Traditionally Self-Published with Mica Merrill Rice

Back-to-School 101: What Your Developmental Editor Really Wants You to Know with Nicole Meier

• Season 1 • Episode 3

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"Don't let your plot happen to your character." 

In this episode, we are sitting down with a developmental editor to talk through developmental editing. By the end of this episode, you will understand who they are and  their critical role in your self-publishing journey. We covered story structure, plot, pacing and character arc and ways for an indie author to get the various parts of editing done on a budget. At the end, Nicole leaves us with five actionable tips that you can do right now to help elevate your writing.

Nicole Meier is a certified book coach, developmental editor, and author of four novels. Her books have been recognized by Booklist, Refinery29, BookBub, and Popsugar. She is the host of The Whole Writer podcast for emerging authors and co-founder of bookworks.co. Nicole lives and works in the Pacific Northwest and can be found at:

Have a publishing question? Email me at mica@micamerrillrice.com

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"Traditionally Self-Published" theme music is written by Landon Bailey and performed and produced by LNDÖ


SPEAKER_00:

What's up, plot twisters, and a warm welcome to my page turners, the intrigued readers and listeners who are just stepping into the story. Whatever title you fancy today, I am so happy you're here with us. You're listening to Traditionally Self-Published, where we unravel the chaos of self-publishing and help you write your own success story like a pro. I'm your host, Mika Merrill-Rice, author with a passion for learning and sharing the love. I'm bringing you real talk with publishing pros and indie authors, just like me, who flipped the script and built thriving author careers on their own terms and are doing it like a pro. Whether you're rewriting your third novel or still plotting your first, you're right where you need to be. This episode is part of my inaugural back to school series and covers editing 101. Today we are exploring all things developmental editing. what it is, when you need it, and why it's so important. If you want to make this book shine instead of fading into the background, this episode is for you. I am joined today by the talented Nicole Meyer, an author, professional developmental editor, and book coach. Today we're going to talk about the role of the developmental editor, the importance of crafting a strong story, and advice for hiring a developmental editor. And then we're going to conclude with the Inkstarter lightning round and the Nicole's five best tips for authors. All right, students, class is in session. Hello, Nicole. I hope you're doing well today. This is so fun. Thanks for having me. Thank you so much for joining. I'm really excited about this. So let's start with a little bit about you. So tell me, how did you get into the editing business? And what kind of what types of editing do you do?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. So I do developmental editing. I'm a certified book coach. And before that, in my previous creative life, I was an author. And I always had this thing in the back of my head thinking, there's something missing from the process. I had... You know, my writing friends, I had, you know, writers association I belong to, I had an agent, I had different publishers, but I always felt like there was something missing that I wanted in terms of a support system for my own writing. And so over the pandemic, as many of us did, I sort of did a pivot. And I got certified to be a book coach, and I started working with emerging authors. And it was right at that nice Venn diagram, if you can believe it or not, of being a writer, but also seeking something out and then being trained as an expert in something that it clicked for me. And I met writers and started helping them strengthen their manuscripts. I thought, ah, this is what I was missing the whole time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

That is awesome. I love it. Oh my gosh, that has to be so much fun. And you probably meet like a ton of people in the process.

SPEAKER_01:

I do. And it's really fun to see all the different genres and the different sources of inspiration. It's kind of a never ending well.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, for sure. Awesome. What do you love most about, you know, what you do? You do a lot of things, but what is your favorite part?

SPEAKER_01:

You know, my favorite part, it's always fun to be surprised. And when I say that is we all start with that messy first or second draft. And that part's not surprising when I meet a writer that says, oh my gosh, I just have this mess, but I know I want to make something of it. I love the surprise feeling when we work together for a few sessions and I do inline edits and we talk about strategy and next steps and they understand the assignment and they come back to me with these really strong pages. It's the best feeling because It's like, oh, they get it and they're on their way. And I'm so happy to be a part of this.

SPEAKER_00:

That is awesome. I love it. I love it. Yes, I love the aha moments. I can assure you right now I am not having that. I am deep in one and a half draft. I'll say that. Oh, man. That's relatable. Yes, for sure. All right. So talk to me a little bit about developmental editing versus copy editing when it comes to hiring an editor. So these are two different. slightly different. Oh, actually they're pretty big differences, but like, do you hire one editor for both of them? Or do you say, all right, you're going to do developmental editing for me, or that's what I'm requesting of you. And you're going to hire another person for a copy editor. Like, how does it work?

