Okay, okay, I know that all the editors have not
gone away. I know that there are many dedicated editors out there
slaving away in the word mines to help writers wrangle their manuscripts
into things of beauty. I do not want the entire Internet editorial
community to descend upon me, angrily wielding their blue and red pens
as weapons of vengeance.
But.
I detect a noticeable lack of editorial input in far too many of the books I read these days.
If you follow me on Goodreads
or take note of my occasional reading update posts hereabouts (or on my website), you’ll
know that I am not a snob when it comes to reading. I read traditionally
published books, I read self-published books, I read e-only books, I
listen to audiobooks and self-produced audiobooks. If it sounds
interesting to me, I don’t quibble about the format or the provenance,
I’ll give it a try.
In fact, I will even cut some slack to the authors who are
self-pubbing, to a certain extent. If the writing and plotting and
characterization and ideas are strong overall, I can forgive a few
little grammatical or syntactical missteps. I usually find it a bit sad
when a story fails to reach its full potential due mainly to a lack of
editing, but it won’t make me bail on the story.
But traditional publishers, I have to say: I hold you to a higher standard. I expect
that you will have given your authors the benefit of proper editorial
input. You are supposed to be the “gatekeepers”, after all; the
setters-of-standards. This is not to say that I expect to love every
traditionally published book–there’s no accounting for taste, and there
are plenty of (IMHO) bad tradpub books. But regardless of how far they fall short of my expectations in story or plot, I expect them to be line edited.
And I am disappointed, with increasing frequency of late.
I expect words to be used properly. “Occupied” is not the same thing as “preoccupied”.
I expect you to weed out repetitions. When the word “faience” comes up five times in three pages, it’s kind of noticeable.
I expect that characters’ names will remain the same throughout the story.
(Sadly) I could go on. But I won’t. Maybe I’m just in an editorial
frame of mind lately, having recently finished an intense bout of line
editing for Unearthed. And I won’t say I caught everything
there, either. But if traditional publishers want to continue to
publish good authors–if they want to be thought of as some kind of
legitimizing force in publishing, I think they owe their authors
something. And their readers, too.
I think they need to spill a little more corrective ink on those
manuscripts. Or soon there’ll be nothing at all setting them apart. And
then where will they be?
Image courtesty of jppi.
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