Editing With a Partner

Once the fun of writing is out of the way it’s time to edit, and that’s another case where having a writing partner can be extremely helpful. You got yourselves into this mess, now you can work together to get yourselves out.

It’s sort of like having a child. The creation is the fun part. Once it’s there you both need to parent, and everyone will be happier if you’re on the same side.

We like to let a manuscript rest for awhile after the first draft is complete before we get into the editing process, to be able to see it with fresh eyes. When we do pick it up again, we start with a full read-through. On this first pass we mark major problems (plot holes, bad dialog, overexplaining or underexplaining) and any typos that we happen to catch, but we save the line-editing for later.

After each chapter we have a quick (and sometimes not so quick) conversation about what we’ve noticed. The goal is not to fix the problems on the spot, just to make each other aware of concerns so we can pay attention to them going forward.

A writer working on his or her own lacks the built-in sounding board a collaborator provides. The author might sense that there’s something wrong with a passage, but without a coauthor steeped in the minutia of the project to discuss it with, might be unable to diagnose the problem.

You do need to be careful, though, not to talk each other out of necessary edits. We’ll talk about that more in a future post.

Once the first read-through is done, it’s time to start working on those edits. Don’t worry, as you get in and start making changes, you’ll find a million other things to tweak and finesse. It’s fun! Honest!

If you were working on your own you’d be responsible for everything, but since you’re smart and have a writing partner, you can share the load. You can break it down by chapter if you like, or you can make assignments a different way. Set one partner to beefing up character descriptions and the other to improving dialog.

In our edits we’re currently dealing with the fallout of my darling partner deciding that the ending was too abrupt. This derailed all other work while we had lengthy brainstorming sessions and walked laps around the neighborhood, getting some exercise while we confused any eavesdropping neighbors with our cryptic conversational shorthand. We’re coming out the other side of that quagmire now, and I have to admit the finished product is going to be better for it.

Thanks, writing partner!

Oh Hell

  • a paper cup of hot chocolate
  • sat neatly on the back of her neck
  • Allan Goth, the unshutupable
  • Nothing exotic.
  • She’s a trained beautician
  • “Well, Dr Greenlea,”
  • we’re going to nail Aaron’s ex-wife
  • The red-haired boy was on his left
  • Oh hell
  • I disagree with this brash fool

Oh hell. Here comes Allan Goth, the unshutupable. He’ll have some screwball order, as usual. “What’ll it be today, Al?”

“Nothing exotic. A paper cup of hot chocolate, with an olive.”

“Comin’ right up.” Weirdo.

“And later,” here he goes, he’ll talk all night, “we’re going to nail Aaron’s ex-wife. She’s a trained beautician if I’m a kangaroo. Which I’m not. Jeff should have listened to me and had his nails done at Mario’s, the red-haired boy was on his left and they were really hitting it off. I said he should stay, but he announced ‘I disagree with this brash fool‘ like he has any real sense of his own, I mean Aaron told him never to go near his ex but what do you think he did next?”

“Well, Dr Greenlea, my mom’s gynecologist, would say –”

“Screw that quack. He wasn’t even there. So Jeff lost a finger, long story short, and Aaron’s ex just saddled her mare and left. But I don’t know where she got such an odd saddle. And the horse must be a masochist if she likes it. The saddle she used sat neatly on the back of her neck.”

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We Finally Reached

  • by jensat around the dwellings
  • Are you still left-handed?
  • a desperate plea for sanity
  • ten mile hike with a full backpack
  • I became too feeble to move
  • which inspired the nickname
  • my fake damn bladder
  • if the plane crash hadn’t killed him
  • going into the lawn care business
  • that patch of New Mexico soil

We finally reached that patch of New Mexico soil we’d heard so much about. After the ten mile hike with a full backpack we endured to reach this place, I became too feeble to move, and so sat around the dwellings with the others. Our immobility was in response to a desperate plea for sanity from our overtaxed muscles. Conversation centered around Bob’s plan for going into the lawn care business, until he looked at me and abruptly asked, “Are you still left-handed?“

I responded in the affirmative which inspired the nickname Lefty. Bob was never known for his creativity.

