4 Tips for Every Writer

by Jamie Lapeyrolerie

On one of her blogs, Musings of Jamie, Random House editor Jamie Lapeyrolerie described her writing path, which began with a story she wrote as a child about a fantastical sea creature and has included several columns and blogs. Jamie gave us permission to share this excerpt with you, which highlights four great tips for writers of any genre or format.

Tip #1 – You can completely refocus what you want to write on. I most definitely have. Some were for a season (like book reviews), some were trial and error (I started countless “series” on my She Laughs With Dignity blog only to write two posts). Life, passion, and time can all shift what you want to do. There are helpful ways to transition, but don’t fear it either. You might lose readers (I have and that’s totally okay!), but it’s more important that you are enjoying what you’re writing on (especially if it’s a hobby!).

Tip #2 – Don’t discount the writing jobs you take that aren’t your favorite. Every type of writing I did shaped the writer I am today. Even the small jobs after college like newsletters and interviews for my church denomination headquarters gave me professional experience I could add to a resume. And with each completed job I grew in my confidence that I was still very much building as a recent college graduate in my early 20s. Blogging about weddings when I was a wedding photographer helped me to keep writing.

Tip #3 – You don’t have to share everything you write. Today, it’s all about content creation, content creation, content creation. I’ve fallen into this trap numerous times. But don’t feel like you always have to share what you write. There have been articles that I really loved, but only wrote for myself to help me process something I was going through or because I wanted to get some writing time in. 

Tip #4 – Take a break. When my book blog was at its height, I was blogging daily (M-F). I look back now and think HOW?! When I got my new job and moved to Colorado, I realized I didn’t have the same time, energy, or desire (it helped that my now full time job was all about books) and so I slowly started blogging less. I finished my commitments (of blog reviews) and then stopped for a while. There wasn’t an announcement or anything fancy like that, but it was what I needed at the time, so I did. Having that space and time was refreshing and gave me the space to think about next steps and what I wanted my writing to look like moving forward. 

Whatever journey you’re on (could be the arts, could be a completely different field, could be something you hope to keep a hobby), I hope it fills you up, inspires you, and that you can use it to encourage others. 

Read Jamie’s full blog post here. You can also connect with her on Instagram.

Small Chunks, Big Projects

by Ann Byle

Freelance writers have a well-developed deadline muscle. We can whip out a news brief, short news story, or blog post pretty quickly and without an all-out panic attack at the thought of meeting a deadline.

We know how to collate an interview, background facts, and new information to create an 1,100-word piece. We can interview people without stress, discern that one piece of information the article needs, and can find the lede in the midst of all the details.

Yet writing something longer that 2,000 words? Heart palpitations, sweaty palms, deep breathing, and a remarkable resistance to starting. I felt these exact things when it came time to write Chicken Scratch: Lessons on Living Creatively from a Flock of Hens (Broadleaf, May). I clucked and delayed, fiddled around, procrastinated, and generally made myself miserable with thoughts about how much work writing a book was going to be.

Then I sat on my vent (which is chicken language for bottom), and starting writing. Lesson learned. Just start. If you’re planning to or dreaming about doing a larger book project, here are several suggestions for getting started and staying on track.

1. Outline first. This may go against the grain for those who believe outlines are of the devil, but knowing where you’re going is a huge help when the project seems too big. I had created a chapter outline for Chicken Scratch to include in the book proposal, which helped me greatly to move forward with the book. I didn’t always stick to it religiously, but it was enough of a scaffolding to keep me moving and out of the chaos of not knowing where to go next.
2. Know your Anne Lamott. In her book Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, Lamott describes a time her brother needed to complete in one night a project on birds he’d had three months to do. His dad said, “Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.” The same principle applies to a writer moving from shorter pieces to longer books. Paragraph by paragraph, section by section, chapter by chapter. Looking at a project as one big whole can stop you in your tracks, but seeing it in small pieces—bird by bird—can keep you going.
3. Trust the process. More than once I thought of Chicken Scratch as a big, confusing pile of mush. I couldn’t see the way through to a completed book. But over the years as a freelance writer, I learned to trust the process in small articles. I learned to trust that the interviews, facts, details, and research would coalesce into a readable piece. This same trust applies to books, too. Yes, I had to create a process (with help from Kid 1, who is a process person and the Left-Brain Chicken in Chicken Scratch) to help me organize the many details. And yes, I trusted the process and the process trusted me back.
4. Create a process. You can trust the process only so far as you create a process that works. If your process is printing your notes, cutting them into pieces and rearranging on your kitchen table, so be it (I have a friend doing this very thing right now). My novelist friends use colored note cards for each scene based on which character is leading that scene—allowing them to see who has more scenes, when scenes need to be repositioned, etc. For Chicken Scratch, I used different-colored note cards divided into source books, people interviewed, quotations, resources listed, Left-Brain Chicken details, Egg-tivities, and chapter overview. I kept track of all the different pieces of each chapter in a cool box complete with dividers. A bit old school, yes. Who cares anyway? Do what works for you whether it’s colored note cards, sticky notes on a wall, or a project managing platform such as Trello, Scrivener, or Asana.
5. Set deadlines. Give yourself a week to complete a chapter, an hour to research that detail, an afternoon to write and edit that section, until next Tuesday to set up interviews with five sources. Lots of small deadlines add up to meeting that self-imposed deadline to finish your book or longer assignment, or that publisher-imposed deadline to turn it in. 

