Yay! Congratulations! You just finished your final draft and sent your manuscript to your beta readers or an editor. Or you self-published your work.

All of your friends went out of their way to congratulate you and to tell you what an honor it is to know an author, especially a published one!

But now, the fun begins. Actually, the opposite. This is when the reviews roll in; from your beta readers, editor or initial batch of readers.

Now is when you find out those same friends don’t: like your genre, write reviews, have time to read, like reading at all, lost their reading glasses, can’t afford your book and a dozen other things you never knew about them.

Now is when you’ll find out that your beta readers are heartless, hate your genre, think your hero is a wimp, your heroine puts out at the drop of a hat and they’re sure they could help you write a much better story for only a slight fee.

Now is when you find out the sole function of editors is to malign you as a writer, convince you that you can’t spell, construct a whole sentence or have the faintest idea of what a story plot is; no less know how to build one. Oh, and editors are color blind, except for… red!

Now is when you’ll find out that often, readers are like people who’ve had a bad meal in a restaurant and they can be even more heartless than editors. Good review or bad, you’ll also question whose book some of them read.

Before you convince yourself that this blog is a total downer, highlighting all the evils of writing and designed to convince you to never write anything, please read on. As you do, we hope you’ll find that it will help you understand that you’re not alone. You’ll suffer through the same things all authors do but you’ll know they’re coming. And that makes a big difference. With luck, we’ll also teach you to see the humor in some of them.

Forgive me because I’ve used this line before. Actually, it’s one of Robyn’s favorites. Stephen King once said, “Starting your story will be the hardest thing you’ll do as an author”. (Or something like that.) We totally disagree. Writing your story will be the easiest thing you’ll do.

Why? Because most writers have a story idea long before they start writing. Also there are numerous sources to help you along your writing journey. Sources to help you outline your story, create story and character arcs, develop your plot, characters, and scenes and then enhance them.

But when you’re all done with your story, as a first time writer, what your likely not prepared for is what comes next. The beta reads, the edits, getting it published or self-publishing it and the reviews. Then as if dealing with all that wasn’t enough, there’s advertising and marketing.    

In this blog, we’ll skip a lot of that and only cover dealing with comments back from beta readers, edits and reviewers.

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So, what do you do with the comments that come back in the form of beta readers’ responses, an edit or reviews? Simple. Read them, try to understand what they’re telling you and learn from them.

Beta Readers

Ideally, your beta readers are not friends or family. If they are, you need to filter their comments to make sure they’re being honest and not just trying to make you feel good by praising your work. If they’re all: “Oh, I love this part,” and “Wow, your hero is hot, hot, hot!” you can probably skip those comments.

If the comments are more in line with: “Are you for real with this part?” or “I’m so confused,” or “There is no way anyone will believe this,” then you need to take a good hard look at what they’re pointing out.

Remember, beta readers are typically the very first to read your manuscript. Ideally, they have no idea what’s coming or what you’re trying to say. Trust in their comments and analyze them. Why didn’t they get what I said? Did I not describe my character? Did I over describe them? (typical for first time writers.) Did I just say they were in an ally and not describe the scene? Oops, they’re right. I jammed twelve thoughts into that giant run-on sentence. Ha ha. My heroine does sound like a twig with blondish kinda hair.

Hopefully your beta readers will be kind, but even if they’re not, don’t discount what they’re trying to tell you. Most of all, keep your sense of humor. And remember, we’ve all been where you are. Describing things with words is not an easy task. It takes time and practice and often one added word can send your description off in the wrong direction. So, have patience, read, analyze and learn.

Editors

Beta readers are not professionals, typically, but editors are. Make sure you hire an editor you can work with and one that understands this is your first manuscript. A good editor is one that will not just cross out things or suggest a different wording. Instead, they will explain why the word is not needed (unless it’s obvious) or another wording works better. This is critical for first time writers. This is how you learn!

When we edit someone’s work, first time writer or not, we always try to say why we suggest something. We’ll note “repeat” when we change a word. Add “not needed” when we delete something or “show” when we suggest they reword what the character is seeing. In our mind, every story is different and even with a ten-times published author, the story is new to them and in some ways, each one can be like their first manuscript.

Which brings us to two points: First, every writer has had an editor hack their work to death with a red pencil (or Track Changes mark ups) or totally reject a manuscript, often cruelly.

Some well quoted examples:

Sylvia Plath: There certainly isn’t enough genuine talent for us to take notice.

Rudyard Kipling: I’m sorry Mr. Kipling, but you just don’t know how to use the English language. 

J. G. Ballard: The author of this book is beyond psychiatric help. 

Emily Dickinson: [Your poems] are quite as remarkable for defects as for beauties and are generally devoid of true poetical qualities. 

Ernest Hemingway (regarding The Torrents of Spring): It would be extremely rotten taste, to say nothing of being horribly cruel, should we want to publish it.

And finally:

In J. K. Rowling’s – A Year in the Life – she’s sitting down with her editor and you catch a glimpse of her manuscript – with red marks all over it.

Second, if you publish traditionally, you’ll likely not get to choose your editor, the publisher will provide one for you, even if your work’s already been edited. Worse yet, their editor is going to edit your work until your story reads the way they want it to. So here, you’ll really need to dial down your sensitivity, put on your suit of armor and not take things to heart. Can you learn from this type of edit? Debatable. (Unless you’re going to continue to publish in this publisher’s selected genre.)

Reviews

Ah yes, every author’s nemesis. Can’t live with them and can’t live without them.