SPEAKER_01:

Yes. So you could have one in the same, but that's very rare. You really want to get someone who specializes in one thing or another. And it's hard to do both because you as a developmental editor want to focus on story structure. So when I'm looking at someone's manuscript pages, I'm looking for... pacing, plot, character development, believability, repetition, narrative drive. I'm looking for all of that good sort of foundational work that builds a story. And for a copy editor, they're going to kind of come in much later in the process. And they're going to look at things like sentence structure, grammar, A little bit of proofreading, although proofreaders are their own job in itself, but really it's something that is very different. And yes, you could find someone that could do both, but you don't want to split focus. So if I had a very rough manuscript and I wanted some developmental edits, I want to look at the structure, even know if I'm headed in the right direction. I don't want someone focused so early on on, oh, this is a grammar mistake or this sentence structure could be strengthened. You want them focused on the structure because that's what we're after is really strengthening our story. Great.

SPEAKER_00:

That's awesome. And very good to know because I was under the impression that they should all be one. So it's good for people to know that they are two very distinct processes and it's good to have those two. And then you mentioned proofreading, which I haven't really touched on at all. Do you recommend all three? Do you recommend that a writer try to go through all three? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

You know, it depends on the publishing path they choose. Certainly, if you go with a traditional house, they will have those people set in place for you. And you'll see there's a time and a place, right? The copy editor comes way before the proofreader. But if you're doing indie, I think that you really want to get the most bang for your buck. So I would say, and I'm jaded because this is not impartial. So I am an editor, but I would really think about investing in the story structure help first, and then maybe find a friend or, you know, a referral of somebody who says, you know what, I'm pretty good at both copy editing and catching errors. And they can kind of give you a two for one. That's, that's more realistic to find, in my opinion. And there's actually a lot of people who really have fun with it. They enjoy copy editing, they enjoy proofreading. You know, some of our friends, probably in our book clubs, our neighbors, our streets, they would love to proofread. There's a That's

SPEAKER_00:

great. I hadn't thought about that. I love that creativity for finding somebody on a budget. I like it. Yes. Awesome. All right. So let's talk about collaboration between the author and editor. So now we know what a developmental editor is. What's a typical workflow when someone hires you?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so it's kind of different depending on where that writer is in their process. Some people come to me and say, I just have three chapters. I need to know if I'm even starting right because I don't want to spend the next nine months going in the wrong direction. Some people come to me with the first half of the book, and some people come to me with the full manuscript. So it's really, we call it a partial developmental edit or a full developmental edit. I love doing it all. And what happens when they come to me is we have a questionnaire. I want to make sure I know the premise of the story, the intentions that the writer has, how they want to make the reader feel by the time they reach the end. It's really good to know all of these. And trust me, there's plenty of editors out there who don't ask these questions. So to anyone listening, make sure you find someone who feels very interested in your story and they feel aligned with the genre you're writing. If I was writing rom-com, I wouldn't pick someone that has only done sci-fi books, to be example. So they would do a questionnaire. We talk about the story and then they send me their pages. I go away and do my thing. And really for me, that's a deep dive. So I spend a lot of time with each page. I'm leaving comments in the margins of everything from, do we see a scene goal in every chapter? Am I seeing character interiority? Do we have narrative drive, which is kind of, if this happens, then what happens next? Do we have good dialogue? Is there too much exposition? How's the pacing? How's the setting? And I really kind of leave comments. And I love to leave both positive and negative. negative comments. When I say negative, it's just areas to strengthen because I don't think a good editor should be just red penning it where you just get all the negative things in the margins. You don't want that because you want to be able to feel like you can come back to your revisions feeling fueled and energized and motivated. I like to point out what they've done really well because every writer has something they can do well. Then I like to point out things that could use strengthening. I do all that. I write in the margins of every single page. I return it via email to the writer and then we get together on Zoom and we have like an hour conversation about all of the feedback, all the questions. We kind of strategize what revisions might look like and it really empowers the writer to go off and do it on their own.