We freelancers know that deadlines are in place for a reason. We meet those deadlines so a piece of writing can go out into the world via a magazine, website, blog, newspaper, or book. The same techniques apply to small and large projects, so flex those deadline muscles, think big, and get writing.

Ann Byle has been a freelance writer for 25 years. She writes for Publishers Weekly and Grand Rapids Magazine and has written for Christian Retailing, Inspire and more. She has cowritten or written several books including When Angels Fight with Leslie King and the ebook The Joy of Working at Home with fellow EPA freelancers, The Baker Book House Story, and Christian Publishing 101. Her newest book is Chicken Scratch: Lessons on Living Creatively from a Flock of Hens.

Pick Your Battles (with Editors)

If you gain a reputation as a constant complainer, you may forgo future writing opportunities with that publisher, who might look for a different writer who is more manageable. Are you are willing to cut those ties? If not, it might be best to swallow your pride in order to build a relationship. Then, after you’ve written additional stories and gained the editor’s trust, you can speak up more often.

Michael Foust

Read Michael’s full article here: “5 Questions to Ask Before Challenging Your Editor.”

Your 2023 Reading List

Whether you’re a newbie writer or a seasoned veteran, it’s always a good idea to keep learning about writing (the craft and the business) and improving your skills. If you’re looking for some new-to-you resources to dig into in the new year, you’ll want to peruse this list we’ve compiled for you. (Some of us will be taking each other’s suggestions!)

We asked several Evangelical Press Association freelancers for their favorite books and they were happy to share these. Some of them are specifically about writing. Others touch on related topics such as marketing or establishing good habits. In no particular order . . .

• Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer by Roy Peter Clark
• Newsletter Ninja: How to Become An Author Mailing List Expert by Tammi Labrecque
• The Christian Writer’s Manual of Style, 4th Edition by Robert Hudson
• Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamotte
• Atomic Habits by James Clear
• The Solo Video Journalist by Matt Pearl
• On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction by William Zinsser
• The Writing Life by Annie Dillard
• On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King
• On Writing (and Writers): A Miscellany of Advice and Opinions by C.S. Lewis
• A Dash of Style: The Art and Mastery of Punctuation by Noah Lukeman
• Writing for Story: Craft Secrets of Dramatic Nonfiction by Jon Franklin
• Make Every Word Count by Gary Provost
• You Can Succeed as a Christian Writer by Nick Harrison

And here’s a podcast suggestion to jazz up the list:

• Thomas Umstattdt Jr.’s Novel Marketing Podcast

One last suggestion (which we are not getting paid to make): The Evangelical Press Association has compiled a library of 78 on-demand video presentations from the virtual events and webinars held in recent years and will continue to add to this treasury in the years ahead. This is a valuable one-stop source of training from industry experts in writing, editing, design, photography, digital publishing, social media, professional development, and more. The catch? You need to be an EPA member to access the library, but Associate membership (i.e. if you’re not a publication) is only $80 a year. For the price of four or five of the books listed above, you get access to a great many resources and networking opportunities, including the monthly freelancers’ Zoom chat hosted by this blog’s editors! Learn more here.

What are your favorite resources for writers? Please share in the comments section.

Thanks to Ann Byle, Sommer Cunningham, Akosua Frempong, Chris Maxwell,
Patti Townley-Covert, and Terry White for their recommendations.

More Baskets = More Stability

Freelance writers can improve their financial sustainability by building relationships with multiple clients. They can further increase their stability by writing in a few different niches. And many serious freelancers will also work toward a diversified mix of offerings, perhaps writing articles for publications, crafting books, teaching classes, speaking at events, critiquing writing, and more. Each new client and offering strengthens a freelancer’s business.

