Editors make a writer an author. Editors makes a book a novel. Editor keep authors grounded.

Editors are cats and they make us into dogs.

Editors are cats because they go from ignoring you, concentrating only on the task at hand, then suddenly they offer affection, a moment of snuggles and adoration, only to claw you to shreds a moment later, and back to ignoring you.

This isn’t a complaint it is just how it works.

We the authors, on the other hand, become dogs.

We studiously do what we are told, trying desperately to learn all the new tricks that are shown and explained to us. We crave to please or editors, spending our waking moments in figuring out how to make them happy. If we do something to garner their displeasure, we apologetically scamper to fix it. When we are told a part is good, funny, dramatic – is short ‘good dog’ – we get all happy and wiggle our fat asses in our seats.

But this is a good relationship. This is how the job gets done and how a tale becomes a story. If the editor is not good, invested, and balanced in praise and critique, then the story suffers for it.

If the writer is not open to change, not ready to adapt, and too sensitive about their work, the story suffers for it.

If the story suffers than the readers suffer, and Rule Number One – A Readers Won’t Suffer Shit to Read a Book.

So if you don’t have one – go and find your self a real, good, honest editor. There is little to match, rewriting a passage that didn’t work

into a proper turn of phrase, and having your editor praise you for it.

Good Dog!