my clients have been first-time authors just beginning the process of transferring their ideas into reality. I love the dance as we explore their vision for the book. I will generally take the first chapter to read and edit, giving suggestions or asking questions, then ship it back to them to see how my ideas gel with theirs. If we're lucky, we have similar ideas and we can move forward as a team toward the ultimate goal of making the book the best it can be. 

That doesn't always happen. I've had a few instances where my ideas were not even close to the author's, and we've agreed quickly that we're not a good fit together and move on. Such is life, and of course it's better this way. Neither one of us would enjoy the process, and the result would not be as good as it could be, if we were on different pages. 

But with those whose ideas do dovetail with mine, we make an awesome team. It's pure joy to take a rambling, sometimes disjointed conglomeration of sentences and give it structure, flow and punch. It's great fun to take a Word doc and mold it into book format so the author can see, sometimes for the first time, what their brainchild will actually look like. And of course, it's ecstasy when the author holds that first book in their hand, when the idea in their head becomes a real, tangible thing. It's not even my book, but I can feel the satisfaction and the sense of accomplishment right along with them. 

Can't beat that with a stick.

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