No, we’re definitely not against reviews. However, as you’ll quickly find out, people who didn’t like something are the first to post a review about it. Additionally, reviews will vary all over in terms of what the reader liked or didn’t like. Simply put, that means a reader may have loved your story but hated your hero. That ended up as a one star review. Or, you used one curse word and so your reviewer thinks you’re a heathen with no moral compass.

Then there’s the most confusing reviews of all. The ones that praise what you wrote, loved your story and characters but gave you two stars. (??? Go figure.) Or, the reviews that quote things they hated about your story but none of which has the slightest thing to do with what you wrote. (Uh, who’s story did they read?) Finally, the reviewer who drones on and on about what they think you should have written about but has nothing to do with what you did write about. (Obviously a frustrated author wanna be.)

conclusion

So what do you do with all of this?

Simple. Learn. Read each comment and learn as much as you can from it. If it makes sense and you can go back and fix whatever was critiqued, do it. If not, store it in your memory banks (for us that means write it down) and use it next time.

Learn to read between the lines. Even with the worse review comments, there’s something to be learned from them. What made them feel that way? Why did they think that’s what you meant, said or described? (Some of our most valuable discoveries came from realizing a word or description created a feeling we hadn’t intended. That got stored away and the next time we wrote a scene around it.)

Remember, review comments express only that reviewer’s opinion. Just because they think something sucks doesn’t mean it does or that everyone else thinks it does. The same goes for good reviews. But here too, take note of what they liked, what worked for them and try to discern why. Then, use that in your next revision or story.     

We’ll close by reminding you that it seems like everyone wants to write a book. But most people never do. So, have faith in yourself, cherish the good reviews and smile through the bad. No matter what, learn all you can from them.

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If you have a funny story or two from your reviews, please feel free to share them.

We’ve been editing for a number of years. Over time, our edits have surfaced two very big surprises.

Who would have thought that our editing would have taken us on a tour of writers from all over the world? Writers from Romania, Bermuda, New Zealand, Australia, as well as coast to coast in the United States.  Writers not only spread all over the world, but stories, that like our reading, cover a host of genres and are aimed at age groups from children to seniors.

But perhaps the biggest surprise has been the talent of those whose work we’ve edited. Many have been first time writers, and we’re glad to say that our initial expectations of extensive editing, have often been unfounded. Even for those with English as their second language, their storytelling skills have made our correcting misused words or rewriting jumbled sentences more of a pleasure then a trauma.

Perhaps our vast travels have helped, especially when regional details and time zones become muddled. Even there though, spotting where they went astray and getting things back to the proper place and time is often easy.

But it’s not just been a one-way street of learning. Helping with our knowledge of regional histories has been the various memoirs we’ve edited. Here again, our editing has taken us into areas of research that have broadened our worldly knowledge and allowed us to verify the author’s descriptions, based on their memories.

Finally, the wide variety of genres, each with their own rules, story arcs and subplots has often allowed us to suggest blending these from one genre to another, thus, helping our authors to create some truly unique subplots.

Stuff Every Author Will Need When They Publish

Most of us started writing because we wanted to tell a story, describe a life event or just plain make stuff up.

As we’ve said in several of our blogs, writing is the easiest thing you’ll do. It’s all the other, often little, things that will pop out of the woodwork when you’re totally unprepared for them that will have you mumbling to yourself. The things you never thought of.

Yeah, you knew we were going to get her in here somehow

So, our job in this blog is to make you aware of the most common things you’ll need and let you develop them when it’s convenient and easy. That way you’ll not be surprised, and they’ll be in your files when you need them.

Note: Throughout this blog we’ll use the term “work” to mean your manuscript, book, story, memoir or whatever it is your writing.

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Let’s start with things that are, or should be, part of your work.

Your Work’s Description

As you write, keep in mind that you’re going to need a description of your work; actually, several versions of it.

The longest version will be something for the back cover. This can often also be used for the description on your Amazon page or other places where you’ll post your work (The Authors Den, Goodreads, and other places you list your work). Typically, this description will be five to seven paragraphs long, but shorter is better.

Keep in mind the intent is not to tell your story here. It’s only to give potential readers enough information to get their attention. Briefly mention characters, where things take place and only enough of the plot to pique their interest. And always, always leave them with a question.

Next will be a shorter version for places that have a word or space limit. If you’re skillful you can usually chop the middle out of the above long version, or at least skinny it down, so you have one or two paragraphs.

Your Author Bio

For the back (sometimes up front) of your work, you’ll need an “About the Author” section. Typically, this will contain:

• Where you’re from
• Where you live now
• Places you’ve lived or favorites you visit often
• Schools you went to
• Degrees you’ve earned
• Things you like to do; read, travel, sports, volunteer, etc.
• Married, single, kids
• Anything else about your personal or writing life you’re okay divulging
• A listing of your available works (keep the list is short, no more your latest five works) and upcoming work to be released soon (within the next several months)
• Links to your website, your author pages and other places your work is posted.

This bio can also be used for your Amazon Author Page, your Goodreads Author Page, other sites where you list your work, your website, author interviews, etc.

Like with the description, you’ll probably want several versions of your bio; each a different length and possibly appealing to the interests of different groups. For example: Charity or animal groups you belong to/or support, volunteer with or that your work may be about.

What Others are Saying About (Yourk Work)

If you have beta readers, friends or professionals reading and complementing your work, write down what they have to say about it. Their positive comments can be added to the descriptions when you post them, your webpage, your author pages, or anyplace else your work appears.

