In Praise of Editors

This week I'm working hard on the first set of edits suggested by my editor Sarah Harvey for my next YA novel for Orca Book Publishers, currently called Feast. I say currently because one of the first things Sarah suggested, was a new title for the novel. I was not pleased about this. Luckily because I have worked with Sarah on three previous novels I know how this will play out: eventually I will see the beauty of each of her suggestions. Sarah is not only a great editor, she's also the author of several books for children and young adults, including her current title Spirit Level.

Working with an editor is an interesting and humbling experience. For a year or more, I work by myself, quietly at my desk, or more frequently, on my laptop on my couch. My characters form in my heads like imaginary friends, and their problems and goals blossom as I type. I start with a voice and dialogue. My characters argue and discuss and from there, I find a structure to chart my character's development. As I write I often have other writer friends read short excerpts for me. For the most part they are supportive and say nice things about my writing.

Orca Editor Sarah Harvey

And then there's my editor. Her job is to make my book the best it can be. And so often when I get back the first draft of comments I'm overwhelmed. Sarah finds things in the story that I had no idea weren't working. Then I am briefly annoyed- what does she know? This is my book. Next, I have a moment of sadness. I realize Sarah is right. My book which seemed perfect, is hopelessly flawed. I mumble incoherently in my car on the way to work and complain to my husband about how bad my book is. I sleep poorly and worry I'll never have a solution to my book's endless problems. This lasts a few days. And then I get down to work. At this point I realize just how brilliant Sarah is, how she can see my whole book in her head in a way that I can't. I praise her vision, and the way she cuts out all my verbal tics, the "sighs," "shrugs," "wells" and "ums," that litter my writing, like tiny crutches. I start to see how her vision is really my vision, but better.

When the manuscript becomes hopelessly marked up with changes and I think I can't improve it anymore, I send it back to Sarah. I know she'll send me another raft of comments for the next round of editing, but the second session is never as hard.

At this point in my editing I still haven't changed the title of my book, but I'm starting to come around to her suggestions.

The Complete Indian Housekeeper and Cook

This week in the in the mail I received The Complete Indian Housekeeper and Cook by  Flora Annie Steel and Grace Gardiner. This might not be to everyone's reading taste, but if you need first hand information about Victorian households in India, this is a good place to start. In particular I wanted to know more about what Victorian Brits in India actually ate. This book has meal plans and recipes for everything from Brains au Gratin, to Creme Frite and Dal Poorie.
 

 

Flora Annie Steel

Coauthor Flora Annie Steel is unlike the more common images of the Victorian memsahib as a retiring, delicate flower. Instead Steel took on India with great energy. She married Henry William Steel, a member of the India Civil Service, and lived in India for twenty-two years, mainly in the Punjab. Not only did she learn the local languages, she urged educational reforms, was interested in Native women's lives, including their handicrafts and stories. She also worked informally as a medical practicioner and wrote many books about India including On The Face of the Waters, about the Indian Mutiny, and Tales of the Punjab, a collection of Punjabi folklore. 

 

Illustration from Mrs. Beeton's Guide

Lucky for anyone interested in the daily running of the Victorian woman in India's household, Steel also co-authored The Complete Indian Housekeeper and Cook, a practicial guide advice for young women setting up a household in India. It includes details on how to handle servants, plan a menu, manage young children as well as general hints for the preservation of health. Who can resist gems like Steel and Gardiner's suggestion for women to get enough exercise: "A languid stroll from drawing-room to your carriage and back is not sufficient to keep your organism going." The book is like Mrs. Beeton's Guide for Household Management but specific to the sub-continent. 
 
Like any good primary source reserach material, the book offers more than just specific research details; it reflects the attitudes of the Empire, specifically of British women living in India. Although these attitudes often make the modern reader uncomfortable (the book includes a section on "managing native servants"), it is still fascinating research material. 

Re-reading

My friend Marg recently told me that she plans to make at least one third of the books she reads re-reads. She recently picked up Ian McEwan's Saturday, and was looking forward to going back to Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway. I thought this was a great idea and recently re-read Coetzee's The Age of Iron, which I adore. Other books I frequently re-read are: Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, Herman Hesse's Siddartha, Helen Humphrey's The Lost Garden, Chaim Potok's My Name is Asher Lev, and AS Byatt's The Children's Hour. I'm planning a list of re-reads that I'm hoping to sneak in between the new books I'm also looking forward to.

With this in mind, last night I set myself the goal of trying to remember the name of a book that I'd like to re-read. This might seem like a fairly modest goal, but I'm avoiding editing a novel with what feels like irreparable problems. So instead of tackling my character's uneven mental health issues, I looked to recover a lost book. This turned out to be a fairly easy, despite being frustrated by finding the title previously. Laurie Colwin's Goodbye Without Leaving was  published in 1990. Colwin, an American author who died at only 48 from a heart attack, wrote for Gourmet magazine and published several cookbooks as well as other novels.

 

Goodbye Without Leaving tells the story of Geraldine, a bored graduate student who is invited to tour as the only white backup singer for Vernon and Ruby Shakely and the Shakettes. She spends a year as a Shakette before going back to school, getting married, having kids and doing all the other adult things people do. My parents gave me the book when I was twenty-one and home from university recovering from the Hepatitis A I had picked up traveling in Morocco. I enjoyed the book, but mostly remember it because my parents and I had such radically different reactions to this light humorous read. I was horrified that Geraldine had given up her singing career to be a bored mother. I distinctly remember my mother replying, "You can't be a Shakette forever." I wondered, "Why the hell not?" Tina Turner was still performing, Madonna was still out there, the Stones were barely mid-way through their career. I had no interest in singing myself, but I had just had my first taste of travel (albeit with somewhat disastrous results) and had started to write seriously. The last thing I wanted to hear was about the importance of settling down to a financially beneficial career.

 

These days, like Colwin's Geraldine, I find myself solidly mired in mid-life responsibilities- jobs, kids, and house repairs. (Nothing says you're middle-aged like being excited over a new roof!) I'm curious to know how I'll feel re-reading Colwin's Goodbye Without Leaving. Books mean different things to us at different stages in our lives. When I was twenty-four I was sure Bruce Chatwin's Songlines was going to be a book that spoke to me my entire life. Now I'm pretty sure it's not. I think I'm closer to my mother's 'You can't be a Shakette forever' comment than I ever imagined, but I'm good with this. You can be a Shakette forever, but you can't be a Shakette (or whatever your art goal happens to be, in my case, an unemployed writer) and save for your kids' university education, go on ski vacations and afford a new roof- all things which are also important to me. Writing is an essential part of my life, but as one of my sons likes to remind me, he is much more important and interesting than any book I'm reading or writing. I must agree.