From Edie: Spring brings fresh starts—even in writing. Discover why revisions are essential, how editing strengthens your story and characters, and how to embrace the process to create a better book.
Spring, Revisions, and the Writing Process: Why Editing Makes Your Book Stronger
by Lynn H. Blackburn @LynnHBlackburn
It's Spring.
I don’t know what that means where you are, but in the South? It means we could easily have all four seasons in one day. It means you can plant stuff before Tax Day, but only if you’re willing to watch them die a painful, frostbitten death. And it means that the pollen will, again, do its level best to end me. Y’all…the yellow dust is everywhere!
The weather can be gorgeous, but you don’t dare sit outside to enjoy it because if you do, you’ll basically be breathing in so much pollen that your lungs will go on strike!
Clearly, my feelings about spring are … complicated. But don’t let my ranting make you think I hate it. I mean, it’s not Winter (boo…hiss). And it isn’t Summer (sizzle…fry…sweat). So, it’s actually my second favorite season. When I dare to go outside, or, honestly, when I look out of my window, I find that there’s something so encouraging about watching things bloom.
Spring is hopeful. Spring says, “Let’s go!”
This Spring, I’m in the middle of revisions on the first book of a new series. And revisions — I say this with complete transparency and zero shame — are not my favorite. If my relationship with Spring is complex, my relationship with revisions requires copious amounts of Cadbury eggs and conversations with myself that go something like, “You’re not the worst writer in the world. Really. Here’s a Coke in a glass bottle and a Reese’s peanut butter cup. There. That’s better. You can do this.”
Y’all think I’m joking.
But, again, don’t let my ranting make you think I hate the revisions. Okay. Maybe I do. But I would never, not ever, publish a book without them.
NEVER.
Here's what I know about my editor—she is not trying to change my story. She is trying to make it the best version of itself. She finds the places where I've gone soft when the story needed to be stronger. She names the weaknesses I'd rather not look at directly. She can see the missing pieces that I lost sight of in my deadline-driven desperation to reach THE END.
Here’s an example: I don't know my first book-in-series characters the way I'll know my third-book characters. Those early characters are still telling me who they are while I'm writing them. By book three, I've lived with these people for years. I know how they’re wired and exactly which wounds haven’t healed. But my Book One characters? We're still getting acquainted and in the first version of the story, it shows.
That's a real problem, and the revision process drags it into the light and gives me the tools to fix it.
I'm grateful for it in the way you're grateful for things that are genuinely good for you but involve some degree of suffering — physical therapy, difficult conversations, vegetables. I know what's on the other side of this. A stronger book. A sharper story. Characters who feel like real people instead of placeholders wearing character names.
Just because I’m grateful doesn’t mean I enjoy it.
But I trust the process. I trust the people God put around my work. And I know that when I hold my stories with open hands, they can run off into the world and do exactly what God intended for them to do.
So this Spring, I’m choosing to see revisions as an exercise in hope, knowing that when I’m done, I’ll be able to launch this book with a joyful, “Let’s go!”
Grace and peace,
Lynn
TWEETABLE
Lynn lives in South Carolina with her husband, children, and an overprotective goldendoodle. She writes her novels in between homeschooling, parenting an adult with special needs, watching her boys play baseball, and teaching at conferences. You can follow along with her real-life plot twists by signing up for her newsletter at LynnHBlackburn.com and connecting with her @LynnHBlackburn on social media.
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