How to know when it's time to take your characters to bed

So, I’m editing my third novel, Bleak Landing, which releases in August. I’ve learned that I love the editing process more than the actual writing, probably because you’re taking something you had to tear your hair out just to get onto the page and now you’ve got help to polish it and make it much better. I’m learning that a good editor is worth their weight in coffee pods—and not the cheap kind. 

The way it works is, I receive my manuscript back from my development editor, Shari. What was once three hundred plain, black-and-white, double-spaced pages is now a rainbow of Track Changes, averaging three or more per paragraph. I’m eager to dig in, knowing I have about two weeks to work my way through all Shari’s comments and suggestions and return it. Then we do a second, shorter round the same way. A few weeks later, I’ll get it back from the copy editor and go through the process one last time before my baby is completely out of my hands.

Right now I’m in the middle of the first round. Most of the time, it’s just a matter of clicking on either “accept” or “reject” or choosing a more precise word. Sometimes it means clarifying a whole sentence for the reader or deleting an unnecessary one. Sometimes it’s verifying a historical element. Occasionally, Shari challenges me to rework an entire scene to make it more engaging for the reader. She’ll write something like, “This is a little pat/cliché. I know you can give me something even stronger.” Or “I’m not sure this is convincingly romantic enough.”

If that challenge happens to come at 8:00 on a Friday night after I’ve met my obligation at my day job, grocery shopped, made dinner, cleaned the kitchen, and already spent a couple of hours editing at a desk that’s in desperate need of tidying and the pain in my shoulders is screaming for relief—I can get a little surly. I want to yell at Shari, “You’re wrong, you tyrant! I can’t give you something stronger. This is it. I was proud of that scene! It’s the best I can do. So shut up and leave me alone!”

Yeah, that’s when you know it’s time to close the laptop and call it a day. Take your characters to bed with you and pray they’ll show you better words by morning.

In the middle of this process, my second book, Maggie’s War, is launching—a bit of a timing misfortune on the publisher’s part. But I can’t whine about it and still appear professional, especially when I’ve only just got my nose in the door of this business. So I’m juggling plans for three launch events, radio interviews, and newspaper ads. I’m keeping track of receipts, preparing speeches and door prizes, and responding to early reviewers. Oh yes, and it’s really time to put up another blog post. And how can I answer questions about the second novel when my head’s all wrapped up in the third? The characters and situations are all muddled together.

Seems a bit much for a woman who still can’t get through the day without a substantial nap.

But guess what? Lots of writers would kill to have the problems I’m describing. I could have called this post “Be careful what you wish for.” After all, I wanted this. Prayed for this. It seems when God opens a flood gate, he does a thorough job. Sure, I could throw up my hands and say “forget it.” I could return the manuscript just the way it is, collect the remainder of my advance, and call it a career. The book would still be published. Sales would be disappointing. Reviews would be dismal. A chance at another contract would be gone. I could spend the rest of my life on the couch watching Netflix or reading other writers’ books, ignoring the words on my laptop’s wallpaper: “I want to see what happens if I don’t give up.”

It’s seven a.m. and I’ve had a decent sleep. My desk is still a mess. The bathroom’s dirty and laundry waits. I’ve got a book launch in three days. But I’ll go back and tackle that troublesome scene because, deep down, I know Shari is right. I can do better. And I owe it to her, to my readers, to myself, and most of all, to my Creator, to give it my very best.

But first, another cup of coffee. The cheap kind. Sigh.

“As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” Proverbs 27:17

This will make somebody mad

I’m not a country music fan, but on weekday mornings while dressing for work and making my bed, I listen to a local station for news and weather. Hearing the latest country songs is a sometimes questionable fringe benefit. One song that seems to be getting a lot of air time lately is “Better Man,” recorded by Little Big Town and written by Taylor Swift.

I’m not surprised this song is gaining popularity. I imagine multitudes of women relate to it, and I confess these kinds of thoughts have tromped across my own brain and emotions many a time. This could have worked out if only you were a better man. I don’t doubt that many a regret-filled man listens to this song with a woulda-coulda-shoulda nod of his sorry, sad head.