SPEAKER_00:

That's great. So you spoke about two different ways to do developmental editing. So you talked about a little bit about like the halfway mark editing and then also like a full manuscript. So When in the process, like let's talk about the halfway point. When you do a halfway point, because this is something I've never heard of before. When you do halfway point as a writer, do we like write to the half point, make it shine and then send it to you? You know how like with a full manuscript, we sort of do some self editing before we send it out. Obviously, we're not going to send you, you know, a script that has not been read, but is the same process kind of applied towards that midway edit?

SPEAKER_01:

A little bit. I've even done this myself as an author is I've always worked with a developmental editor on my end as well for my books. And I have in the past said, here's the first hundred pages. Can you just tell me if I'm on the right track? And what that means is, am I meeting genre expectations? Is there a clear narrative drive? Do we understand what the character wants? What's standing in their way? How they think they're going to go about getting it? and all of the other characters at play. And if an editor sends it back and says, I don't know where to place my focus. You got way too many things going on. I call it the kitchen sink syndrome where people just keep throwing in subplot after subplot. And it really helps the writer say, okay, I need to focus. I need to maybe edit out a million subplots or I need to bring in way more character motivation, whatever it is, because what you don't want to do if you're unsure, depends on really how seasoned you are as a writer, you don't want to get all the way to the end and have these hair pulling iterations of having to rip everything apart and start over. So Again, it depends on know yourself as a writer. Do I have that little red flag kind of flickering in my head that I keep ignoring, but I know I shouldn't, that something's not quite laying together with the story? Then yeah, get a partial edit, get the feedback. It's really fun to know, have someone else point out your strengths and weaknesses, and then you can sort of strengthen that first half and just write forward for the second half. That's

SPEAKER_00:

great. That is really good advice. Thank you. Yeah. What about tough feedback? So, you know, you mentioned like doing your red pen in the margins, you know, like, do you get tough on people? Do you have sort of that balance? Like you did mention that you have like, you leave some positive and maybe some like constructive feedback. But if you know, like, if you know the story is just not maybe that great, how do you give that feedback and kind of lead them towards like, maybe if you did this, it would be a little bit better or whatnot.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Yeah, I'll give you a past writer I worked with as an example. This person really held me on the surface for the entire book. I never could figure out what the character was feeling or thinking. I could never figure out what was motivating them to say or do what they were doing. And to me, the whole book fell flat because of it. And so what I said to that writer after I went through each page is I said, I'm being held at arm's length. As your reader, I want something to root for. I want something to connect to. I want to have empathy for your character. And the only way to do that is to go back and add a lot more interiority. And here's how and here's where. So it was really instead of me saying, hey, look, this book doesn't work. I could care less about the character. I said what I would love to see instead And that helps someone really have actionable next steps as opposed to this sort of vague feedback of, yeah, it didn't work for me.

SPEAKER_00:

That's great. I love that. I love that you don't give up on us so easily. We've all been there, truly. Yes. All right. Well, what about making a strong story? What are some common story issues that you might see in an indie manuscript? And I don't know if it really varies, you know, like there's a difference between like an indie manuscript and like maybe somebody who's going to a publishing house. Do you see some of those common story issues? Are they a little bit different?

UNKNOWN:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, again, it depends on the author, but what happens, and I'll speak for this myself because I have two traditional and two hybrid books. And with the books that are hybrid or self-published, there's a tendency to lean into the rushing of it all because you know you have the power to put that book out whenever you want. And when you have that power, it's like, let's go fast. So when your book is with a traditional, it you know, publishing is glacial. It takes forever in a day. You have so many people touching the work and, you know, you have time to really reflect on everything. So when it comes to indie, I will say sometimes I noticed that writers rushed through the process and it's very obvious that they did not get a beta reader, that they didn't seek feedback, they didn't have an editor, and they very well could have. Yes, sometimes it's about budget, but you could also join a writing group and trade pages with friends. And so I would just say, don't let the rushing be the downfall of your great story because what if you just waited three or four more months to really get feedback and address the feedback? It would be so much stronger.