At that point my fake damn bladder started acting up and I cursed the day I’d ever met Bob’s brother Lou. This was all his fault. If the plane crash hadn’t killed him, I would have done it myself by now.

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Tales From the Dark Side

So far we’ve done nothing but extoll the virtues of writing collaborations. But surely it’s not all rainbow muffins and puppy baskets, right? If you’re used to thinking of writing as a solitary pursuit, shifting gears to work with a partner can be jarring. If you’ve chosen the right partner, the adjustment period should pass rather quickly. But for people who just aren’t compatible, working together will always seem hard.

The major obstacle to a successful writing partnership is the need for compromise. You and your partner have to agree. About everything. Perhaps that should more accurately be stated as you and your partner have to be able to come to an agreement about everything. It’s highly unlikely that you will be in complete concordance from the get-go on every issue, so the two of you need to be able to work together to make the finished product the best it can be.

There’s no one piece of advice that covers how to successfully compromise. You will each need to yield a bit sometimes, but that’s not always how to make the writing better. Sometimes you need to take a stand and persuade your partner to do things your way. The trick is finding the right balance of give and take, and doing them at the right times.

These moments of conflict can occur at any phase of a project, and on any level of detail. You need to agree on the big picture, and even something as fundamental as genre might create a snag. The story’s overall structure, point of view, and pacing need to come together seamlessly to create a unified voice. Right down to the nitty gritty of line editing and word picks, you and your partner will not always want the same things, but only if you can compromise is any of it going to work.

The need for skillful compromise is perhaps the most fundamental difference between working solo and with a partner, but there are other pitfalls to beware. There are logistical considerations, like schedules and file formats. How will you decide whose name comes first on the cover? (We suggest sharing a non de plume.) Many of the same things that are strengths in a healthy collaboration can become sources of trouble if you’re not careful. We can’t tell you how to resolve these conflicts, we can just warn you that you’re going to have to.

From time to time we’ll revisit the Dark Side of collaboration, and delve into these hazards in a bit more detail.

 

We Never Did Manage

  • I can bring a wild duck
  • kissed me on the lips
  • Monique had been faithless
  • distrust turned to horror
  • and brandy if the gentlemen wish
  • He wriggled and wailed

We never did manage to make our picnic plans. Hector had just announced, “I can bring a wild duck, and brandy if the gentlemen wish,” when Silas’s indiscretions boomeranged in front of everyone.

Silas opened the conference room door and sidled in. At first I was happy at his unexpected arrival, but then Monique broke down in sobs and fled the room. Confused, I looked to Silas for an explanation and read the misery in his eyes.

“Valerie,” he began, tears choking off the rest of his worlds. He wriggled and wailed and kissed me on the lips, although I didn’t kiss him back. I could not trust him, his erratic behavior. Distrust turned to horror as I realized Monique had been faithless as a friend, faithless to her own husband, and Silas was a sorry fool to whom I had given half my life.

So the picnic plans kind of never got worked out.

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I Dare Not Kiss You

  • by jen“She works so hard.”
  • corrupted by your father’s notions
  • To John’s dull perceptions
  • I dare not kiss you
  • but now the bitter aftertaste

“I dare not kiss you,” she said, meaning, “Our previous kisses were sweet while they lasted, but now the bitter aftertaste is all that remains, the joy corrupted by your father’s notions of class distinctions and I dare not risk raising his ire again.”

To John’s dull perceptions it merely sounded like rejection. He blamed her cooling ardor on the long days she spent toiling cleaning his family’s mansion. “She works so hard,” he reminded himself. “I really should learn to pick up my own dirty socks.”

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Collaboration = Synergy

One of the more important benefits of writing with a partner is that together you can be more than the sum of your parts. This applies to various aspects of the process, and shows up in unexpected ways.

Some days it’s hard to get motivated, and if you work alone then there’s nobody to help you out with that. But as long as you don’t want to let your partner down, you can find it in yourself to do the work. Put another way, if your partner is pushy enough you work out of self-defense.

It’s like cycling: two riders are faster than one. They can take turns going first, which lets one of them ride in the slipstream where it takes less energy. Racers know that when you lunge out on your own you’ll be reeled back in eventually, because you have to work harder to maintain the same pace.