But just hold on a minute. Let’s imagine that a guy were singing the same song, wishing his lost love had been a better woman. How might we react to these lyrics:

I hold onto this pride because these days it’s all I have
And I gave you my best and we both know you can’t say that
You can’t say that
I wish you were a better woman
I wonder what we would’ve become
If you were a better woman
We might still be in love
If you were a better woman
You would’ve been the one
If you were a better woman.

Do you find these words offensive? Anyone? And if so, why is that? Why, if the original version is okay? All I did was switch the genders.

I think this song might be equally popular if a man were singing it, saying “We might still be in love if I were a better man.” Women everywhere would nod, possibly fall a little bit in love with this guy who’s finally seeing the light.

But let’s turn that idea on its head. Some woman singing, “We might still be in love if I were a better woman,” would incite an outpouring of female support for this poor soul suffering so heavily from rock bottom self-esteem. You just need to be you, Honey. You don’t need to make yourself over for no man. You’re fine just the way you are!

Help me understand this. Without falling back on the “centuries of oppression make it okay” argument. How is it not sexist to say it’s acceptable for a woman to sing this song, but not for a man? How is it not childish to want it both ways? Thinking that the success of a relationship falls solely on the man being “a better man” turns women into the helpless stereotypes women have fought against for years. 

We say we want to receive the same respect as men, but how can that ever happen if society as a whole doesn’t respect men any more than this? Am I missing something?

Meeting Yourself

The other day, I came across this definition of hell from an

unknown source: “On your last day on earth, the person you became will meet the person you could have become.”

It was meant to motivate us to achieve our potential. But that could go either way, couldn’t it? 

Let’s say today is my last day on earth and I get to meet this fabulous person I could have become. Let’s say she’s accomplished far more than I did. She’s published hundreds of novels that have sold millions of copies because she started much earlier and learned the craft at a younger age. Her marriage, family, and friendships are thriving because she invested in them selflessly. She’s physically fit because she resisted all that junk and applied herself to exercise. She licked all her issues with jealousy and resentment years ago. No one’s heard a sarcastic comment from her mouth in decades. She’s fearless. She’s kind and encouraging and genuinely compassionate. Her social calendar is full, because people can’t wait to spend time with her. She’s overflowing with energy, daily extending generous hospitality in her well-appointed home. 

I kind of hate her.

And I suppose that would be hellish torture, knowing it’s now too late.

But what if the person I could have become is entirely different? She’s all alone because she gave up on her marriage. She’s worried about becoming homeless because she just couldn’t handle work anymore and there’s no money coming in. She quit writing because the rejection and criticism were too much. She’s turned to alcohol for an escape. She smokes because it settles her nerves. She rarely gets off the sofa (which, by the way, is covered in cat hair) because all that weight is just too challenging to move around. She’s wallowing in self-pity and takes it out on her children who never come around or call. Convinced life has dealt her an unfair hand, she’s well known on social media and at the public works department for her constant complaining and demands. Even her cat is growing weary of her company.

It’s not really that big a stretch to think I could become her. Well, except maybe for the smoking part. Eww.

Frankly, both scenarios are a little depressing.

Here’s the thing. God made each of us with far more potential than we can imagine. And no matter how hard we work, we will never live up to it while we’re on this earth because we are broken people in a broken world. It’s great when we can rise above circumstances, when we can achieve much through our diligence. But if this life was all there is, I don’t think I’d be motivated to do or achieve anything. What would be the point?

I’ve got something better driving me.

You see, I’m not going to meet the person I could have become. I will become the person I could have become—when (and only when) I meet my Creator face to face and he finishes transforming me into the me he had in mind all along. All the hang-ups gone, forever. A perfect new body. A heart that carries inside it only love. A mind that knows only truth. Joyful. Radiant. And the more I can look like her in this life, the easier it will be for my friends to recognize me in the next.

2017 has arrived. Maybe today won’t be your last on earth, but it’s coming. Sooner or later. And each day between now and your last can make you a teensy bit more like the person your Creator had in mind—if you let him begin his transformation work now. Ask him. 

“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the former things have passed away.” And the One seated on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” –Revelation 21:4-5