Robert Lee Brewer, Writer’s Digest (Nov. 18, 2022)

CFWN’s Top Tools & Tips (continued)

a collaboration by EPA freelancers

If you missed it, click here to see Part 1.

What are your favorite tools or resources as a freelance writer?

Lori Arnold: Otter AI transcription service has cut my transcription time by at least half. It’s pretty accurate for a multi-voice recognition system. You can also search keywords in the transcript. They offer a free basic package for individuals just starting out.

Akosua Frempong: My favorite tip came from Joyce Ellis during one of the EPA Freelancer Zoom calls and was  confirmed during another meeting by Jeff Friend. Joyce mentioned the Christian Writers’ Market Guide. I decided to subscribe to it and, through it, I got my first professional break in Christian freelance writing, writing for Peer! The guide provides essential information on the publications, including pay and, as Jeff mentioned, tips on how to get the editors’ attention. For me, as a freelance journalist and more specifically a Christian one, it’s been a beneficial tool.  

Stephen Clark: After trying and rejecting several journaling tools, I stumbled onto The Journal by DavidRM Software. This software offers much more than just journaling and is loaded with useful features that are intuitive and easy to use. You can create unlimited dated journals that allow you to create one entry per day. You can also create undated loose-leaf notebooks where each entry is just like adding a page to a binder. The notebook feature is great for organizing projects. For example, you can create a notebook titled “Articles” with each entry an article in progress. Navigating the journals and notebooks is very easy by way of tabs and file trees. You can rename the tabs at any time. Each notebook and journal can be set up with their own default font, color scheme, and passwords. Entries use formatting features similar to what you will find in Word as well as spell check, thesaurus, and auto-replace. You can cut and paste or insert text and graphics from other sources. You can search a single notebook or every journal and notebook for a word or phrase, and you can export the text (individual entries or batches) as RTF files.

Ann-Margret Hovsepian: These are my top three suggestions:

1. The Print Friendly browser extension button is the best and fastest way to print out (or save as a PDF) a web page in a readable format. You can click on any images or text you don’t want in your print-out.

2. The “Save” feature of Facebook is something I use a lot. If I see a link, quote, or idea that I want to hang on to for a future project, or just for my personal use, I save it. You can create “Collections” to organize the posts into categories.

3. I highly recommend signing up for Jane Friedman’s Electric Speed newsletter, which features helpful tools and resources and is sent out twice a month.

What is the best advice you would give other freelancer writers?

Jeff Friend: Never, never, never miss a deadline.

Ann Byle: I’ve learned these things along the Freelance Way:

1. Walk through the doors God opens. Whether the project works out or not, the exercise of moving forward without fear (or with a little bit of fear) is worth the effort.

2. Trust the process. We want the right lede, the right ending, the best story RIGHT NOW, but sometimes it takes a bit for those things to come. But they will come if you do your research, give yourself time to think, and relax. This also applies to starting a freelance writing career; you have to do your due diligence—put in the time and effort—to get started. 

3. Don’t hold things too tightly. Which is to say, your stories will be edited and the projects will go to someone else. Disappointing at times, but it’s part of the gig. 

Ann-Margret Hovsepian: Check out the five tips I shared last summer in this post: Freelancing 101. Also, here is my list of 4 Essential Qualities for Writers.

CFWN’s Top Tools & Tips

a collaboration by EPA freelancers

After a little break, we’re back! We asked several associate members of the Evangelical Press Association, some of whom are on our team of blog contributors, to share their best tips for successful freelancing. We got such great responses, we’re sharing the wealth in two separate posts. Here’s the first part, which is all about getting organized.

How do you keep track of deadlines and juggle multiple projects at the same time?

Randy Petersen: I have a calendar on my wall for deadlines and meetings. And I make a list every morning of my work for that day. I try to break big deadlines into shorter ones (e.g. one-third of the project by April 1.)

Ann-Margret Hovsepian: I use a large hard-bound spiral agenda (sorry, that’s Canadian for “planner”) with two-page monthly and weekly spreads and write down every deadline and task, adding sticky-notes in bright colors for anything I want to make sure I don’t forget. I’ve also been using Google Calendar to immediately block in appointments and meetings. I like that I can quickly access it on my phone to make sure I don’t double-book, and that I can use different colors for different types of commitments (e.g. red for professional meetings, dark blue for medical appointments, etc.)

