If It Isn’t Broke, Fix It
I have taken a shallow dive into documenting my self-editing process, but never fully exposed all the gory details. This seemed like a fun topic to explore, but some background is necessary. While I have an English minor, I have never taken an editing class or read a book on the subject. Instead, I cobbled together a self-editing method out of necessity.
I was rather proud of the first draft of my first book because I thought the plot was excellent and the writing mechanics were good enough to be accepted by any publisher. (Insert laughter here.) So, I did what other authors have done since the dawn of the written word. I turned to the first page and began self-editing.
I now call my first attempt “reading with a purpose,” but in reality, it was a whack-a-mole game of locating issues and doing my best to correct them. That first pass taught me that my writing skills were profoundly lacking. I know, big surprise.
Still, I soldiered on with pass after pass. Looking back, I made many changes and uncovered glaring issues. A big part of my problem was that while I had a lot of experience writing technical documents, I had zero experience writing for readers looking for a fun book.
I began to understand that my writing was flat (unemotional), too technical, stiff (harsh sentences), and I had enough logic errors to fill a dump truck. This self-editing marathon lasted three solid months until I admitted I needed help. So, I asked my mother to read my book and make suggestions. She was a lifesaver, and her honest comments really shored up my words. This marathon of changes taught me a great deal about my writing problems, and I now understand this was the beginning of a formal self-editing process.
My get-rich-quick plan was to submit my book to a major publishing company, and they would cut me a fat check. However, because of my mother’s input, I felt my work was not good enough and sought out a professional editor. How did I find this person? Yelp. Another great plan. While not the best editor, she made some good corrections, and I accepted them all.
The few professional edits convinced me that I had created a masterpiece. So, I tried submitting my book to publishers and immediately hit a massive wall. I mistakenly assumed that all major publishers, like Simon & Schuster, had a website section for submitting books for review. It turns out that publishers “do not accept unrepresented manuscripts.” Books are called manuscripts. I know that now.
An internet search revealed that to get my book to a publisher, I needed to send it, along with a fee ($2,500+), to a representative, who would read it. Then they would tell me whether they would represent me. Oh yeah, they would get a cut of all future profits. To me, this seemed like a classic scam.
Still, I was ready to pony up the $2,500, but I needed to find a representative who would give me the best chance of success. I asked my editor if she knew any. She did not, but knew somebody who did. Nice!
Enter Bathany. It turns out that she was not a “book representative.” Instead, she was a “self-publisher helper.” I was about to say, “Thanks, but no thanks,” but Bethany explained her service and made a compelling case for self-publishing. It was a more straightforward path with more control and a better chance of success. (I was unaware that it was possible to upload an eBook to companies like Amazon, which would sell it.)
I was rather proud of the first draft of my first book because I thought the plot was excellent and the writing mechanics were good enough to be accepted by any publisher. (Insert laughter here.) So, I did what other authors have done since the dawn of the written word. I turned to the first page and began self-editing.
I now call my first attempt “reading with a purpose,” but in reality, it was a whack-a-mole game of locating issues and doing my best to correct them. That first pass taught me that my writing skills were profoundly lacking. I know, big surprise.
Still, I soldiered on with pass after pass. Looking back, I made many changes and uncovered glaring issues. A big part of my problem was that while I had a lot of experience writing technical documents, I had zero experience writing for readers looking for a fun book.
I began to understand that my writing was flat (unemotional), too technical, stiff (harsh sentences), and I had enough logic errors to fill a dump truck. This self-editing marathon lasted three solid months until I admitted I needed help. So, I asked my mother to read my book and make suggestions. She was a lifesaver, and her honest comments really shored up my words. This marathon of changes taught me a great deal about my writing problems, and I now understand this was the beginning of a formal self-editing process.
My get-rich-quick plan was to submit my book to a major publishing company, and they would cut me a fat check. However, because of my mother’s input, I felt my work was not good enough and sought out a professional editor. How did I find this person? Yelp. Another great plan. While not the best editor, she made some good corrections, and I accepted them all.
