Have you made your invitation inviting? That is, is it tempting or attractive or irresistible? Once a reader has glanced at your opening, will he or she find the story impossible to put down?

That’s one aim of your story opening, to issue a hard-to-resist invitation to your fictional world. You don’t want to create barriers for readers. Instead, you want to make the entry into your story one of ease and inevitability. You want to make the story attractive and compelling.

Books compete with movies and other books and games and the Internet and families and lovers—why wouldn’t you give your opening the strongest chance to snare a reader’s attention?

What can be found in a compelling opening?

Murder

Sex

Betrayal

Conflict

Jealousy

Death

Guilt

The unexpected

Confusion

A new world

What isn’t so compelling?

Routine

Bliss

Pointless talk

Back story

Cliched characters

Consider your first scene and first words your invitation to readers. You want them to stay a while? Give them a reason to enter your world and tease them with reasons to stay. Entice. Attract. Stir emotions. Stir their imaginations. Stir up curiosity.

Give them a reason to begin your story.

Give them a reason to turn pages.

Give them a reason to race to the end.

Invite readers into your story.

She admitted it was a big step, asking me to look at her work. To critique her work. To point out the problem areas.

Her words got me thinking. Was it really that hard to submit a manuscript to an editor? I know I’m not an ogre. I’m guessing most other editors aren’t either.

So what I want to stress here is that editors are on your side. Just as you do, they want your work to be the best possible. When a manuscript leaves the editor’s hands, he expects to have done his best to make it worthy of a read by an agent or publishing house.

He wants to please his client and polish the manuscript, difficult tasks to accomplish at the same time when most of what the editor points out are areas needing improvement. With the wrong approach, corrections and suggestions could come across to the writer as the editor believing there’s nothing good in the story.

Yet that shouldn’t be the effect or result of edits.

Instead, edits should strengthen the work and definitely not cause the writer to second-guess his career.

I see editing as a highly encouraging endeavor. You’ve done this here, see how it sings? Why not do something similar in tone with this section or scene? Keep those threads tied tightly throughout the story—keep it cohesive.

Or

Look again at your main character’s word choices. What words or patterns of speech reveal him? What words can be changed to reveal character or motivation, rather than using word choices that would fit any story about any character in any setting?

An editor doesn’t have the same investment in a work as the writer does,of course, but he does have an investment. His goal is to offer suggestions that will strengthen the narrative, that will deepen character, that will improve pacing. His purpose isn’t to make the writer feel bad but to feel encouraged about what he’s created.

Here’s a manuscript, a story, worthy to be worked on. Here’s a project worth a second and a third glance. Here’s a story with promise.

Can I put you at ease about submitting to a freelance editor? He or she is on your side. She wants to serve the project to the best of her skills.

Find an editor you can work with, someone who’ll challenge you. Someone who’ll offer suggestions that work with your vision and your goals. But don’t settle for an editor who agrees with you on every point. There’s no reason to engage an editor only to have him remain silent when he should speak out.

Listen to your editor’s suggestions. Give those suggestions a chance. And then follow them, adjust them, or pass on them. Stand your ground on an issue when you need to. But take advice when that advice will serve the story.

Take a chance every once in a while and try something your editor suggests, even when it seems odd. You never know when one small suggestion may lead to a story breakthrough.

Know your vision; but know also that vision can be expanded.

Find an editor you can trust. Then trust that he’ll offer good advice.

Your editor wants you to succeed. He wants your story to be successful. He is on your side.

I change many instances of like to as when I edit. But I also leave some that technically should be changed. Why? Let’s look at the differences between like and as first and then I’ll tell you why I don’t change some misuses.

Like is used for a comparison, typically of things. It’s often used when comparing nouns or comparing something to a noun. The noun follows like in the sentence…

Little Katie looks just like her momma.

The skin on his palms felt like the finest grain sandpaper.

Dorothy laughed like a hyena.

The prisoner ate like a pig.

The following examples are incorrect…

Little Katie looks like she’s about to cry.  X
(Little Katie looks as if she’s about to cry.)

The skin on his palms felt like he’d run sandpaper over it. X
(The skin on his palms felt as though he’d run sandpaper over it.)

Dorothy laughed like she was a hynena. X
(Dorothy laughed as though she were a hyena.)