Your Head Shot

You’re also going to need a relatively current head shot of yourself. This can be used for author pages, your website home page, inside your work if appropriate, author interviews and blog posts. Make sure you’re dressed appropriately and don’t have too much going on in the background. They want to see you, not be distracted by your kids or a semi-naked girl running on the beach behind you.

Key Words

When you publish your work, you’re going to need to provide key words wherever your book is listed. This is not the genre(s) your work fits in. These are words that someone might use when searching for your work.

For example, if you write romance don’t list “romance” as a key word. Why? Because it’ll automatically be listed as your genre. Instead try: love story, young adult, contemporary, teenage, crazy love, etc. List anything you can think of that someone might search by. Oh, and it doesn’t have to be just one word, it can be a short phrase and even another author’s name whose genre and style is similar to yours.

If you’re writing a memoir you’ll want to add key words that help describe what your life (or event) was about. Like: life on the farm, raised in religion, growing up in Iran, funny stories, world travel, professional golfer, etc.

Internet Links

Be sure to jot down the links to wherever your work is posted. Often you’ll find yourself where you can’t leave a half completed page to go copy a link; at least not without losing everything you’ve already entered. So, have a list of link addresses handy for just such occasions.

ISBNs

Once your work is published and you have an ISBN, jot it down. Trust us, you’ll need it, especially when you can’t get to a copy of your work.

Page Count

Yup, just like ISBNs, someone will want to know how many pages there are in your work when you’re mumbling, “Where is my copy?”

Amazon Account

If you don’t have an Amazon account, you should establish one as soon as you can. There’s not much you can do about a KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) account until you have something to upload and publish but adding KDP to your Amazon account is literally a one click step before you start to upload.

Other On-Line Accounts

As with KDP, a lot of other on-line accounts like Draft to Digital, Goodreads, Authors Den, etc. all pretty much require you have something ready to publish or already published; if not, get your account established and the personal details out of the way. For the rest, you might want to start a list of sites you want to establish accounts with. That way, you’ll not forget them. If you’re like us, once you’ve got all of the above information at hand, you’ll get on a roll and want to establish as many accounts as you can.

Books Go Social

We haven’t talked much about marketing, which is a blog, and then some, all its own. But like everything above, you’ll be facing it before you know it. Thus, if nothing else, read through Books Go Social. They are expert at setting up social media and other marketing accounts to help you sell, advertise and market your work.

It never hearts to be smart, before you need to be, so you can avoid surprises.

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What’s he got to do with this? Nothing. We just thought he’s cool

Your Web Site

The last thing we’ll bring up is your web site, but it’s the one thing that every author should have! Your web site allows you to collect anything and everything you think your followers and readers need to know about you and your work. It also lets you blog about things that are important to you and it’s the one place where you can provide a link to everything you.

Web sites are inexpensive, or free, relatively easy to set up and you can (and should) claim your domain name as soon as you can. There are tons of ready to use formats and simple to follow instruction for making your site attractive and up and running in a heartbeat.

Once it’s up, adding to it is simple and we suggest you play with it and learn how to link it to everything else, because once your work is published it’ll become your center attraction and likely your theme.

Most of this seems so simple but, trust us, having it prepared ahead of time, and all in one place that’s handy, will save you a lot of frustration.

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We know we’ve missed things, so help us out here. What bit of information have you needed and didn’t have or had to hunt for that we should add to the list?

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• Facebook

We started this series by assuming you already have a story arc. Or at least a story idea and possibly an outline. For many writers, next up would likely be your characters, who they are, descriptions and so on. (Actually, it’s not unusual to have your characters in mind first and build everything around them.)

Hopefully, as you were building your story, you kept notes. Notes about things like what you named your characters, their descriptions, places you took them to, facts from research you needed to do and anything else peculiar to your story, characters and settings. These notes are sometimes called a story bible, a fact sheet or a style sheet. Some writing software will actually provide these notes for you or, at least, provide a pre-formatted list where you can enter things from your story that you’ll want to keep track of.

(Much of this is covered in our Writing 101 workshop or most other workshops for those new to writing.)

In any case, you’ll want to have those notes handy as you go through and tweak your novel.

As you’ve been following our series, we hope you’ve been adding various locations, dialogue, scenes, as well as developing subplots and support characters. Weaving things together and adding to your story notes.

But, as you’ve built your story, it’s not unusual to find gaps in the story line, characters that simply don’t seem to fit the image you wanted and scenes and locations that are just not adding anything to your story. Quite often, these will jump out, nag at you or simply not read right as you self-edit; no matter how many times you try to rewrite them. Or they will be pointed out by your beta readers.

So, how do you find and fix these?

Let’s take the easy ones first.

Chapters and Paragraphs

Start with your longest chapters, the ones that are at least half again as long as the others.

• Why is each one long?  
• Are you just rambling or is it long because it’s an important scene?
• Can it be broken in two?
• In some cases more?

If it’s the latter, you really need to take a hard look at it.

The same goes for paragraphs.

• Does each chapter and paragraph have more than one point?
• Do they flow well?
• Are they strong or do they sag in the middle or snail crawl to the end?

Quite often as we get more and more into writing our story, comfort wise, we can forget that there should be natural break points. Why? Because long or weak chapters, and paragraphs, wear out the reader. Unconsciously, they can be holding their breath, anticipating what will happen next, or worse, become bored and want to get on with the story.

So go through your longest chapters and paragraphs to look for natural break points. Check to make sure each flows well, is adding to the story line, that you’re not just rambling or repeating what’s already been said several times.

This last point is quite common, especially with new writers. Make your point, make sure it’s clear and get on with your story. 