SPEAKER_00:

That's a good, I love those points a lot. And you brought up something else that I had not thought of. And that's the beta reader. So we talk about like the manuscript, our own process of self editing before we get ready for an editor. But do we want to send our manuscript to a beta reader before we send it to the editor? Or maybe after we send it to the editor?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, this is one of the most common questions that I get asked. And I will tell you my opinion. A developmental editor is reading your book for structure. A beta reader is reading your book for entertainment. They will read it like a normal reader will read it. So they're looking at what they're getting out of it. They're looking if it feels satisfying to them, a satisfying arc of change, a fun character. It's almost like they're looking at how much they enjoyed it. where an editor is saying, let's really look at your scene structure, your story structure, your pacing, your plot, setting, etc. And they're really helping you build a stronger story. So in my opinion, I always say, work with an editor first. then beta readers come next. And again, if you don't have the budget, there are ways to go around that. There's plenty of people that offer partials that aren't as expensive as you think. There's contests, there's giveaways, there's all kinds of ways to go about it. But if you had a choice and you had the freedom, I would do editor first, beta reader second.

SPEAKER_00:

Awesome. Great. What about, okay, a potential client has come to you. You have read their manuscript or maybe you're in the process of, and maybe there is a sign that that needs more structural work. I know we talked about it a little bit, but what is like a major red flag in one of your manuscripts that you've read that you're like, okay, we got to address this like right away.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Not having a clear showing of what the character wants, their big wants. why they want it, both on an external and internal level. You know, I work with some people and say, well, they just want the big job promotion. Well, why? Like internally, why is it important to them? So show what they want, why they want it, and then what's standing in their way and how they think they're going to go about getting it. You know, there's a lot of times I see a manuscript where the plot is happening to the character and they're just sort of reacting and bumbling along. They don't have agency because they don't have anything like a big want they're going after. So I would say that's kind of the biggest thing I see is don't let your plot happen to your character. I

SPEAKER_00:

love that. Excellent. It's a good way. It's a good thing to keep in the back of the mind when we're kind of working our way through this.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Awesome. So how do you help authors strengthen things like character arcs or pacing? Like what are your words maybe that you use or I don't know, how do you kind of show the author like how to get through those things or explain it?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Character arcs, I always love to go deeper. I mean, I love reading character-driven stories. So interiority is something that I will say time and again. I'm probably on everyone's pages. You can never have too much of it. So what that means is show a character's inner thought, feeling, or reaction. Don't do it with dialogue alone. Don't do it with action alone or plot alone. I want to know how things are landing with your character. I want to know how they're reacting on the inside as well as the outside. So that's one thing. And then you want to see them learning lessons and evolving so they're a different person by the time the story reaches the end. It doesn't have to be a happily ever after, but we want to see them evolved and have new insights on the world around them. So that's one way. And then your other question was pacing, right?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, pacing, big

SPEAKER_01:

one. Pacing, right? Yes. So there are certain things that, slow down pacing. One is exposition. If someone goes to a large swath of backstory, it's like three pages of backstory that's really slowed your pacing. Another thing I call treading water, where we see your character just staying one place forever. They're not doing anything to move through the scene. So use the scene to move them forward. Yes, they want something that they're going after, but show them moving through the room and show that setting. Show them interacting with another character and how it's landing with them. Show them making decisions, which means having agency. And I like to use this formula if you really want to get the pacing going, is if your character has decision followed by an action followed by a consequence. And you can put that on repeat, decision, action, consequence, decision, action, consequence. That will really get your pacing going faster.

SPEAKER_00:

I love it. Excellent. I love all this advice. Oh my goodness. So many great things out of this. All right. So moving on to revision. So how many rounds of developmental editing do most authors need? Like, is it one and we're just kind of going back and forth for a little bit? Is it, I need a developmental editor midway. I need another one at the end. Is it, you know, like constantly hiring? I will let you answer. I have my opinion about this, but go ahead. Oh, I want to hear your opinion. Oh, no, I just, I assume, okay, this is what I think, that you would need it, you could either do the midpoint, of course, but if I gave a full manuscript at the end, I would assume that some kind of timeline is established, and we're going to say, like, okay, we're going to do this for one month, this is a one-month project, I am going to go through edits and provide you feedback maybe weekly, or maybe bi-weekly, I don't And so I guess that's kind of what I'm wondering, like, is it one project that just kind of in this little time gap or do you need to do it several different times?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I think you're totally right with that. So I have clients, I'll just use my own clients as example. I have some clients that send me 25 pages every two weeks and we just keep a steady clip of moving forward. I edit those pages, send them back. They send me a fresh submission. We keep going until the book is done. And then I have people that send me the whole manuscript and I'll read all of that and I'll do a deep dive with notes. We have a call and I trust them unless they have questions to understand my notes enough to go back and work on their own. And really they don't come back to me for another developmental edit unless they're feeling so unsure about themselves but honestly a good editor should be explaining it clearly enough so that you can take it away and go on your own

