Three Tips for Self-Editing Your Book

Three tips to help the self-editing process and prepare your manuscript before you send it to your editor

If you need three tips for why self-editing your book is essential, then keep reading. There’s no reason any author should skip the self-editing process or editing. Regardless of personal experience, another set of eyes on your work is vital. Before you send your manuscript to your editor, self-editing is just as important, especially if you want to make your editor’s life a little easier.

Below are three tips as you begin the self-editing phase.

If you’re ready to start editing, you might want to check out 10 Formatting Tips Your Editor Wants You to Know! It covers some practical tips and ideas to make life a little easier for your editor, and when you have a good book editor, it’s worth it to keep them happy.

3 Tips for Self-Editing Your Book

One. Put it down and step away for a week.

As excited as you are to move on to the next step in the publishing process, a little patience is required. You’ve most likely been putting a lot of your time into the manuscript, and when you weren’t writing your book, you were probably thinking about it. You know all the characters, what happens, why it happens, when it happens, and the motive behind them.

This alone can make it challenging to identify any potential issues with the manuscript. Set the book aside for a week or two and give yourself a mental break from it.

Once you’ve had a decent break from your book, pick it up and read through it again with a clear mind. It will give you a last opportunity to identify any inconsistencies, plot holes, or confusing language that could be tidied up.

Two. Consider printing your book and reading it.

Looking at your manuscript on your laptop, computer, or tablet often tricks the mind into skipping over certain words compared to when you read a physical book on paper. By printing your book out and holding it in your hands as you read it, you may be able to pick up on some inconsistencies you’d been skipping over in its digital format.

Before you print out hundreds of pages and try to sort through them, there are a couple of options:

- - - - Office Works and other printing companies or office supply companies can print and bind your book for you for a reasonable cost.
        
        Print it out chapter by chapter instead of printing out every chapter at once, especially if it’s a longer book. This can make it easier to digest in smaller chunks.

Three. Read your book aloud.

Often, the words that we read off a screen and how they sound in our heads are two very different things. The hardest thing to pick up when you’re working off of your screen is how words sound aloud. Even the most well-written sentence can sound a little clunky when you read it aloud.

If you’ve printed out your book, as we mentioned above, find somewhere quiet where you can take your time and read it aloud as you work your way through it. If you can’t read it aloud, there are other options.

- - - - Microsoft Word – Open up the manuscript, go to review on the top menu bar, and then hit the read-aloud function.
        
        Pages – Open up the manuscript, go to edit, speech, and then hit the start speaking function.

Self-Editing Tips and Quotes from Famous Authors

Below are some self-editing tips and quotes from famous authors to help you as you navigate your self-editing journey.

“I’ve found the best way to revise your own work is to pretend that somebody else wrote

it and then to rip the living s— out of it.”

Stephen King.

“Edit your manuscript until your fingers bleed and you have memorized every last word. Then, when

you are certain you are on the verge of insanity…edit one more time!”

Don Roff.

“You write to communicate to the hearts and minds of others what’s burning inside you,

and we edit to let the fire show through the smoke.”

CK Webb.

“Editing might be a bloody trade, but knives aren’t the exclusive property of butchers.

Surgeons use them too.”

Arthur Plotnik.

“When you write a book, you spend day after day scanning and identifying the trees.

When you’re done, you have to step back and look at the forest.”

Blake Morrison.