re: edit. and rev.

I think the title says it all. I'm in the process of cleaning up one of my accepted anthology stories. The process is made easier by having one of the people from my writer's group giving me helpful hints and suggestions. No small feat, actually.

Having someone you trust to read your work for revision ideas, not an interested family member, friend or lover, is a huge risk. They see the story differently from the writer, though the story reads the same to both on the page. The writer has the unfortunate advantage of a bigger picture of anything he or she writes and not all of that information ever hits the page. In a short story, that information may not even have an impact on what others see but may affect how the writer feels that character would react to tension and mood in the growing story. A writer that knows his main character likes chocolate but not peanut butter knows this information may do little for the story arc and leaves it out, but that personal choice helps the writer define a character and it fleshes the character out, makes them 'real.'

In a bigger sense, though, the writer may know things that don't hit the page and the reader may wonder why the protagonist or antagonist has reacted the way they have to a certain stimulus. Only by having an outside eye will this omission be made clear. The writer may need someone to point out that something is not making sense because a detail, one only the writer knows, needs to be present on the page for reader to understand why something happens the way it happens.

If you take writing seriously and want to do the best you can, you honestly can't do it alone. Sure, writing is a solitary art, one that takes a person away from others to brood over a pen and paper or a machine for hours at a time, but after the work is done it needs to be reviewed and critiqued. Sometimes it needs a nudge in the right direction, other times it may need a shove and a kick. In the end, few writers in history have ever been able to sell and publish their work without someone else's keen eye and subtle suggestions. I'm no fool.

And if the writing fails to be accepted, I also understand that it's not the fault of the person that took the time to help me. My story needs more work or it needs some time alone in my stacks to ferment and age. If there is still a salvageable story after it's been sitting a while, then it's still worth telling, even if not the same way it was told the first time. The terrible truth is that a story is never finished. Just ask any writer about one of their books or stories. Ask them if they are 'happy' with it and you'll get many different answers that mean the same thing: I could have done better, I should have changed this... I understand that I may look back on something I've written and laugh or try to apologize for it, it's in the art. I will always try to make what I write the best it can be before print. After that, only time will tell.