Stephen Clark: There are three things I’ve used for years to manage my work:

1. Simple wall calendars. I always have two hanging side by side show the current month and the next month.

2. A small notebook. I make lists, write down ideas, take notes at meetings, and basically keep everything in the notebooks.

3. Technology. I use Google Calendar on the phone to manage deadlines and stay in synch with other devices.

How do you organize your ideas (and material) for future projects?

Stephen Clark: I always carry 3 x 5 cards to jot notes and collect them to scan later. Using the The Journal by DavidRM Software, I create tabs and files and add notes from time to time on various topics, and even paste in URLs to articles and other sources. And there’s always tabbed manila files neatly labelled and stored away in a file cabinet. I have sometimes maintained several files, each on a different topic, to collect clippings and notes on specific topics to pull from later. I’ve also kept one folder just for stuff that I found interesting. When I needed a fresh idea, I’d pull out this folder and just browse through it.

Ann-Margret Hovsepian: I used Evernote for a while and it’s got great features for organizing notes and saving online information (whether it’s an entire web page or just the bit you’ve highlighted on that page), with the ability to use keyword tags and much more. . . but I eventually felt overwhelmed by the task of creating folders and coming up with keywords and keeping everything organized, not to mention remembering to refer back to my notes. I find it much easier to keep a basket with colorful labeled file folders next to my desk and throwing bits of paper in there that I don’t have to hunt around for when I need them. (I’m intrigued by Stephen’s suggestion, though, and will be checking it out!)

How do you deal with information overload / digital clutter?

Randy Petersen: In research, I try not to find more than I need.When beginning a project, I may do a lot of background reading to learn about the subject. From that, I’ll develop my structure for the piece. Then I’ll have a sense of how many quotes I might need, and I find them. There’s considerable flexibility in this. Sometimes I find a quote that’s so good, it forces me to change my outline.

Stephen Clark: Ignore it. It will always be there. I use what I need and walk away from the rest. If it’s something on the internet, I can Google it later if I need it. If I can’t find a specific article or other piece of information I once read, I can always find newer resources that serve just as well. Even on my PC, it’s easy to search on files using remembered keywords and phrases. I’ll squirrel stuff away in various folders and then ignore it until I need it.

Watch for Part 2 on November 15. We’ll be telling you about our favourite tools and resources, as well as our best tips for freelancing.

Dealing with Down Time

by Randy Petersen

“How are you?” someone asks.

“Busy!” I reply without thinking.

That now-reflexive response draws empathy and often camaraderie. People nod and groan. Everyone is working hard.

But what should I say during down times, when I’m not busy? We all go through periods when the publishing cycles turn against us, when our favorite editors all go on vacation, when our inboxes contain only spam. Even more important, what should I do in these dry seasons?

The Bible talks about “redeeming the time” (Ephesians 5:16 KJV). Most modern translation rephrase that as “Make the most of every opportunity,” or something similar. Not a bad paraphrase, but Paul used a business term with the word agora (marketplace) tucked inside. In a literal sense, this is saying, “Buy your time back from the market and use it for good.”

Isn’t that what we’re talking about? As a freelancer, you market your time, but at this point no one’s buying. How will you “buy it back” and use it in a positive way? Here are some ideas.

Don’t Lose Hope

You may be tempted to mope because no one wants your wares. You might worry about your career. But reread Ecclesiastes 3 and note that there are seasons for everything. Seasons to work feverishly on deadline and seasons to slow down.

Plant Some Seeds

There is “a time to plant and a time to harvest,” says Ecclesiastes 3:2. Maybe this is a time to invest in relationships with editors or potential co-authors. Float some ideas that aren’t yet at proposal stage, and see if any seeds take root.

Think Like an Editor

If you were the editor-in-chief of a Christian magazine, what sort of articles would you be looking for? Do some play-acting. Imagine yourself at the helm of one of the publications you pitch to. Then map out the next few issues as you’d like to see them. What topics should be covered? What stories demand attention? What tone would you like to set? Then return to your own persona and look at the Table of Contents you’ve just created. Is there anything the real editor might be interested in, anything you could write?

Fix Up Your Space (and Your Tech)

Maybe this is the time to make the guest room your office, or to get a proper desk chair that won’t give you backaches. Maybe you should reevaluate your hardware or software.  You never have time when you’re in the thick of things, but now that your schedule has thinned out, maybe you can discover some better ergonomics.

