As I talked about in my original post in this series about editing, I’ve found it’s more effective to start editing with big changes that need to be made (regardless of where they are in the story) rather than beginning in chapter one and working my way through. Jill and I also co-wrote an entire book on this method, so that could be a good resource for you if this method of “macro editing” before “micro editing” appeals to you.

One not-so-fun byproduct of this method is that after weeks of working on edits, I end up with a book that feels overwhelmingly messy. I always think of that quote about how in the middle of open heart surgery, it looks like the surgeon is committing murder. There are many things, especially in the art word, that look like a horrifying mess when examined mid-process. At this point in creating my story, I definitely do some fretting that I’ve accidentally murdered my book.

But I’ve edited enough books that I can remind myself the mess is part of the process, and that I just need to stay the course. Now that I’ve covered all my big edits, I pull out my editing to-do list (as discussed in this post), review everything I’ve checked off, and look at those smaller items that are left. I ask, “Does it make sense to take care of this now, or take care of it in the chapter-by-chapter edit?”

Before I go through my book and do the micro edit, where I’m looking at each scene, each paragraph, each word and making sure they’re all doing their job, I have a few things I like to get into place:

I put together my story workbook.

“Story workbook” is a fancy way of saying, “the spreadsheet I use to track my story details.”

My story workbook is an Excel spreadsheet because that’s what works for me. You could use a variety of tools for this, though. OneNote, Scrivener, a Word Document, a three-ring binder. Anything that works for you and helps you track your details. You can get the free tutorial for my story workbook when you sign up to receive our email newsletter, Go Teen Writers Notes.

I’ve already been using my story workbook some as I’ve written my first draft, but it’s not very complete. While there would be benefits to tracking details like character eye color and what date certain story events happen during the first draft process, I’m not good at it. In the first draft, I’m all about getting words down.

So now that I’m about to turn the corner and start my scene-by-scene micro edit, I want to make sure I have my workbook ready to be filled out. Now is when I actually need to track whose eyes are green and what days of the week my character has swim practice.

I do a character journal for anyone who reads flat.

While I worked on all those big changes during the macro edit, I’ve almost always noticed a character who hasn’t blossomed the way I thought they would.

For those of you who have read Within These Lines, Diego was my problem character until I did a character journal for him. Now I frequently get comments from readers about what a great side character he is. In my experience, Michael Crichton is proved right over and over again that good books aren’t written, they’re rewritten.

If you’ve identified any of your characters as reading flat, your micro edits will benefit from you investing time now on adding dimensions.

What’s a character journal? This is a character developing exercise I learned from James Scott Bell. Start by picking a question that’s a good springboard for rambling. The one that’s most effective for me is, “Tell me about your family.” And then you just write. So your journal might start like this:

I’ve heard my mother was once beautiful, but a marriage to a cruel man left her looking old long before her time. I guess that’s why I’ve never really believed in marriage. All I’ve ever seen is how it destroys.

I’m often surprised by how long I can free write for when working on character journals. Pages and pages, especially if I’m nailing down the backstory of an antagonist.

I think the reason this works so well, especially for antagonists, is that you’re getting deep in the character’s head and figuring out why their bad choices make sense to them. Even if what you learn during the character journal process is never actually stated in the story, knowing it will help you create a consistent, logical character and get those extra dimensions on the page during your micro edit.

I take care of any lingering research.

During the macro edit, I do all my research that I believe will impact the plot. But often I haven’t taken the time to dig into details like fashion, food, popular movies at the time, etc. I’ll save myself some time if I get the last of the research done before I dig into the detailed edit of the story. Typically, I’ll flag pages in my fashion books or bookmark websites with lists of movies so that I can access them quickly when I need those details in a scene.

After I’ve done these things, I’m ready to start my micro edit, which is what we’ll talk about next!