Editing...Fun?

Well, my nerve-wracking wait has come to an end. I received the edited file for my novella And Is Never Shaken from DSP, all marked up and ready for me to revise.

I had been biting my nails about this for a while because I've never worked with an editor before who I haven't met face to face, and I've never worked with an American editor without their comments being filtered though a British one (and British editors like to make their authors quiver with tales of how incredibly harsh American editors are). I was also a little nervous because this is my first m/m story, and what if the editor, being very experienced at working in m/m, finds loads of amateur mistakes? What if they want more sex scenes? What if they want to change loads of things and I don't agree? Argh!

I actually really enjoy revising - and yes, I know this makes me an unnatural freak, shunned by other writers. But I do. There are times when I've been in tears because an editor completely misunderstood a character or kept asking for explanations of stuff I thought was perfectly self-explanatory, but usually once I calm down the value of the comments sinks in and then it's all fun. I'm effectively trying to beat myself at my own game, and I do love a challenge like that.

But it's also exhausting, because once I start revising that's all I want to do. Eat? Nah. Sleep? No way. Talk to other human beings? Not a chance. I go into Revision Mode and it's like Terminator Mode only more terrifying. My last book was 120,000 words long. By the time finished everyone I knew thought I'd died and been eaten by Alsatians.

Bearing this in mind, it seems silly that I was so stressed out by the idea of working on a fairly short story, especially since m/m writing is supposed to be a lovely hobby. But I'm a naturally pessimistic and anal retentive type. I always expect the worst.

What a pleasant surprise then, to find that instead of wanting to rip the novella apart and rewrite it with dinosaurs fighting vampires, my Dreamspinner Press editor basically just wanted to fix all my stupid English Grammar mistakes (I thought I'd done quite well with my American Grammar, but...well, that was a beautiful dream), point out a couple of typos and spelling errors, tell me that I'd got a fact about Andrea Botcelli incorrect, and clarify whose hand was sliding up whose arm and whose leg went where.

There was no misinterpreting of the characters, wild requests for changes in the plot, mocking laughter or nit-picking. Frankly, if my print editor did this kind of job, I'd marry her. I managed to turn the ms around in about an hour, and it was pure pleasure. Phew.

I can only hope and pray that revising my other m/m stories will go as smoothly. Even though I actually got my first m/m contract with Torquere (for novelette Love Bites) a week before And Is Never Shaken was accepted by DSP, I haven't heard anything from TQ about editing yet. I assume this is because TQ puts out two or three times as many titles as DSP, so their queue is longer. Patience, Alexi, patience...