The prisoner ate like the food would disappear before he could swallow. X
(The prisoner ate as though the food would disappear before he could swallow.)

Use as when you’re not comparing something to a noun. Verbs, rather than nouns, typically follow the use of as.

When don’t I change like to as, even when the words following like are not noun but verb? In dialogue.

Many, many people use like rather than as in speech. Characters in novels would use such a construction just as easily as people in the real world. So, if the use fits the character, I leave like in dialogue. Now, if the character is highly educated or picky in his mannerisms, I would definitely suggest switching like to as for him as well.

Be sure to reserve like for comparisons. The construction in this next example often slips past the most careful of writers because it seems to be making a comparison. Yet, in this sentence we’re not comparing foods to certain types of foods. We are expanding on the category of food…

Foods like cakes, pies, and cookies are great for the taste buds, yet bad for the arteries. X

Correct construction for this sentence is…

Foods such as cakes, pies, and cookies are great for the taste buds, yet bad for the arteries.

Both like and as have other uses. This article serves to show the correct uses in circumstances when the two words might be confused for one another.

A few quick tips for self-editing…

• Edit from hard copy. Mistakes, unintended repetition, overused sentence construction can all jump off the page of a hard copy.
   
• Edit in a location different from where you write. Stimulate the mind with sounds and sights different from those of the writing environment. Stir your mind to look for differences in the room and on the page.
   
• Be free with your pen or pencil. Cut out long sections and delete repetition. (You can always add back anything you take out.)
   
• Remove or change favorite words. We all have words that we repeat in every piece we write. Learn your favorite words and go after them ruthlessly.
   
• Cut down on adverbs and adjectives. Make your nouns and verbs do heavier duty and get rid of modifiers that bloat the work.
   
• Ignore the manuscript for a while. If you’re not under deadline, allow the piece to breathe before editing. Go on to another story, read something new, start a project around the house. Get the story out of your head for a while. For weeks if you have the time. If you give it enough time, the bloated phrasing and poor rhythms will jump out at you when you come back to edit.
   
• Delete character names. Check for overuse of names, especially in dialogue. The repetition of names can cause a story to drag.
   
• Check first words of consecutive paragraphs (and sentences). Every paragraph shouldn’t begin with he or she or Elvis.
   
• Look for unanswered questions. Read the first three to five chapters and make a list of problems your characters face. Then find the places in your manuscript where the problem is solved. If there is no solution, write one. Or get rid of the problem. Also, make sure that the solution is sufficiently satisfying for the level of the problem. You may intend one problem to play a large part in the story, but by the time you get to it, other story elements may have taken over. Adjust problems and solutions so their weights match.

Repetition can also drive your readers crazy.

Repeated words, repeated information, repeated sentence construction can turn your reader’s attitude from eager interest to downright hostility. Face it, there’s not much more irritating in a novel than reading the same events again and again. Or the same phrases. Or the same unusual word used three times in five pages.

Yes, readers like connection in their stories. But they certainly don’t enjoy overkill—Fiona and Ed walked the avenue, the most beautiful of the avenues surrounding central Paris. Of the roads and tree-lined avenues, the one just outside their hotel was the prettiest avenue.

Single-word repetition is often easy to spot. Yet sometimes its use does get past a writer. Be sure to proof your work for this irritant.

Information that’s repeated until a reader wants to throw your book across the room is also a problem. Tell the readers once. Repeat if you have to, using different words, a different character, a different tone. But don’t treat your readers like students who have to be told a point again and again. They find repetition of this kind more than annoying. And you lose readers when they’re annoyed.

Character description is often repeated in novels. How to avoid the annoyance factor? Give it a twist. If a character has unusual eyes and you’ve already said so, show how those unusual eyes affect another character rather than repeating that they’re unusual. Build on what you’ve established rather than saying the same thing.

Repetition That Works
Lest you think all repetition is bad, here’s a reminder that it can be strong rather than annoying.

Repetition is great for making a point, for creating a mood, for establishing rhythm. Sometimes a repeated word or phrase hammers home a point. And as long as you don’t overuse the technique, it can be powerful and effective.

Robert intended to leave a legacy, a legacy that would remind his children where he’d come from. Where they’d come from.