It’s also more efficient in other ways. You can each take on the parts of the project that you’re best at, which means they get done quicker. Stuff that would have you stumped for days, or that you just can’t get excited to tackle, might be just what your partner is hungry for. When your plot becomes a riddle even for you, it’s nice to have someone as a sounding board. Come editing time you have two sets of eyes to spot typos or grammar errors, and you have two brains to problem-solve larger issues.

Our critique group members always compliment us on how clean our first drafts are. The secret is, they’re not really first drafts. It’s more like version 1.5. At the end of each writing session we share with each other what we’ve accomplished, and immediately flag problems or concerns. This leads to on-the-spot troubleshooting and the “first” draft benefits immensely. A million little course corrections along the way make for a better final product, one that is closer to the visualized ideal.

It takes time to develop a smooth-running collaboration. You and your partner won’t mesh seamlessly, especially in the beginning. It takes mutual respect and dedication to make it work, but it is definitely worth it. Two heads are definitely better than one. In a thriving collaboration, they’re often more than twice as good!

Despite the Morning’s Embarrassment

  • despite the morning’s embarrassment
  • a confusion of alternating nightmare and oblivion
  • uphill would be difficult
  • smell the woodsmoke
  • they will find Mona
  • around in a long widdershins loop

Despite the morning’s embarrassment at discovering Mona gone, I couldn’t lose focus. I had to find her before her true enemies; winning her trust could come later.

I had awakened from a confusion of alternating nightmare and oblivion, which must have been Mona’s doing. Poison? Magic? I would ask when I caught her.

So I set out. I will find her trail first, walking around in a long widdershins loop, listening for hounds. They will smell the woodsmoke. They will find Mona unless I protect her.

Tracks, to the east. Toward the heights, her old home. Did she really go that way? Uphill would be difficult for her, slow her down. These tracks must be a decoy.

But, maybe not. East I go, hunting a prey I must save from another.

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“Happy Birthday,” He Said

  • by jenshrinking like a balloon
  • 50 bucks worth of shit
  • picture of the burly child
  • “Happy birthday,” he said
  • passed a cohabitation law

“Happy birthday,” he said and handed Loretta 50 bucks worth of shit she didn’t need, as well as a picture of the burly child he had once been, back before the state passed a cohabitation law that compelled her to leave him behind with his father and take up residence with an old, half-senile party official whose phallus had the habit of shrinking like a balloon stuck by a pin whenever they were in bed together.

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The Pseudonym

I want to get business cards printed up that say:

Rune Skelley
Pseudonym

We would hand them out at writing conferences, of course, but also drop them in the drawings that restaurants have for free lunches. The thought of someone drawing that card and wondering about it makes me smile.

Why a pseudonym? It’s not that we are wanted fugitives or anything like that, it’s just that we want to have a single composite identity that represents our work. Our novels and short stories are not “by Jen” or “by Kent” or even “by Jen and Kent.” We work very hard at cultivating a shared writing voice that is not simply a combination of His and Hers. It’s almost like the Rune Skelley voice is a child and, individually, Jen’s Voice and Kent’s Voice are the parents. On our own neither of us can entirely capture the je ne sais quoi of Rune Skelley, and we wanted a nom de plume that embodied that.

Our peculiar belief in the genetics of authorship led us to immediately rule out “Jen Lastname and Kent Lastname,” as well as “Jen and Kent Lastname.” We considered “JK Lastname,” but JK Rowling pretty much screwed us on that option. And we both feel that KJ is an awkward combination of initials. Apologies to all you KJs out there!

We dismissed “Jennifer Kent” and “Kent Jennifer” because we decided we preferred a gender-ambiguous name.

After much discussion and many lists we hit upon “Rune Skelley.” We like it because it’s unusual, but not too weird. The name Rune evokes writing in its earliest form. Skelley, according to some baby name book or other, means Storyteller. Put them together and you have something that’s memorable and easier to pronounce than our real last name.

We originally planned to keep our true identities a secret, even the fact that there are two of us. That doesn’t work very well with book tours and speaking engagements, though, so we have finally settled where we are now: Hey, world, there are two of us. We write together. Pretty cool, huh?

If we ever decide to write epic fantasy we will call ourselves Rune RR Skelley.