The few professional edits convinced me that I had created a masterpiece. So, I tried submitting my book to publishers and immediately hit a massive wall. I mistakenly assumed that all major publishers, like Simon & Schuster, had a website section for submitting books for review. It turns out that publishers “do not accept unrepresented manuscripts.” Books are called manuscripts. I know that now.
An internet search revealed that to get my book to a publisher, I needed to send it, along with a fee ($2,500+), to a representative, who would read it. Then they would tell me whether they would represent me. Oh yeah, they would get a cut of all future profits. To me, this seemed like a classic scam.
Still, I was ready to pony up the $2,500, but I needed to find a representative who would give me the best chance of success. I asked my editor if she knew any. She did not, but knew somebody who did. Nice!
Enter Bathany. It turns out that she was not a “book representative.” Instead, she was a “self-publisher helper.” I was about to say, “Thanks, but no thanks,” but Bethany explained her service and made a compelling case for self-publishing. It was a more straightforward path with more control and a better chance of success. (I was unaware that it was possible to upload an eBook to companies like Amazon, which would sell it.)
Bethany read my book (she was okay with calling my work a book) and had a bunch of suggestions. A major problem was that my story had a narrow perspective, meaning I did not write for the reader. After thinking it through, I understood the issue and made significant changes. Then the book underwent an intensive edit by a different professional editor; she recommended. This person was excellent, resulting in a tighter story, but the plot remained 95% the same.
I self-published that book, and my next book underwent a similar process. By this point, I had learned about 20% of my writing ticks and mostly how to fix them. This was still difficult because I had not yet established a formal process. Fun side story. Why yes, my first and second books required a second edition to fix glaring mistakes.
By the third book, I was beginning to piece together a formal approach to self-editing. The big change was to make an editing pass with a specific goal. For example, inspect the dialogue. While making this pass, if I spotted a problem, I would fix it.
This third book, while more complicated, followed the same process as the first and second, but this time the self-publishing went more smoothly. Big reveal, it looked more polished and did not need a second edition.
I began my fourth book entirely differently by using an outline. This was a three-page text description of the entire plot, and it took about four months to create. During this time, I identified many issues and strengthened motivation, plot structure, and character biographies.
This prep work radically reduced self-editing time, and the flaws were smaller. In addition, I formalized my self-editing process by creating a list of topics to check on each pass. Plus, I had a new ally in the form of the professional grammar tools Grammarly and ProWritingAid. The self-editing passes had expanded to inspecting scene transitions, character descriptions, dialogue integration, feelings (what is going on inside a character’s head), and scene (non-character) descriptions.
Since that fourth book, my self-editing has improved in quality, but the process has not changed. Yet I have not described what I am doing at a very high level.
To explain, I will describe how I develop products as an electrical engineer. I begin by strictly defining all the design requirements. Then: a block diagram, a formal meeting with all participants to ensure everybody agrees on what is being done, simulation, design, build, testing, final design, and then production. If the customer locates flaws, then a redesign corrects the issues. Of course, there is creativity and inspiration along the way, but my approach is entirely linear.
A few of my coworkers have a different approach, which I call, “If it isn’t broke, fix it.” Meaning, they are endlessly tinkering, which leads to long development times, poor or nonexistent documentation, meandering from initial design goals, endless side projects, failing to listen to advice, not meeting specifications, and a sloppy final product.
What is going on is that these designers cannot help themselves. They try the latest technology to see what it is about, do things because it is fun, or experiment on the company’s dime. Of course, I am guilty of some of this during my career, but I fought my desires by limiting the tinkering to a minimum. From a manager’s perspective, this playtime is incredibly wasteful.
It turns out that this is exactly how I self-edit. I experiment, change sections for no reason, add useless junk, and randomly delete important parts. Sometimes, I have no idea why I made an edit. And other times, I will realize I messed something up, go to an archive copy, and return to the original text.
You might be thinking, “Wait a minute. You said you have a formal process, like making one pass to check the dialogue?” On that pass, I would indeed scrutinize every sentence containing dialogue. My goal would be to make it read as close as possible to how I think actual people (people I have met) would speak my fictional words.