Because it’s noticeable, repetition has great power in fiction. It can drive the reader away or draw him deeper into your imaginary events. Repetition can weave threads to hold your reader close or pound at your reader until he gets the unintended message—leave this place; there’s nothing new here.

Use repetition, but practice restraint as well. Repetition should be effective without calling attention to itself. While you want readers to experience effect, you don’t want them noticing the cause.

If you’re writing long fiction, you’re trying to entertain your reader, hold him with your storytelling skills until he finishes the story. Yet, if he sees the mechanics, the underpinnings of the tale, he’s no longer involved in the fiction but in the elements that create the fiction. The reader doesn’t want to see Oz behind the curtain, manipulating him. He just wants to enjoy the manipulation. After all, he’s willing to believe your lies. He’s willing to invest time with your imaginary world. He’s willing to let his emotions be stirred and to put his mind to work to figure out the resolution before he reads it.

He doesn’t really believe there’s a serial killer loose in Dallas, picking off husbands of female cops. But if you write the story well enough, he’ll indulge himself and join his imagination to yours and he’ll act as if he believes, at least for the time it takes to read the novel.

Keep him involved. Keep him interested. Don’t give the reader an excuse to doubt that what you’ve written could happen—did happen—and that there’s something vital at stake for your characters and for himself.

As you use other writing tools, use the power of repetition to strengthen the fiction, the story, the emotion. Refuse to let it come between you and the reader’s enjoyment.

Today’s topic? The dangling modifier.

I hear at least one of you laughing, but it’s true; that’s what it’s called. But since many of us might not know what a modifier is, much less how it can dangle (and why that would be bad), let’s look at a few examples of this tragic misuse of English grammar. (This is no slam against those who don’t know the zillion and one grammar terms;  you don’t need to know the names to know how to apply the rules.)

Watching from the cliff top, the ship grew smaller and smaller as it sailed away from Angela.

Hoping to reach her mother before her sister did, the phone felt alien in Gretchen’s shaking hand.

Not wanting the dog’s bark to give away their position, the muzzle was pulled over his snout.

Pretty bad, I know. What should I have written to keep from dangling my modifiers out in front of the entire English-reading world?

Watching from the cliff top, Angela saw the ship grew smaller and smaller as it sailed away.

Angela was the one doing the watching, so she should be the subject that follows the modifier (watching from the cliff top).  As written in the first example, the ship is watching itself. An impossibility.(At least the way it’s written here. I’m not precluding sci-fi writers from figuring out a way to make that happen in their fictional worlds.)

Hoping to reach her mother before her sister did, Gretchen lifted the phone in her shaking hand.

In this example, Gretchen is doing the hoping, so she should follow the modifier.

Not wanting the dog’s bark to give away their position, Vandercamp (or Elvis or the twins or someone), slid a muzzle over his snout.

As first written, this said the muzzle didn’t want to give away their position. Humorous, maybe, but not likely a true read of the situation. This example’s trickier, however, because of the construction. The subject of the modifier—the person not wanting the dog to give away their position—is never stated.

So, why were these modifying phrases dangling? Because they didn’t modify the subject they were intended to modify. Or, as in the third example, there was no stated subject to modify.

The modifier needs to be attached to something, to a subject (often a simple noun). That subject needs to follow the modifier. And that subject needs to be explicitly mentioned, not merely implied. For sentences using this construction to be read correctly (and without confusion), subjects need to be both identified and attached to their modifiers.

Dangling modifiers aren’t found only at the beginnings of sentences, but that’s where I most often find them. And they don’t need to begin with a participle (those -ing forms of verbs), though again, I often see that rather than something such as—

To ease his conscience, a dozen roses were ordered.

How to make that better?

To ease his conscience, Tom ordered a dozen roses.

Or the straightforward—

Tom ordered a dozen roses to ease his conscience.

So, it’s an easy error to fix, this dangling modifier, once you know what it looks like and what it should look like.

Look for actions performed by no one or nothing, and look for subjects performing actions that make no sense.

Check out any sentence that begins with a participle since those are the ones that often contain the dangling modifier.

Make sure that the first noun (subject) following the modifier (often right after a comma) is the one performing the action of the modifier.