SPEAKER_00:

great that's good to know I love that And what advice do you give authors who feel overwhelmed? Maybe they just got their first edit back. There's a ton of information. I am sure that you probably not only do like maybe track changes, but maybe you also like write a letter on the side and kind of explain things along the way. But what advice do you sort of give them when you're giving this edited manuscript back?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Number one, even the most seasoned of writers gets a lot of feedback. So this writer's not alone. And number two is I have seen some of the messiest drafts turn into beautiful gems at the outset. So anyone can achieve it as long as they really, really put the work in. I personally go through a lot of range of emotions. When I get feedback, it's like, That's good to know. Yeah. Very good to know.

SPEAKER_00:

All right, Nicole, we have made it to the Ink Starter lightning round. So I'm going to ask you four different questions, and you're just going to quickly answer whatever comes to mind. So you mentioned you are also a writer. What kind are you? Are you a plotter, a pantser, or a planser? Both. I

SPEAKER_01:

did pantser for the first book, which is super fun. But then I wound up plotting the next ones because I was on contract with a publisher and I was forced to show them my outline. So

SPEAKER_00:

I'm both. I guess I'm a plantser. Okay, a plancer. I love it. And did you prefer that over the plotting? Or do you prefer like kind of having that flexibility between the boat with between the two of them? I

SPEAKER_01:

really like the flexibility. I love making discoveries along the way. Yeah,

SPEAKER_00:

yeah, I totally agree. All right. What is one book you wish you could have edited?

SPEAKER_01:

Oh man. Is this because I love the book or because it needs editing? I

SPEAKER_00:

would say, let's say because you love the book.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. So I have a writer friend, Amy Papel, who wrote a book that just came out called Far and Away. And I loved it so much that I, she certainly doesn't need my help, but I wish I could have been involved in. It was about two families from other countries that swap houses. And I just loved it so much.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh my goodness. I'm gonna have to look that one up. I love that. Okay. Because I'm a big holiday person. and, you know, they were like swapping houses. So that is right up my alley. All right. What snacks are you bringing to the editing session? Oh,

SPEAKER_01:

I have snacks here because I always have food on my desk. So these are crackers, Good Thins crackers.

SPEAKER_00:

Love it. I love it. All right. And what is one actionable tip that writers can do right now, like right after this episode that is going to help improve their manuscript?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Let's go back to that formula that I mentioned before is decision, action, consequence. If you can follow that in your scenes, I bet you you'll find ways to move them forward better.

SPEAKER_00:

Awesome. I love it. I am definitely taking that for my own and I hope I can deliver. Nice. All right. Five tips. We are here. You are going to give us your five best tips for us authors.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh my gosh. I think the very first one is mindset. Just know that tenacity most often wins over talent. As long as you keep showing up to the page, you're already winning. So I would say that's the first one. The second one is make sure you understand what your character is after and why. The next one is... Make sure to find a trusted writer friend or writer group who you feel comfortable with. Sometimes it takes a minute to find your people and see if they might want to gather, support, or trade pages. The next one is in your free time, even if you're watching TV at the same time, do research. Research books in your genre. Research agents, editors, indie publishers, anybody in your genre because knowledge is power. And then I have a fifth one, right? One more. Never stop learning. This industry changes on a dime. And what I came into in the industry in 2014 is wildly different from it is now. So just keep on, you know, subscribing to those newsletters to keep learning about the industry. And again, knowledge is power.

SPEAKER_00:

Awesome. I love it. I love your tips. Everything about today. Nicole, thank you so much for joining today and having some fun with me sharing this process of developmental editing because I'm super passionate about getting books edited, making sure that we're doing it the right way. And of course, for your five must have tips. So if you're interested in learning more about Nicole Myers editing service and the book she has written, you can check the show notes for her website, her publications and places you can purchase her book. Thank you, Nicole. Thanks so much. I loved it. Thank you for listening to this episode of Traditionally Self-Published. If this episode helped you subscribe, leave a review and share with your author and reader friends like and be sure to check the first episode where I share a bit about how this all came to be and why building a helpful community is so important. Until next time, be bold, write smart and keep turning those pages.