Learn Something and Write About It

You’ve always wanted to learn biblical Greek. Or understand computers. Or read the top ten novels of the last century. Or figure out Twitter. You were also too busy, but now you’re not. So go for it, but also write about it as you do. Thousands of others can learn from your learning process.

Grow Your Soul

Memorize a chapter of the Bible. Practice various forms of prayer. Listen to great music, or make music yourself. Wander through an art museum, or make some art yourself. Gather wise sayings from your ten closest friends and family members. Do a task at your church that no one else wants to do.

Take a Strategy Day

Make it a personal retreat. Find a room, preferably with a whiteboard, at your church or a local library. Invite a “consultant” to join you for part of the time—someone who knows you and will help you think logically. (It was my sister who helped me storyboard a career plan at a crucial time.) Map out your plan for the next four months, twelve months, two years, in getting work, doing work, lining up regular projects, and improving your own ability. Let your vision soar, but then bring it down to specific action steps.

Down time can be growth time for you and your business. As the “time-redeeming” passage goes on to say, “Don’t act thoughtlessly, but understand what the Lord wants you to do” (Ephesians 5:17 NLT).

Freelancing 101

By Ann-Margret Hovsepian

Wouldn’t it be great if you could sit with your computer or pad of paper, write your stories, and then have them magically appear in print? And make money? Yes. Well. That might work in a fantasy novel, but we live in a non-fiction world that runs on contracts, deadlines, accounting, and—sorry, we cannot avoid it—taxes.

Although writing is a creative process, talent alone will not move you forward if you want to earn a living as a writer. You must start with administration and finish with marketing. Think of these two brackets as the bread and your creative work as the innards of your sandwich. Without the layers, you basically end up with salad. Here are some ways to make your first layer solid.

Partner with God

Before you do anything else, bathe your assignments in prayer. Ask God to give you discernment about what stories to write, to open doors for your story to get to where it needs to go, and to touch the hearts of those who read your story.

Quantify Your Goals

What do you want to write? Where do you want to see your work published? What steps will get you there? How long will it take? What will you let go of to make the time? It’s fine if you don’t know the answers to all these questions right away. Just do the first thing you know to do and that will lead you to the next step.

Manage Your Time

Figure out your routine. How many hours will you work per day or week? What time will you start and finish? Keep in mind that the time you spend on a project includes not only writing, but also reading, researching, brainstorming, and learning. Leave ample margin for revisions and unexpected setbacks. Make sure family and friends respect your work schedule.

Run a Tight Ship

Few people enjoy paperwork, but developing and sticking to an efficient administrative system will mitigate headaches in the long run. Use downtimes (when you don’t feel like writing) to clear away paperwork. An easy-to-remember rule of thumb for keeping paperwork off your desk is the “FLAT” approach: File it, Let someone else do it, take Action, or Throw it away!

Keep detailed accounts. Learn about rates, rights, and income tax rules for freelancers. Keep all your business-related receipts. Invoice as soon as a job is finished.

Keep track of your assignments, too. Whether you use a planner, a wall calendar, a computer program or an app on your phone, mark deadlines as soon as you have a confirmed assignment. If your article requires interviews, set up those calls or meetings before you do anything else. Don’t assume that your subject’s schedule will coordinate with yours.

Be Professional

It doesn’t matter how brilliant your manuscript is if you are a nightmare to work with. Remember that your editor or publisher is your client, and the customer is always right (in theory, at least). Show humility and grace when your work is criticized or corrected, even if you have to disagree, and resolve to be teachable. Not only will this show good character and make you a pleasure to do business with, but you will actually learn things and get better at your craft!

Meet your deadlines. Call when you said you would. And never, ever get “under-promise and over-deliver” mixed up!

Words of Wisdom

by William J. Petersen

When I was 20 years old, I decided to give freelance writing a try. Why not? I had been reading Sunday  school literature since I was six years old, and I understood that editors were crying out for children’s stories.

So I hastily compiled a list of six Sunday school papers aimed at kids 9 to 12 years old. Then I went to my typewriter (computers hadn’t been invented yet) and pounded out a story about a wanna-be baseball player named Herbie, who was afraid of getting hit by a baseball every time he came up to bat.

The story ended with Herbie coming up to bat in the last inning with the bases loaded. He got hit by a pitch to force in the winning run.

I decided to send the story to Scripture Press, because my church used Scripture Press materials. It was returned to me—rejected—within a week. I was disappointed, of course, and I thought the editor was stupid for turning down such a classic story for junior aged boys, but I had five other Sunday school papers on my list. If Scripture Press decided to turn down a classic, I would send it to one of their competitors!

