{"id":167,"date":"2013-09-17T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2013-09-17T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/blog\/2013\/09\/17\/tactical-tuesday-advice-for-self-editing_17-2\/"},"modified":"2015-11-25T12:22:17","modified_gmt":"2015-11-25T19:22:17","slug":"tactical-tuesday-advice-for-self-editing_17-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/tactical-tuesday-advice-for-self-editing_17-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Tactical Tuesday: Advice for Self-Editing"},"content":{"rendered":"
\nA
\ndisturbing trend has begun in the world of fiction. I have to admit that I do
\nnot read much secular work, so the novels in which I have noted this newest
\ntechnique have all been in CBA.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nBack
\nstory is something every writer hears about. We\u2019re told not to drop it into the
\nstory in large chunks. We are taught to layer it into the story, use it to
\nprovide twists and turns to a great novel, and never, ever do we dare to slam
\nour stories to a halt to jettison the poor reader back to the past.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nI have spent
\nyears learning to craft back story that does not stop the forward motion of my
\nnovel. I work at layering in the details to surprise the reader. I do everything
\npossible to keep from pouring a bunch of back story information onto the
\nreader. I encourage all authors that I work with or teach to do the same. That\u2019s
\nwhy this new trend is so disturbing to me.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nWhat is
\nit that has me so bothered? <\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nIn
\nseveral recent novels, I have come across large chunks of italicized text.
\nSometimes the entire chapter is italicized. It took only a second to realize
\nwhat was happening. The author was being lazy, the editor was allowing such
\nlaziness, and the publisher, despite all of the advice to the contrary, went
\nback on years of teaching and allowed the stories to come to an abrupt start
\nand a drastic jump to the past. This new technique adds nothing to an author\u2019s
\nwork, but it takes much away from the story.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nIn all
\ninstances, I refused to read the italicized text. I cringe at the over use of
\ninternal monologue, and I shuddered at pages and pages of italicized back
\nstory, as if the italics made the back story important enough to the story that
\nit could be dumped upon the reader.<\/div>\n
\nIt did
\nnot. When I reached the end of each of the novels where this technique was
\nemployed, I found that I did not miss one bit of the back story.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nThat in
\nand of itself is very telling to me.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nI encourage
\nauthors to learn the art of back story. Edit your novels to incorporate what
\nhas been learned. Yes, back story is necessary, but the way it is presented can
\nmake a vast difference in the way the story is shown.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nHappy
\nediting.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A disturbing trend has begun in the world of fiction. I have to admit that I do not read much secular work, so the novels in which I have noted this newest technique have all been in CBA. Back story is something every writer hears about. We\u2019re told not to drop it into the story […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[504],"tags":[79,67,18,143,144],"class_list":["post-167","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-editing-writing-advice","tag-back-story","tag-editing","tag-editing-tips","tag-novel-writing","tag-trends-in-fiction"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pelicanbookgroup.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}