Your readers will appreciate that you make their reading experiences both clear and enjoyable, without them having to do a double-take over questionable phrasing or laughing at poorly written sentences when a scene should instead induce tears.

Yet, it’s hard not to react when people throw stones.

No, not at me personally. But at my profession.

I spent time last week (more than was good for me) following blogs and Internet articles where the main activity was jumping on freelance editors, complaining about them, lumping them all into the same negative category. One somewhere beneath lawyers and a step or two above car salesmen. And yes, I know that such a comparison plays into stereotypes about men and women in those two professions.

My point exactly.

There are poor representatives in every profession. There are stellar ones as well. But those who take advantage of their clients or customers paint not only themselves but their colleagues with the same ugly brush.

I read complaint after complaint from writers abused by editors who either didn’t come through with what they promised or who were no good at their jobs. The most common complaint was that a manuscript was in worse shape after the editor was done with it. The writers and their friends thus wondered if any freelance editor was worth hiring.

Yes, they are. Many of them. Most of them.

Good editors spend hours working out ways to make their clients’ writing clear and entertaining. They look up oddities of grammar and punctuation. They find a phrase that could be written as two words, a single word, or as a hyphenated word and take time to check on the current accepted spelling. They read and study and check facts.

Good editors aren’t trying to cheat the writer or make him look bad. Instead, they’re doing what it takes to make a manuscript as flawless as possible while saving the writer the embarrassment of submitting error-riddled stories.

A good editor isn’t going to produce an edit with more spelling errors or punctuation mistakes than the original manuscript. He’s not going to gut the work and rewrite the story according to his vision. He’s not going to fill it with adjectives and adverbs and passive construction. He won’t add his pet theme.

He is going to clean up the mechanics. And he will offer suggestions to tighten plot and sharpen focus and make characters more memorable. He’ll address emotion—or lack of it—and the overuse of dialogue and the lack of depth.  He may ask about character names and dangling plot threads and inconsistencies.

No, not everyone needs a professional editor; some writers get enough help from critique groups or education or experience.

And not everyone is ready for a professional editor. If an editor suggests you need more writing experience or training or help with certain skills, consider that he might be right and go get that experience or training or help. If he suggests your story needs a rewrite—by you—consider rewriting.

Don’t accept sub-standard work from an editor; don’t accept it from anyone. But don’t think all editors are bad because of your experience (or your aunt’s or your best friend’s) with an incompetent editor. Most have quite high standards. We expect the best from ourselves and put our names and reputations out in public with every edit. We want to make it right—that’s exactly what drew us to the profession. Our true pleasure is watching so-so stories become great ones and good stories connect with an audience.

Unless you have a legitimate complaint, don’t jump on the bash-an-editor bandwagon. No profession is represented by only one member. Are all car salesmen crooked? Of course not. Are lawyers the scum of the earth? Ask the ones who work for near-nothing to provide legal advice for those without money and others who give up nights and weekends for their clients.

One bad apple don’t spoil the whole bunch.

Advice to editors—

Don’t promise what you can’t deliver. Deliver what you promise.

Don’t accept every client who comes to you—some manuscripts aren’t ready for editing.

Spell out your services. Be clear about what you do and about what you don’t do.

Know your stuff. Take a class, brush up on your skills, know the rules and know when they can be broken.

Be realistic about your expectations. No editor is perfect; you will make mistakes. Learn how to fix them.

Advice to writers—

Shop around. Not all editors will be right for you.

Get recommendations from friends.

Ask for a sample edit.

Be realistic about your expectations. No editor is perfect; yours will make mistakes.

Writers likewise need attention-attracting elements to steer the focus of their readers to the story in their hands (and keep it there).

Books compete with TV, computers, movies, hand-held devices and who-knows-what-else for attention. If your book’s opening doesn’t capture the reader, doesn’t draw her into your tale, you’re going to lose her. (Cover art and cover blurbs also need to do their part, but those items we’ll leave for another discussion.)

So, how do you entice your reader to stay with your book?

You hook her, engage her with an incident from the life of your lead character.

No, you don’t need to shoot someone or blow up a building and have your lead save someone from burning to death (even though those scenes work for action movies), but you do need to make the reader pay attention.

Consider events from your own life. When you get home at night, do you tell your spouse about the ordinary moments from your day or do you share those stand-out moments? I’m guessing it’s the departure from the normal that you share. You may even embellish the events or the emotions to make those moments more involving for your spouse.