Still, while checking, I would be playing around. A spoken sentence might change form, “That sounds like fun.” to “Brad, you’re correct. That does sound like fun.” or “Cool, let’s do it.” Over the course of all my edits, sentences might get changed ten times. It is an evolving process without exact reasons or methods. Who knows where my mood will take the story?
What am I looking for during a self-edit? My best answer is, “Something out of place.” This is in stark contrast to my engineering mindset, which has established steps. Does this involve right or left-brain thinking? I suppose, but to me the two are entirely different. Engineering is a detailed, though intensive, process that results in tight documentation, while self-editing feels like a fun art project.
Looking back at my first book’s first draft, I was trying to engineer something. What I should have been trying to do was create something for readers to enjoy. And even today, my first drafts often have choppy/frumpy sentences, incomplete thoughts, or things that do not belong. Over the course of many self-edits, I play around with ideas to slowly hone in on something that I think reads well.
Well, you might be asking, “If you were teaching an editing class, would you recommend this method?” No, which requires more explanation. I have always felt that writing should be fun, and my self-editing method is fun for me. I can see that such a chaotic method would not be fun for others, as it takes so much time to clean up a document.
Still, you might be asking, “Is your method better than other authors?” The answer is probably not, but it mostly works for me. And I fully admit that I am in the middle stages of perfecting my craft.
How do other authors self-edit? It turns out I have two secret weapons to explain this: pen-pal authors. We talk often about our process, and I have learned a great deal from both. They have similar self-editing styles, which are very focused efforts to correct a bunch of issues at once. This means they would never make an entire pass to check the dialogue or delete a large section for no reason. Simply put, they edit with great purpose, thinking about every aspect of a sentence at once.
Such techniques would serve as a starting point for a good classroom lecture on successful self-editing. I can see a teacher putting up an example paragraph, reviewing the problems, and editing it in front of the class to show solid solutions and the improvements they make. I imagine such a formal approach would get the job done ten times faster than mine.
While I would likely find this lecture interesting, and really wish I had such a lecture at the beginning of my writing journey, I have gone too far down this path. That is interesting, but where does this leave you?
I have learned that when determining how to do something, it is helpful to look at what multiple people have done in the past. Once I have as much information as possible, I use the methods that work best for me and understand why I am not using the others. So, there is some value in learning about my chaotic method.
Well, now that I have defined my messy process, will writing this article allow me to improve my methods? I think this requires a yes/no kind of answer. I am always learning and looking for new techniques. And overall, my edits are catching more errors, resulting in less self-editing time; meaning the more defined my approach is, the more effective the results are. Yet, I do find myself making more edits for no reason. This likely means I am becoming more creative or making bigger mistakes. Hmm. Maybe I should have self-edited that last sentence.
You’re the best -Bill
April 08, 2026
I self-published that book, and my next book underwent a similar process. By this point, I had learned about 20% of my writing ticks and mostly how to fix them. This was still difficult because I had not yet established a formal process. Fun side story. Why yes, my first and second books required a second edition to fix glaring mistakes.
By the third book, I was beginning to piece together a formal approach to self-editing. The big change was to make an editing pass with a specific goal. For example, inspect the dialogue. While making this pass, if I spotted a problem, I would fix it.
This third book, while more complicated, followed the same process as the first and second, but this time the self-publishing went more smoothly. Big reveal, it looked more polished and did not need a second edition.
I began my fourth book entirely differently by using an outline. This was a three-page text description of the entire plot, and it took about four months to create. During this time, I identified many issues and strengthened motivation, plot structure, and character biographies.
This prep work radically reduced self-editing time, and the flaws were smaller. In addition, I formalized my self-editing process by creating a list of topics to check on each pass. Plus, I had a new ally in the form of the professional grammar tools Grammarly and ProWritingAid. The self-editing passes had expanded to inspecting scene transitions, character descriptions, dialogue integration, feelings (what is going on inside a character’s head), and scene (non-character) descriptions.
Since that fourth book, my self-editing has improved in quality, but the process has not changed. Yet I have not described what I am doing at a very high level.