I got my second rejection within a week, from the Free Methodists in Winona Lake, Indiana. So I sent my masterpiece to the Assemblies of   God in Springfield, Missouri—another rejection—and then on to the Nazarenes in Kansas City, and then to David C. Cook, at that time in Elgin, Illinois, and finally to a Baptist publisher.

Within six weeks, believe it or not, I had collected six rejection slips.

I was discouraged, yes, but I wasn’t quitting, though I had reached the end of my list. I thought of trying a few more denominational houses, but since I had written Herbie specifically  for the Scripture Press publication called My Counselor, I decided to give them a chance to redeem themselves. Maybe the  editor had a quarrel with the boss the first time. Or maybe he had an upset stomach, or maybe . . .

Well, within another ten days I received a letter from the editor of My Counselor. When I saw the envelope, I was sure it was another rejection.

I was wrong.

The editors had accepted “Herbie, the Ball-shy Wildcat”  for publication. It appeared in print the following year. And amazingly, every three   years during the next dozen years, the publication reprinted Herbie, and of course each time they sent me a little check as well ($15 for the first publication and $10 for each reprint).

Word of Wisdom Number One: It’s always too soon to quit.

Years later, when I was editorial director of a book publisher, a very discouraged lawyer and wannabe novelist submitted a manuscript that had been rejected 27 times. We accepted it and A Time to Kill  became a bestseller. Its author, John Grisham, became one of the best-known novelists of the past 50 years.

It’s always too soon to quit.

Branch Out

I’m not especially gifted in any particular area of writing. The flip-side of that is, I never knew what I couldn’t do until I tried. So I have tried a lot of different things: Gospel tracts, movie scripts, TV commercials, missionary biographies, Bible study curricula, quizzes, fiction, personality sketches, how-to’s, poetry, interviews, radio writing, daily devotionals, fund-raising letters, humor, writing for kids, you name it.

I am no Bible scholar, but I have written some very successful books on the lives of biblical characters, as well as curriculum for adult Bible study classes.

By trial and error I’ve learned that, despite my success with “Herbie,” I  don’t do fiction very well. But I’ve been trying to learn that craft, and managed to self-publish several unpublishable novels in my eighties.

While serving as a mentor for the Christian Writers Guild, I introduced students to all genres of writing. One writer was especially interested in fiction, but she had to go through the lessons on writing newspaper articles, how-to articles, devotionals and all kinds of things. She finally got the chance to develop her novel, but by then she’d had two non-fiction articles accepted by national publications and one magazine had invited her to do a regular column.

So you never know what doors the Lord might open for you.

Word of Wisdom Number Two: Take some risks. Branch out into new areas. Go outside your comfort zone. Don’t limit yourself to one writing genre.

Edit yourself

I’ll never forget Miss Fackler. She was my freshman writing teacher in college, and I was scared to death of her. No frog had ever  been dissected the way she cut apart my writing.

Oh, I had been accustomed to seeing red marks on my papers, showing  me where I had misspelled a word or used the wrong punctuation. But she asked questions: Why did you say this? Is that the best word to use?  Do you really need that paragraph? Can’t you say this in fewer words?

I dreaded her favorite expression: Superfluous.

But before long, I was asking some of those questions myself before I turned in my paper. In the process, I learned the importance of self-editing.

Now writing and editing are two different skills. I doubt if Miss Fackler ever had anything published, but in her role as teacher, she was a fine editor. And she taught me both skills.

You will be a better writer if you learn to edit your own work effectively.

Don’t edit as you write. Get your first draft down on paper or on the computer, and then you can edit.

Sometimes it helps to wait a few days before editing. Then, does it still make sense? Can you outline it now? One of the first things I do in self-editing is to look at the verbs and eliminate all the forms of “to be” that I can, replacing those dead verbs with action verbs. Then I look at sentences beginning with “There” and “It.”

Then I look at word-length, sentence length, paragraph length. I look at “ly” adverbs, impersonal pronouns. Use Anglo-Saxon words, not Latin compounds, wherever possible.

These cautions might paralyze you during the writing process. Write freely. But then go back later and prune your work to make it stronger.

Word of Wisdom Number three: Learn to be self-critical, to be your own editor. When you write, be warmly involved in your story. When you edit, be coolly detached.

William J. Petersen, father of CFWN editor Randy Petersen, passed away in January, 2021, at the age of 91. An editor at Eternity Magazine for thirty years, he also authored more than twenty books. These were notes for a talk at a writer’s conference a few years ago.