The easiest way to do this? Read it out loud. Your ears are your best friend. As soon as you stumble over something on your read-through, go back and read it out loud!     

Scenes, Support Characters and Subplots

As you go through your chapters, keep track of how many scenes, support characters and subplots are in each. Are the scenes all related and reasonably balanced? Do any of the chapters jump out with too many scenes, too many characters, scenes or characters that don’t seem to fit?

• Does the plot and subplots comfortably flow from one scene to the next?
• If there’s a skip, is it intentional, such as a flashback?
• Do the subplots flow smoothly into and out of the main plot line and not take over the main story line or become a story of their own? **
• Finally, does each scene and character add to your story?

** subplots may often be a mini story on their own, but they shouldn’t detract from or be more interesting than the main story line.

Things That Don’t Make Sense or Aren’t Clear

Often a sentence, especially in dialogue, simply comes out wrong. It either doesn’t make sense, interprets wrong or doesn’t say what you wanted it to.

More often than not, these will stick in your head as you read through. Something will nag at you and make you go back and reread it.

Examples:

“But, you and I are different.” Does that mean you and I are different from each other or we’re both different from everyone else?

“She reached up, pulled his head against her chest and looked into his eyes.” She can’t really look into his eyes with his head against her chest. How about, “She looked into his eyes, reached up and pulled his head against her chest.”

This brings up a good tool. When a compound sentence doesn’t make sense or read right, flip it around. This is also a great way to avoid consecutive sentences from starting with the same word.

“I love staring into your eyes, they fascinate me. I love your wavy brown hair, the little dimple in your chin and your rosy cheeks too.”

Rewritten it could be: “Your eyes fascinate me, I love staring into them. Then there’s your rosy cheeks, the little dimple in your chin and your wavy brown hair.” (The reader will automatically carry the words ‘I’ and ‘love’ over from the first sentence.)

Characters and Credibility

In many cases, this will require that you double check your research.

Review the traits you’ve given to each of your characters.

• Are they coming across as you envisioned them, as a reader would expect?
• Do you need to add more details to their physical description, make their emotional responses and actions more in line with their job or the image you want?
• Is your soldier or firefighter a hunk? Is he or she in shape to lug the equipment they need to or lift a person and carry them out of a burning building or out of harm’s way? Have you described their equipment correctly, their conversations using soldier, police or firefighter speak?

But it’s not just your characters you’ll need to review. The same goes for your scenes.

“He stood at the gate and watched her come up the boarding ramp.” Not going to happen; at least not after 911 when no one can get beyond security without a ticket.     

“He scratched under Moonshine’s chin as he waited for Ciara to get ready.” The problem here is, several chapters before, they (we) named the kitten Moonlight.

This last example is actually from one of our stories, where Robyn and I, both experienced editors, missed that we had misnamed the kitten in this scene, which is the perfect lead in for our last point.

No matter how many times you’ve self-edited your work, always, always, always, have another set of eyes look at it. Preferably someone experienced in editing.

Why? Because you’re the author. You know what should be there and you’ll read it in, whether it’s there or not. You know the kitten’s name is Moonlight and that’s what you’ll see, just as we did.

Out of fairness, we had joked about naming the kitten Moonshine, which likely helped us to read over the error. A poor excuse and Moonshine would likely have nagged at an independent editor who would have checked it against the story’s fact sheet!

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What critical things do you look for when you do your read through?

Recently we’ve noticed a lot of comments and questions about copyrighting your work. Hope this blog will answer many of them.

This blog started out to be quite simple. Define copyright, then tell you why should or shouldn’t copyright your work. Ha! That quickly turned out to be not so simple. Then, my wonderful partner Robyn started editing my first cut and threw the plagiarizing monkey wrench in it. So, please bear with us as we try to keep this as simple as we can yet help you to understand copyrighting your work.

To start with, we are not copyright attorneys and in fact have no legal experience. We have, however, done a lot of research on the internet and strongly encourage you to follow our footsteps to better understand what follows.

Our internet sources for what follows are: Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org) and Plagiarism.org (https://www.plagiarism.org/)

One final note. Our research covers US law only so if you live or sell your books in other countries, the laws may be different.

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Let’s start with what is a copyright? From there we’ll cover some of the elements of copywrite law, then talk about plagiarism and finally suggest what you should do and why.

What is a copyright?

Our friends at Wikipedia define copyright as follows:

Copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to make copies of a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educational, or musical form. Copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself. A copyright is subject to limitations based on public interest considerations, such as the fair use doctrine in the United States.

In many jurisdictions, copyright law makes exceptions to these restrictions when the work is copied for the purpose of commentary or other related uses. United States copyright law does not cover names, titles, short phrases or listings (such as ingredients, recipes, labels, or formulas). However, there are protections available for those areas copyright does not cover, such as trademarks and patents.

What’s all that mean? First, the copyright protects the owner and gives them the exclusive right to make copies. That means only you, the copyright holder, can make copies. Anyone else who wants to copy your work needs your permission.

But your copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself. Nor does it cover names, titles, short phrases or listings (such as ingredients, recipes, labels, or formulas).

What’s all that mean? Copyright is intended to protect the original owner’s expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself. So, to start you’ll probably need some way to prove you’re the owner, which is where fixation comes in. But it also means only your story is protected.

So, if you write a story about CJ helping horses at a horse rescue ranch, like I did, your copywriting the story of someone named CJ helping horses at a specific horse rescue ranch. That does not mean that you own the rights to all stories with characters named CJ or about horse rescue ranches. We’ll talk more about this in a bit too.

