editing

We, the Editors, are hard at work behind the scenes on the upcoming fabulous February 28, 2013 Issue of Electric Spec. We're all deep in the editing process. We each get assigned two stories. How, you ask? It's usually the stories in the issue we like the best. Let me explain. To make things more quantitative, before the production meeting each editor gives each story in hold-for-voting a numerical score and I compile them before the meeting. Then, at the meeting we have our knock-down drag-out fight, er, I mean, discussion. When the dust clears, we have our final stories and each editor usually ends up editing the ones he/she gave the most favorable rankings.

Which brings me to the editing itself. Correcting grammar and spelling issues is a no-brainer. The tricky part is paring out all the non-essential bits of the story to leave a perfect story jewel. Editor Dave is awesome at this. We actually call him The Hacker behind his back. Oops, did I just let the cat out of the bag? Gremlin Editor made me do it. :)

Personally, I find editing to be very challenging. A story is work of art and I don't want to do anything to change or compromise that art. But what if that art contains adverbs? We all have our personal editing styles. I'm more likely to tell an author a particular section isn't working or needs to be streamlined and ask them to do it. So far, this has worked pretty well.

Ultimately, a story is the author's work of art. If the author doesn't want to make the changes an editor recommends, they're free to withdraw the story. That has happened a couple times. I can't help thinking this was a mistake on the part of the author. Editors never change the essence of a story, we just try to make it even clearer and more wonderful.

I'll start telling you more about the exciting new issue next week. Stay tuned!
And keep sending us stories for the next fabulous issue. Thanks!