To explain, I will describe how I develop products as an electrical engineer. I begin by strictly defining all the design requirements. Then: a block diagram, a formal meeting with all participants to ensure everybody agrees on what is being done, simulation, design, build, testing, final design, and then production. If the customer locates flaws, then a redesign corrects the issues. Of course, there is creativity and inspiration along the way, but my approach is entirely linear.
A few of my coworkers have a different approach, which I call, “If it isn’t broke, fix it.” Meaning, they are endlessly tinkering, which leads to long development times, poor or nonexistent documentation, meandering from initial design goals, endless side projects, failing to listen to advice, not meeting specifications, and a sloppy final product.
What is going on is that these designers cannot help themselves. They try the latest technology to see what it is about, do things because it is fun, or experiment on the company’s dime. Of course, I am guilty of some of this during my career, but I fought my desires by limiting the tinkering to a minimum. From a manager’s perspective, this playtime is incredibly wasteful.
It turns out that this is exactly how I self-edit. I experiment, change sections for no reason, add useless junk, and randomly delete important parts. Sometimes, I have no idea why I made an edit. And other times, I will realize I messed something up, go to an archive copy, and return to the original text.
You might be thinking, “Wait a minute. You said you have a formal process, like making one pass to check the dialogue?” On that pass, I would indeed scrutinize every sentence containing dialogue. My goal would be to make it read as close as possible to how I think actual people (people I have met) would speak my fictional words.
Still, while checking, I would be playing around. A spoken sentence might change form, “That sounds like fun.” to “Brad, you’re correct. That does sound like fun.” or “Cool, let’s do it.” Over the course of all my edits, sentences might get changed ten times. It is an evolving process without exact reasons or methods. Who knows where my mood will take the story?
What am I looking for during a self-edit? My best answer is, “Something out of place.” This is in stark contrast to my engineering mindset, which has established steps. Does this involve right or left-brain thinking? I suppose, but to me the two are entirely different. Engineering is a detailed, though intensive, process that results in tight documentation, while self-editing feels like a fun art project.
Looking back at my first book’s first draft, I was trying to engineer something. What I should have been trying to do was create something for readers to enjoy. And even today, my first drafts often have choppy/frumpy sentences, incomplete thoughts, or things that do not belong. Over the course of many self-edits, I play around with ideas to slowly hone in on something that I think reads well.
Well, you might be asking, “If you were teaching an editing class, would you recommend this method?” No, which requires more explanation. I have always felt that writing should be fun, and my self-editing method is fun for me. I can see that such a chaotic method would not be fun for others, as it takes so much time to clean up a document.
Still, you might be asking, “Is your method better than other authors?” The answer is probably not, but it mostly works for me. And I fully admit that I am in the middle stages of perfecting my craft.
How do other authors self-edit? It turns out I have two secret weapons to explain this: pen-pal authors. We talk often about our process, and I have learned a great deal from both. They have similar self-editing styles, which are very focused efforts to correct a bunch of issues at once. This means they would never make an entire pass to check the dialogue or delete a large section for no reason. Simply put, they edit with great purpose, thinking about every aspect of a sentence at once.
Such techniques would serve as a starting point for a good classroom lecture on successful self-editing. I can see a teacher putting up an example paragraph, reviewing the problems, and editing it in front of the class to show solid solutions and the improvements they make. I imagine such a formal approach would get the job done ten times faster than mine.
While I would likely find this lecture interesting, and really wish I had such a lecture at the beginning of my writing journey, I have gone too far down this path. That is interesting, but where does this leave you?
I have learned that when determining how to do something, it is helpful to look at what multiple people have done in the past. Once I have as much information as possible, I use the methods that work best for me and understand why I am not using the others. So, there is some value in learning about my chaotic method.
Well, now that I have defined my messy process, will writing this article allow me to improve my methods? I think this requires a yes/no kind of answer. I am always learning and looking for new techniques. And overall, my edits are catching more errors, resulting in less self-editing time; meaning the more defined my approach is, the more effective the results are. Yet, I do find myself making more edits for no reason. This likely means I am becoming more creative or making bigger mistakes. Hmm. Maybe I should have self-edited that last sentence.
You’re the best -Bill
April 08, 2026