Fixation

Fixation means that a works should exist in some tangible, permanent media form before it will attract copyright protection. That is, what you’re copyrighting should be ‘fixed’ in the form of a permanent media. For most artistic works, such as a manuscript, song or photograph, the point at which the work is created is generally considered the point of fixation.

Some jurisdictions require “fixing” copyrighted works in a tangible form when works are shared among multiple authors, each of whom holds a set of rights to use or license the work, and who are commonly referred to as rights holders. These rights frequently include reproduction, control over derivative works, distribution, public performance, and moral rights such as attribution (Credit). (This will become clearer when we get to changes in the law)

What’s that mean? Simple, you need to have whatever you’re copyrighting defined in a media form that can be stored unchanged. This could be a written or digital final manuscript, a published story, typed or written song lyrics or a photograph. Put another way, your original work needs to be in fixed entity that defines what your copyrighting.  

Originality

Copyright requires originality for several reasons. For one thing, it ensures that the work protected by copyright reflects the author’s personality and expression and that the effort the author expends in creating the work is substantial enough to justify legal protection. This also means that copyright protection is limited to each author’s expression, leaving non-original expressions and works free for others to use in the creation of new works: in this way, the originality requirement protects the creative and intellectual freedom of other creators.

Huh? Okay, let’s take an extreme example. Let’s say you write a story that ‘borrows’ big chunks from other stories, TV shows, movies, songs and anything else you can find. Or, worse yet, there is absolutely nothing original in your story. When you copyright your story, the only parts that will be covered by the copyright will be the original parts you created. In fact, for all the parts you ‘borrowed,’ you’ve certainly plagiarized the work of others and likely violated multiple copyrights. (We actually read a story that fell into this category.) (We’ll also get to plagiarism shortly.)

Territorial Rights

Copyrights can be granted by public law and are in that case considered “territorial rights”. This means that copyrights granted by the law of a certain state, do not extend beyond the territory of that specific jurisdiction. Copyrights of this type vary by country; many countries, and sometimes a large group of countries, have made agreements with other countries on procedures applicable when works “cross” national borders or national rights are inconsistent. An example of such an agreement is the Berne Convention Implementation Act which provides a standard for those countries that comply with it.

Some countries require certain copyright formalities to establishing copyright, others recognize copyright in any completed work, without a formal registration.

The key here is to be aware that different countries have different copyright laws so, what may be covered by your US copyright may not be honored if your work sells in other countries.

Changes to US copyright laws

We’re only including this so you know how we got to where we are with US copyright law and you can understand some of our suggestions at the end.

Before 1989, United States law required the use of a copyright notice, consisting of the copyright symbol (©, the letter C inside a circle), the abbreviation “Copr.”, or the word “Copyright”, followed by the year of the first publication of the work and the name of the copyright holder. Several years may be noted if the work has gone through substantial revisions. The proper copyright notice for sound recordings of musical or other audio works is a sound recording copyright symbol (℗, the letter P inside a circle), which indicates a sound recording copyright, with the letter P indicating a “phonorecord”.

In addition, the phrase All rights reserved was once required to assert copyright, but that phrase is now legally obsolete.

In 1989 the United States enacted the Berne Convention Implementation Act, amending the 1976 Copyright Act to conform to most of the provisions of the Berne Convention. As a result, the use of copyright notices has become optional to claim copyright, because the Berne Convention makes copyright automatic. However, the lack of notice of copyright using these marks may have consequences in terms of reduced damages in an infringement lawsuit – using notices of this form may reduce the likelihood of a defense of “innocent infringement” being successful.

But what is meant by the Berne Convention makes copyright automatic? This is where Fixation comes in. Since you need to know what’s being copyrighted, the standard interpretation is that as soon as whatever you’re copyrighting is defined in a media form that can’t be changed, it’s automatically copyrighted. To quote plagiarism.org: Almost all forms of expression fall under copyright protection as long as they are recorded in some way (such as a book or a computer file).

Which is the perfect lead into plagiarism!

What is Plagiarism?

According to plagiarism.org: “Plagiarism is the representation of another author’s language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions as one’s own original work. Plagiarism is considered academic dishonesty and a breach of journalistic ethics. It is subject to sanctions such as penalties, suspension, expulsion from school or work, substantial fines and even incarceration.”

According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, to “plagiarize” means:

• to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one’s own
• to use (another’s production) without crediting the source
• to commit literary theft
• to present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source.

In other words, plagiarism is an act of fraud. It involves both stealing someone else’s work and lying about it afterward.

All of the following are considered plagiarism:

• turning in someone else’s work as your own
• copying words or ideas from someone else without giving credit
• failing to put a quotation in quotation marks
• giving incorrect information about the source of a quotation
• changing words but copying the sentence structure of a source without giving credit
• copying so many words or ideas from a source that it makes up the majority of your work, whether you give credit or not (subject to “fair use” rules).

So, where are we going with all this? Hopefully by now you’ve realized that there is a fine line between what is copyright protected and what falls under plagiarism. Remember, copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself. Nor does it cover names, titles, short phrases or listings.

So, what if someone only steals parts of your work, some unique words, phrases or ideas?While copyright clearly doesn’t cover these, plagiarism very well may. And plagiarism is suable as an act of fraud.

Before we wrap things up, we need to cover registering your copyright.