That’s the same kind of incident you want to start with to open your novel.

Only, you don’t want to report the incident later in the day. You want to drop your reader into the action while it’s happening so she gets a real-time experience. Let her feel the emotions. Get her interested, as if she were the character going through the incident.

Not so much a gimmick, then, but a proven technique to plop the reader into the action.

This is the time for showing, not telling. This is the time for action or emotion or dialogue to move front and center and for description and exposition and back story to move out of the frame.

Open with dialogue—an exchange that sets up the events to follow or dumps us straight into a character’s motivation.

Open with action. A character on the phone, a character in a bed (alone) and thinking on her life, a character driving alone at night (and thinking on her life), a character wandering the woods (alone and thinking on her life), is not the most exciting starting place for a story.

Open with an incident that displays character motivation, even if the incident itself is not the focal point of the story.

Can a story successfully open with description or a character’s thoughts? Of course. Anything can work for a competent writer. But remember your competition—why handicap your story from the start? Give your reader something interesting and engaging. Three pages of description on the flora and fauna of upstate New York is not likely to hold the interest of mystery fans. Give them a mystery to solve. Give them something unusual. Give them something they won’t find in their own world.

Or, take something they would find in their everyday world and twist it, shocking them with the unexpected.

Hook your readers. Compel them into your story. Make them want to start the first chapter. And keep drawing them deeper with each word, each paragraph, each scene.

Give them characters they can identify with (or hate). Engage their emotions.  Give them an imaginary world they can play in, where they can become a character who saves the world or loses a marriage or outwits the police, the bad guys, and a despised older brother.

Create an irresistible opening scene, one the reader can’t escape from. Make it alluring. Compelling. Intriguing.

Fun.

Present your fictional world from the first words, immersing the reader from the start. Don’t tell the reader what’s behind the door; open the door and draw him inside.

Make him want to enter. This is fiction—use what you know about human behavior and motivation to intrigue your reader. Entice and entertain, the same way you do with your spouse when you’re talking about your day. Get a gimmick (that’s not technically a gimmick) and put it to work. Write something that will grab the eyes, mind, and imagination of your readers.

Make it appealing.

Hook your readers.

Who do you ask to read it first?

Mom will either praise it unconditionally or ask why you didn’t take the job in Dallas that guaranteed $45,000 the second year with raises each year thereafter. She either loves everything you’ve ever written or encourages you in every phone call to get a real job.

Your brother promised to read and give you constructive feedback, but his job and girlfriend and ex-wife get in the way of his free time. Besides, you remember that he never got grades higher than a C in English, not even when he studied Shakespeare and acted out all the fight scenes for extra credit.

Your best friend? She may tell you how wonderful the story is, but can you be sure she’s not just being polite? After all, the Wall Street Journal is her first choice in reading matter. She doesn’t care a bit for science fiction, and you’re pretty sure she wouldn’t know what steampunk was if she herself was plunked down into 1870′s London, computer and iPhone by her side.

So…Who do you ask to read your work? Who do you trust to give you helpful pointers and honest critique? And when you’re bruised from that honest feedback—genuinely surprised that your reader found so many errors in what you thought was a perfect manuscript—who do you turn to for encouragement?

If you’re lucky, as many writers have been (me included), you have a critique partner or a critique group or maybe a loose confederation of writing cohorts who act as reality checkers and sounding board for your story and your emotions.

Writin’ Wombats
I hang out with the Writin’ Wombats, a group of writers who met at a Web hangout called Gather. The site began as a place for writers to share their work, fiction and non-fiction. It’s now more a social site. But there are still many writers contributing great content there.

The Wombats are quick to critique for one another, giving time from their own full schedules to help their friends, some of whom still haven’t met another Wombat in person. Wombats also offer encouragement and support when the rejections pile up or when a reviewer (or two or three) slams something a fellow Wombat has written.

And if one of the group enters a contest? The support is absolute.

Writing is most often a solitary venture. Not for all writers and not in all ways, but for the most part, it’s you and the keyboard—your fingers, your brain, and the gadget that helps make sense of your thoughts.

