The Writer's E-Zine Home

Writers' Village University - F2K: Free Fiction Writing Course - ePress-online
Writers' Village University Membership Information

Craft of Writing

Mary Cook

If It Ain't Broke Fix It Some More

You should be turning cartwheels and crowing Peter Pan's famous line: “Oh, the cleverness of me….” when you read the work you're about to submit. It's not enough to be able to sit back with a satisfied smile.

There are a lot of bright writers around. To be ahead of the competition, you need to polish your work to diamond brightness. You should be able to see your face in it.

Did I hear you mutter: “If it ain't broke don't fix it”? You'll get nowhere with that attitude. If it merely “ain't broke” you'll need to fix it some more….and some more.

I learned my craft through an earn-as-you-learn correspondence course, and was mortified when my tutor called an article I'd proudly turned in a “first draft.” I’d been convinced it was a saleable piece of work that any editor would snap up.

I've since discovered it's a common mistake beginning writers often make—to think they've finished when they've just begun.

In time it was the polishing that I learned to love: putting a word in, taking it out, changing its position within a sentence or moving entire paragraphs around. If my work misses its target nowadays, at least I'll have the satisfaction of knowing I gave it my best shot.

Don't let poor presentation ruin a great idea. Format is important and can mean the difference between acceptance and rejection. If an editor says “double-spaced,” that’s what he wants. And he doesn’t want to be confused by a mixture of strange fonts.

Treat the contributors' guidelines as you would instructions for a home improvement project, reading them carefully from beginning to end before you start work. Don't just refer to guidelines when you think you've nearly finished. They’re instructions on how to get it right, not a tool to find out where you've gone wrong.

But what if your target publication doesn't supply guidelines? They're there all right, hidden in the text of the current issue. Analyze it to find what the editor buys. Then write something similar, giving the topic your own unique twist.

Don’t just read the publication, lay it out on the mortuary slab and dissect it. And don’t stop at the editorial content; the adverts are just as important in reaching an understanding of a magazine and its readership.

Word count is important. I have a 10 percent rule. Never write more than 50 words over or under 500 words in a 500-word article or story or 100 words more or less in a 1,000-word piece. Dust off the précis skills you learned at school and excise superfluous words.

It's the role of editors to edit, but the less they need to do to your work, the better. Question every word. Don't settle for the first one you think of. Consult your thesaurus. It might oblige with just the gem you're looking for.

Revise your work as often as you need to. The beginning of my writing career predates the personal computer, so I used to write everything in longhand before typing it on a manual typewriter. In order to produce work that appeared spontaneous, I often had to rewrite it as many as seven or eight times.

Check your spelling
You may think you can spell, but sometimes your spellchecker or dictionary will tell you otherwise. A minute or so of double-checking can rescue your work from the brink of instant failure. And remember to use the spelling of the country where your target publication is based.

Check your grammar
You don't always need to use “correct” English. It's a living language with rules being overturned every day. But you need to know the rules before you can break them confidently. You may find you need to unlearn some of the things you were taught in school.

Check your style
Most publications have a “house style” - a preferred style of writing. But make sure your own voice is heard above the clamor. Wordplay can give your work an edge but don't try to be too clever: you might fall down and dent your rhetoric.

Check your facts
You're 99.9 percent sure of what you're saying. After all, your granny told you about it and she was always right. Well, just suppose that on this one occasion she was wrong?

While you're about it, it doesn't hurt to check it makes sense
This is where hidden meanings and unconscious humor can sneak out to embarrass you. I recently came across a book called Knitting in Plain English. What’s wrong with wool?

Leave the gibberish to the politicians. Read your work aloud, preferably to a captive audience. If they fall about laughing when it's not meant to be funny or if they sit stony-faced when it is, fix it some more.

In the words of writer Will Shetterly: “The great thing about revision is that it's your opportunity to fake being brilliant.”

Who’s faking? Not you, if you’ve done all the “fixing” you need to.

And when you've polished your work to perfection, don't forget that other quotation. It goes like this: “Oh, the cleverness of me….”


About the Author
Mary Cook is a UK-based freelance writer who has contributed articles, verses and short stories to numerous publications, both in print and online. Words are her hobby, her business and her passion. Her homepage is: http://hometown.aol.co.uk/mywordmate/myhomepage/business.html.