Copyright Registration

Registration establishes a claim to copyright with the Copyright Office. An application for copyright registration can be filed by the author or owner of an exclusive right in a work, the owner of all exclusive rights, or an agent on behalf of an author or owner. An application contains three essential elements: a completed application form, a nonrefundable filing fee, and a nonreturnable deposit— that is, a copy or copies of the work being registered and “deposited” with the Copyright Office.

A certificate of registration creates a public record of key facts relating to the authorship and ownership of the claimed work, including the title of the work, the author of the work, the name and address of the claimant or copyright owner, the year of creation, and information about whether the work is published, has been previously registered, or includes preexisting material.

 You can submit an application online through http://www.copyright.gov or on a paper application. In addition to establishing a public record of a copyright claim, registration offers several other statutory advantages:

• before an infringement suit may be filed in court, registration (or refusal) is necessary for U.S. works.
• registration establishes prima facie evidence of the validity of the copyright and facts stated in the certificate when registration is made before or within five years of publication.
• when registration is made prior to infringement or within three months after publication of a work, a copyright owner is eligible for statutory damages, attorneys’ fees, and costs.
• registration permits a copyright owner to establish a record with the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)4 for protection against the importation of infringing copies.

Registration can be made at any time within the life of the copyright. If you register before publication, you do not have to re-register when the work is published, although you can register the published edition, if desired.

Summary

As soon as you finish your work in a fixed form, it is automatically copyrighted.

That’s great! Maybe. But, what should you do and why?

To start with, if someone steals your work it’s up to you, the copyright holder, to sue them. Even if you registered your copyright with the Library of Congress, they are not going to help you sue. However, if you don’t register your copyright, you can only sue for a cease and desist order and will not be eligible for statutory damages, attorneys’ fees, and costs.

So, what should you do? That depends on how worried you are about having your work stolen.

Our recommendation is:

Place a copyright notice in your work consisting of: Copyright © (year) by (your name).

Why? This way, no one can claim they didn’t know your work was copyrighted. (Believe us, it happens! There is no intelligence test required for book thieves but they are good at playing dumb)

Don’t forget to add a notice for other copyrighted items used in your book. For example, the lyrics to my wedding song in book two of my trilogy holds a separate copyright, which is also listed on my copyright page.

If you really think you’ve got a best seller that someone might want to steal, register your copyright. Remember, you can always register your copyright at a later date; like after your second million copies sell. Seriously, registering your copyright is less than $50 so if you’re really concerned and want peace of mind, register it. (The $50 doesn’t count fixed copy and mail costs.)

When should you register your copyright? When you’re finished making major changes, typically when it’s done being edited. Minor changes such as corrections and small story enhancements will not negate your copyright, as long as they don’t substantially change your work. Also remember, for major changes you can always update your copyright, such as after your work is published or for a new edition.  

Some Final Comments

The chances of having your work stolen are slim. Even slimmer are the chances of you finding out about it. However, if the old adage “better safe than sorry” ever applied, this is it. So, do whatever makes you feel like your work is protected.

We often hear concerns about editors stealing an author’s work. If your concerned, copyright and register your draft before you send it off for edit. Remember you can always update your copyright. If you’re still worried, ask your editor to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement.  

Happy writing and copyrighting everyone!

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Have we missed anything? Let us know.

One of the questions we ask when we get an edit request is: Do you plan to self-publish or publish traditionally? More and more the answer comes back that they want to self-publish.

If you plan to publish traditionally, often the publisher will give you their formatting requirements, or they will format your manuscript during their edit process. However, if you plan to self-publish, you’ll need to be concerned with formatting your manuscript – preferably from when you start to type it up.

Many of the things we point out here can be implemented at any time. But if you get used to setting your formatting up from the beginning, it will make life much easier for you when you do your pre-publish cleanup later. It will also let you see what your final manuscript will look like as it grows. Often, this will help you spot and correct mistakes or highlight formatting issues as they pop up too.

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Be aware that we only work with MS Word in creating our own manuscripts and editing the work of other authors. So, if you use a different type of software to create your manuscript, the way you do things will likely be different. Also, we only publish using Amazon KDP. So again, if you use a different self-publisher, check with them to see what their formatting rules are.

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Let’s start with setting up your manuscript.

Unfortunately, there’s no “Format” button on your keyboard

So, we’ll start by having you go to the “Home” heading in Word where you’ll find the standard word settings across the top.

Fonts

We typically work in either Times New Roman, Calibri or Calibri Light. All are easy to read and accepted by most publishing software. They are also easy to read and work with as you develop your manuscript.  

Note: Some fonts, usually the more fancy and unusual fonts, will not be accepted by the publishing conversion software.

For font size, we use 12. This typically is what we publish in too. Anything smaller is too hard to read and it doesn’t add enough white space, so it jambs up the wording on the page. Anything larger takes up too much space and we think is overkill – unless you’re going for a “Large Type” book.

Note: We’ll talk more about white space a bit further down.

If you want something bigger to work with as you spend your days developing your manuscript, go to the lower righthand corner and use the zoom control to increase your display. We typically operate at 120 percent, which eases the eye strain and makes it easier to tell those commas from the periods.

Styles

Unless we’re doing something fancy, we typically use the standard style that shows up in Word. If you’d like something different, select the “Design” heading and choose a style that better fits what you’re looking for. If you type something into the body of the page, the changes will show as you slide your cursor across each of the styles to help you choose.

Line and Paragraph Spacing

For line spacing we prefer to use 1.15 rather than 1. This unjams the wording by adding a wee bit more white space, yet it doesn’t add much to the page count. It also makes things much easier on the eyes for the reader, and you as you write.

