Quote:
Originally Posted by BookCat
[...]Or send it to a professional editor (personally, I'd do my own editing, but I can be ruthless with my own stuff). [...]
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There are various levels and types of edit. Yes, substantive copy editing can require ruthlessness. It is critically important but tends to be less obvious to the reader: they appreciate it when it has been done well, but when it has not been done well the resulting criticisms tend to be vague. I do my own substantive editing, and with practice I am getting better at it.
But what most end readers will complain about directly in their reviews is mechanical editing and proofreading. This work doesn't require ruthlessness, it requires knowledge, experience, an eye for detail, and the ability to read what's on the page (rather than what our brains fill in automatically for us). Try as I might, I can't get this right on my own. Having the computer read the text to me helps, but even that has let me down.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Nabeel
[...] I find friends and family are the toughest critics of all.
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Everyone's situation is different. Some people have editors in their family (they must come from somewhere
), but the advice still holds good as a general rule.
Certainly share your work with those you care about, and who care about you; your knowledge of each other can provide its own advantages. But always remember that this feedback will have its own skew (whether too harsh or too soft), so independent review tends to be more reliable as an indicator of how your work may be accepted by a wider audience.
One aspect of this that people forget is that your close acquaintances tend to speak the same dialect as you, so relying on these people can mean that you miss having your assumptions checked.
Being an Australian that would like my work to be read more widely than just the eastern seaboard of Australia (the west, I have learned, speaks a subtly different version of Australian), I have benefited quite regularly from having my work checked by people further removed from my locale.