But writers need support. They need honest critique, not friends who are hesitant about saying they don’t like what they’ve read. Or maybe they’d like to be honest, but don’t know how to translate what doesn’t work for them as a reader into critique that can help the writer.

Writers need both friends and critics. And they’re twice blessed to find a critic and friend in the same person—a writer buddy unafraid to say something stinks when it does and one who knows enough about the frustrations of the writing life to be able to comfort when comfort, more than critique, is called for.

I can heartily recommend that you find a critique partner or group that will be your support. Know going in that you’ll need to be the same in return, someone bold enough to tell your partner or friends when something isn’t working. No writer wants to send his or her manuscript to an agent or acquiring editor only to discover later it was appallingly bad.

So be a true friend—tell your writer friends when their stories need work. If you can provide specifics, that’s even better. And when the writing world seems to be against your friend, be there with the support she needs (chocolate, bourbon, a willing ear). Be a credible critic and a dear friend. And don’t be shy about finding the same for yourself.

Writers need support. Here’s hoping you find some Writin’ Wombats of your own.

Every writer (and editor) makes mistakes. Whether due to ignorance or sloppiness or the sheer number of possible writing errors, no writer of long fiction will produce a flawless draft. Not without more time than most of us have to produce one manuscript.

Yet, we can lower the number of mistakes by looking at common writing mistakes and then proofing our own work to see where we can eliminate those mistakes.

This list is by no means complete, but I’ve listed very common mistakes that I’ve seen as an editor, made as a writer, and heard about from other writers. (While this list is intended for the fiction writer, writers of non-fiction can benefit from an awareness of these common mistakes as well.)

~ Starting the story in the wrong place ~
Whether the story opens in the lead’s childhood when it should instead start at the moment a car races toward the 35-year-old detective or we meet the heroine as she sits in front of a fire after confronting her ex (which we didn’t get to see), we need to recognize that sometimes our stories just don’t open in the right place.

The fix for starting a story in the wrong place is to begin it instead at a point of action or heightened emotion. Dump the reader into an incident from the character’s day. An incident of importance. A moment of change for the character. An instance after which his life will be different.

~ Filling the opening with back story ~
Some writers want to tell everything about a character (or two or three) before jumping into the story. Resist the temptation to try this yourself. Give us story before back story.

~ Giving all characters the same voice ~
All people don’t speak the same—characters shouldn’t either. Make sure your characters speak with different rhythms and use different expressions. One may rattle off at the mouth while another is the king of one-word answers. Reveal your characters through their dialogue, not only by their actions.

~ Muddled genre ~
Some writers try to stuff every stylistic trick into one book, hoping to make their story appeal across genres. Pick one genre (and a sub-genre if appropriate). But don’t try to write to please every reader of every genre. It won’t happen and you’ll weaken your story.

~ Overuse of cliche and common phrases ~
Cliches and common phrases are someone else’s words. Create your own phrases that fit your character in his situation in his story. Common phrases make your work sound like a hundred other books. Go for the novel phrase for your novel. The work will be better for your creativity and the extra time you invest.

~ Switching POV ~
We’ve all heard of head hopping, switching points of view every page or paragraph or even within paragraphs. Yes, you can get away with it. But why try? Why not give your readers the best and the least confusing read possible? Don’t make them struggle to figure out what’s happening and to whom. Each time a reader has to re-read because she’s lost track of who’s doing what, she is pulled from the story. And you want that reader fully engaged in your book—don’t give her an excuse to put it down.

~ Not enough plot to sustain the story ~
If your story’s thin, throwing in extra descriptions won’t fix fatten it. You may fill it with hot air, but you won’t make it any meatier. Make sure you have enough story to your story. Are there low-level climaxes before the big moment? Have you woven story threads for different characters? Do your main characters face setbacks and obstacles before they triumph?

~ Too many plot threads for your story ~
Too many characters or problems or incidents or locations can overwhelm a story. Combine characters if you have a few who exist only for one scene. Cut out obstacles for your lead if he’s living under a black cloud every day and nothing positive ever happens to him. Keep the story full and rich, but don’t overburden it with extras that smother.

Yes, there are exceptions to any writing rule or suggestion. Yet what we’re looking for are ways to produce good writing and better writing. We’re not looking for what we can get away with—our focus is on what makes the story work and work well.