For paragraph spacing we do the same thing. We like to use 12pts between paragraphs. This again adds more white space to unjam things and is so much easier on the eyes.

Note: One of the things that drives us crazy as readers is to open a book and find page after page of jammed up wording running from top to bottom and edge to edge. Thus, we try to spread things out a bit and add white space.

We also know of no one who has refused to buy a book because it had an extra 10 or so pages from adding white space. We have, however, seen books put back on the shelf when we or others opened page after page to jammed up writing.

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The above settings will get you off on the right foot as you type up your manuscript.

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Some other common format issues.

• Do not use the “TAB” key to set your indents! Amazon’s conversion programs will barf all over your manuscript if you use the tab key to indent. Indent your paragraphs via the style setting or the “Increase indent” selection on the home page.
• Be sure to only use one space after a full stop (period).
• Chapter titles should be larger (we use 16 font size), centered on the page and we use a Calibri or Calibri Light font to help titles stand out a wee bit more. They should also always be proceeded by a page break on the previous page to make sure they appear at the top of a new page.
• One other thing we like to do is give each chapter a title. We consider chapter titles to be an enticement to pull the reader into the chapter. This is not as difficult as most writers seem to want to make it. Remember, you’re not trying to give anything away, just pull the reader in. So, find something enticing in the chapter that doesn’t give anything away. For example, don’t use titles like “Chapter 7 – Jackson Dies”. Instead try “Chapter 7 – Jackson’s in Trouble”. You’ll also have to be careful not make chapter titles too long. Make sure they don’t wrap to a second line.
• For indicating scene breaks or character changes, use *** centered, rather then ——————-. This way the break indication is always the same. 
• Finally, if you go to the middle of the Home page header, you’ll see a backward P with the top filled in. If you left click on it, it will highlight every time you entered a space, hit enter to start a new paragraph or inserted a page break. This is extremely helpful when cleaning up your manuscript – such as finding and removing extra spaces, paragraph commands and making sure each new page starts with a page break, when needed.

Have we provided you with at least one new formatting tool or idea? Did we miss anything that you think should be added?

As authors, we’re all taught to develop our story primarily through our characters. We’re taught to paint detailed descriptions of our characters, use conflict, flashbacks and other methods to let the reader form images. Images of our protagonist, our antagonist, our hero, their lover and our stories supporting cast.

But what about other story elements? Our settings? Our scenes? Dialogue? Character actions? Aren’t they just as important to building your story as describing your characters? Isn’t where they go, what they eat, what they see, hear, and smell important too?

As a mater of fact, does telling your reader that your hero has brown eyes really say anything about them? Do we really care if their hair is blond, red, brown or black?

Painting a picture

What if we say it’s blond with streaks of blue on one side and a faded patch of orange on the other? Doesn’t that immediately form a picture of someone young, a bit wild and daring?

My point being that you can subtly paint a picture by adding visual impact to each element of your story. And that, will be the subject for this blog series.

Letting your scenes tell your story

In the first of this series we’ll look at painting a picture with your scenes and settings. Actually, not only the scene or setting, but also the locations you choose to place them in.

Aren’t these just as important to building your story as your characters? Isn’t where they go, what they eat, what they see, hear, and smell important too? The picture you paint in any scene must contain at least some of these images to be complete; to draw the reader into your scene and make them feel as if they’re part of it.

Many of us refer to this as “Show don’t tell”. Uh, yes! Of course! How simple! But, is it?

 

Let’s give it a shot. Write a quick scene of someone walking on the street above.

Okay. Time’s up. Let’s see how you did.

First, did you tell us where they are? In New Zealand, Germany, Ireland, San Diego?

Did you describe what they saw? What they passed?

What did they smell?

Did they stop and buy something? What was it? What did it smell and taste like?

How about the woman pushing the stroller? Is the baby crying?

Using the five senses

If it’s not clear yet, we’re asking you to put yourself into your characters’ shoes. For you to describe the scene using their five senses. What they:

• Saw
• Touched
• Tasted
• Heard
• Smelled

Also, what emotions, if any, each invoked. What about when they saw their destination, the book store? Did they smile? Chuckle? Did the smell of books fill their nostrils?

If you’ve included all or most of the above types of descriptions in you example, you’ve painted a complete picture for your reader. Not only of the scene but of your character too!

After all, aren’t we all best described by our inner feelings? By how we react to what we see, smell, hear, touch and taste? By the memories and emotions each conjures up, or doesn’t?

Finally, don’t forget the sixth sense, intuition. Intuition not only influences, it interprets what our senses are telling us. It translates their meaning into our unique world.

So, you want to be a writer but you have no idea where to start, what to do, how to do it, or really what your story is about?

That means you pretty much look like this guy. Lost, no idea where he’s at, where he’s going, who to ask for help or even what to ask.

It also means you’re where most authors are, or soon get to, when they start.

Are we going to write it for you? Nope, we have enough trouble writing our own stuff. Besides, it’s your story, not ours. But, we’ll get you started by:

• helping you collect your ideas
• pushing them around to form a rough story
• building an outline
• adding details
• forming a story
• creating nice guys, not so nice guys and plain old villains
• adding lovely women, sexy women, ugly women and even evil women
• inserting characters that support and bring out your main characters
• developing plot twists and turns
• inserting flashbacks, flash forwards and maybe a flash sideways into a parallel world, if you’re into Sci-Fi
• helping you build settings that put the reader into your scenes
• wrapping it all up with a bow around your ending.

 

WOW! All that? Yup! And we’ll even throw in:

• how to find the rules of your genre, style sheets and outlines
• getting help from a developmental editor
• what NOT to do
• how beta reading and editing fit into the writing process and why they are critical
• covers
• book descriptions
• chapter titles
• writing software.

 

If you’re already an author with a story partially or fully written, you’re probably thinking this is pretty lame stuff. Perhaps. But why not give it a read? It’s never too late to learn something new. Then bouncing your work against new, different, or even rehashed writing ideas may just help you tweak your characters, fine tune your plot, brighten your settings or make that boring subplot really work for you.

So grab a note pad (lap top or tablet if you prefer), pull up a couch like Oscar Wilde here and get ready to become famous. Once you are, you too can wear a cool fur coat, boots and spats like his.

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This blog is intended to cover the basics of writing your story, but is there something we haven’t covered? Something you think might help you develop or fine tune your draft? If so, jump in there and let us know.

In Part I we covered the basics of editing. Parts II and III then went on to talk about the most common types of editing: Developmental Editing and Copy or Line Editing.

Part IV will wrap up the basics of the editing process most authors will need and cover two other types of editing primarily used to help new authors get off the ground with their first manuscript.

 

By now, you and your editor have pored over your manuscript. You’ve gone back and forth with ideas, screamed at each other, hugged each other, tweaked things till they’re perfect or as close to perfect as you can get them, and there are no more post it notes hanging everywhere!

The really good news? You’ve learned to trust yourself!

You’re also one step away from being ready to publish. Uh, actually, make that several steps; but that’s the subject of another blog.

So, what’s next?

Proofreading

Proofreading is the final review on your completely edited manuscript. You know, the one you’ve hashed over, revised and tweaked on just about every page.

And, because of the changes, we need to go back and check for:

• Typographical errors
• Punctuation
• Grammar
• Spacing
• Print quality and font consistency
• Sufficient white space – margins, paragraph spacing, indenting.

In short, we need to make sure it’s completely error free and print ready.

Other types of edits

But what if you’re still not sure and somehow, someway, things are still just not working for you?

Well, this calls for a Substantive or Content Edit

A substantive or content edit is a complete assessment of an author’s final manuscript for:

• Style
• Structure
• Logic
• Tone
• Accuracy

 

This is in addition to, and in our case, after or during a full copy edit.

Often, any good editor will throw in some or all of these as part of their copy edit. Why? Well because they, like you, have now lived with your characters and your story from beginning to end. They have built a picture in their head and when the structure or tone isn’t working, it jumps out at them. Likewise, when the style of your story changes or the logic or accuracy drifts and doesn’t make sense they quickly pick up on that too.

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The final type of edit in our editing chest is a Production Edit.

A production edit coordinates all of the manuscript processes from a Developmental Edit through publication, including:

• Copy edit
• Internal content and cover design
• Printing
• Binding
• Distribution
• Coordination with the publisher

Think of a production editor as a project manager, and the womb-to-tomb writing and publication of your manuscript as the project.

 

In Part I we covered the basics of editing. Why you need an editor and an overview of what an editor does and doesn’t do. Then, in Part II we covered Developmental Editing, which is intended mainly to help new writers who are having difficulty getting started with their story.

In Part III, we’ll cover the most common form of editing, Copy or Line Editing.

At this stage, you’ve likely gone over, and over, and over your manuscript. Now you’re either in love with it and convinced it’s perfect or can’t stand to look at it another second!

Whichever it is, will help you and the editor decide which form of line editing you’ll need.

If you’re certain you’ve found and corrected everything you could, are in love with your plot and characters, then a light line edit is likely all you’ll need.

On the other hand, if you’re convinced none of it makes sense and you wrote it in some other language, then you’re probably headed for a heavy line edit.

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By now you’ve likely guessed that a copy or line edit is performed on the what the writer believes to be a completed manuscript and is a line by line check of the authors work.

Line editing can be light, medium or heavy, depending on what state the manuscript is in. As noted above, a clean self-edited manuscript would likely need only a light line edit. Whereas a manuscript the writer is uncomfortable with will need a deeper, heavy line edit to help finish developing the story as well as fixing things.

Typically, a medium line edit and its depth, will fall somewhere in between, depending on what the editor finds during his/her initial manuscript evaluation.

Things the editor will make sure are correct and proper for each type of line edit are:

• Light
  • Spelling
  • Punctuation
  • Grammar
  • Capitalization
  • Number usage
  • Abbreviations
  • Typographical errors
  • Omitted or repeat words
  • Overall story accuracy

 

• Medium – A light edit plus:
  • Consistency of American or British English, colloquialisms, accents
  • Sentence construction and run on sentences
  • Elimination of unnecessary words
  • Syntax
  • Proper and consistent tense
  • Overused words and adverbs, clichés, purple prose
  • Logic or plot holes
  • Character/time inconsistencies
  • Style sheet/guide adherence (if applicable)

 

• Heavy or Full – A light edit, necessary elements from a medium edit and suggestions for:
  • Cuts
  • Additions
  • Rewrites
  • Revisions to unclear passages
  • Replacement words
  • Rearranged sentences and scenes

 

Which type of line edit is right for you? That’s up to you, the condition of your manuscript and your editor.

When is your manuscript done being edited? When you and your editor agree that it is. Remember, this is a circular process. The more changes you make as a result of the edits, the more additional checks the editor will need to make.

In Part IV we’ll cover the final common step in the editing process, proofreading, and mention a few special editing processes you may want to consider.

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Line editing can range from simple to complex. Have we covered what’s generally contained in each type? Do you have a question about something specific? Let us know and we’ll gladly answer it.