An interesting question cropped up on the forum recently regarding editing. I found the Straub story particularly interesting: the idea that an author would publish an unedited version of his manuscript alongside (albeit with a different publisher) the edited, mainstream version of the book. I don't know Peter Straub, but it made me wonder about the relationship between Straub and his editor, and whether he views his unexpurgated version as superior to the edited version. Did he make the cuts reluctantly, and did he feel that they compromised his vision of what the novel should be? All quite fascinating.
My experience of being edited has always been overwhelmingly positive, and I don't say that simply to ensure that my editors don't drop me like a hot stone on the grounds that I'm not sufficiently fawning, although it would be nice if they didn't drop me, and I can be more fawning if that helps. Like many authors who are published on both sides of the Atlantic, I have two editors. When I finish a book, I send the manuscript to both of them on the same day, then wait for their responses. Usually, one will reply sooner than the other, but eventually I'll have the responses from both. Curiously, they're never the same. I don't mean that one may like a book while the other doesn't: that's never happened, thankfully. Instead, one will spot weaknesses, or suggest small changes, in areas that have not troubled the other editor at all, and vice versa. By and large, I think that I've only declined to follow one or two editorial suggestions over my entire career, as they tend to be eminently sensible.
I'd like to think that I help my cause by not delivering a book until it has been rewritten a number of times, a hangover from my time in journalism. Then, if a piece was handed back to you for changes, it was because you'd done something wrong, and it was a badge of shame, like getting lots of red marks on your homework. By the time the book goes to my editors, and my agent, I've usually reached the point where there are few major alterations that I feel can be made to it. Actually, this only lasts as long as it takes for the manuscript to arrive in London and New York, as by that time I've had a day or so to think about it and have already started making further alterations, on the grounds that a book is never finished. What I'm saying, I guess, is that the relationship with my editors is not adversarial in any way. Oh, I want them to have to make as few changes to my deathless prose as possible, largely on the basis of the homework analogy used earlier, but I'm quite happy to have my work improved by them, especially as it's still my name on the cover, and readers will then assume that I'm brilliant all by myself instead of, in reality, not being terribly bright but being ably supported by some very bright people.
Thinking about THE GATES, it was one of my editors who suggested that the demons should be a little more threatening at some point. In my manuscript, they were largely inept, with the exception of Mrs Abernathy, the chief villain. It was my agent and my principal foreign rights agent who suggested altering the footnotes in the main chapter so that they were integrated more fully into the main body of the text, which, visually, made a lot of sense. My agent, too, wanted more made of the relationship between Sam and Nurd, and he was right about that as well. Mind you, those suggestions come in the form of a single line. "Why don't we have more of Sam and Nurd?", my agent might say. "Brilliant", I think, followed by, "Hang on, how do I do that?" I then spend a couple of days fretting about it, dismissing it as impossible, or so difficult as to be nearly impossible, before sitting down and just getting on with it. Rarely will I ask my editors or my agent HOW something might be done. They make a suggestion, and then I figure out how to make it work. After all, it's my book, and I'm the writer. Often, what seems quite hard to achieve when first raised in an editorial letter can usually be achieved quite easily by a bit of tweaking, but despite having written twelve books now, I still get that anxiety attack when I'm asked to make a general change to the text, rather than a specific change to a line or word.
I wonder, too, if the fact that I write up, not down, is a help. By that I mean that my first draft tends to be short, the second draft a little longer, and so on until the book is ready to be sent. I write by accretion, so the chances are pretty slim of of me delivering, say, a book like THE STAND to which, some years later, I might choose to restore 200 pages of cut text. There is very little pruning done to my books. It's just not the way that they're written.
For now, though, I'm between edits. THE GATES, to which I was making changes right up until production, is done. THE WHISPERERS is on one of the early drafts, and it will be December before my editors see it. At this stage, I am my own editor, and I'd like to think that I've written enough books by now to be able to spot when something is drastically wrong, and correct it before it has to be pointed out to me.
I'd like to think that, but I suspect my editors will prove me wrong.
This week John read:
BAD BOY DRIVE by Robert Sellers
and listened to:
TAMPER by Jim O Rourke
LATE NIGHT TALES by Air
SING ALONG TO SONGS YOU DON'T KNOW by Múm
Monday, August 31, 2009
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
OF MAINE, AND MOVIES, AND 'THE NEW DAUGHTER'
Greetings from Maine, where I am currently sequestered in an effort to get some writing done. The word‘sequestered’ is carefully chosen, as I’ve largely cut myself off from human contact: I don’t have an answering machine switched on, and I’m generally ignoring e-mails that don’t come from my editors or my agent with exclamation marks appended to them, and warnings that my contract/home/ life may be in danger if I don’t answer.
I’m working on THE WHISPERERS, the next Parker novel, and trying to make up for the time that I spent writing THE GATES. In a sense, THE GATES was an indulgence: it wasn’t part of a contract, and there was no guarantee that my editors would like it, but it was a book that I desperately wanted to write. Now I’m paying for the time I spent writing it, to some degree. I’ve holed myself up in Maine, and set a target of 10,000 words over the next ten days to add to what is already done, even allowing for the fact that THE LOVERS is due to be published on day seven, with the three days after that devoted to signings.
The curious thing is that, less than three days into my stay here, I have 7000 words written, mainly because I have no routine beyond that which I set myself, and no immediate obligations to other people. It’s selfishness, admittedly, bordering on rudeness, but necessary selfishness, and it brings with it a certain amount of annoyance to other people, particularly friends who might have anticipated some degree of contact. On the other hand, it does mean that when the mood strikes me to write beyond the day’s immediate target, I can do so without a trace of guilt. Ultimately, I need to get some writing done.
Take today, for example. Up in Brunswick, which is about a 30 mile drive from Portland, the Frontier Movie Theater was showing, for one day only, Alfred Hitchcock’s TORN CURTAIN. Now, TORN CURTAIN isn’t a great Hitchcock movie. To be absolutely fair, it’s a bit of a misfire, although it does have one brilliant, excruciating murder scene. No Hitchcock movie is entirely bad and, anyway, how often does one get the chance to see one of his films on the big screen? I was sitting in the parking lot out at the mall, having stocked up on supplies, when I began to think about THE WHISPERERS. I’d written about 1500 words that morning, but I knew where I was going with the plot, and there was a coffee shop across the street that offered bottomless cups of coffee. So, instead of heading out to Brunswick, I sat down in the coffee shop, took out my laptop, and began writing. Admittedly, the coffee shop didn’t make much money from my presence there, but 1500 words eventually became just over 3000, and I didn’t feel guilty as I ate a quiet dinner over a book in a restaurant that night.
A digression: I seem to be having a vintage movie week. In New York last weekend, Robert Vaughn, the last surviving member of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, was introducing a screening at Lincoln Center as part of a festival of Steve McQueen movies, and I went along. I sat two rows behind Vaughn, who was gracious and funny in his introduction, and found myself watching his responses to a movie that he claimed not to have seen in many decades. As I did so, I wondered at how it must feel to be watching the ghosts of these men that he had known flicker upon the screen. There was McQueen, stealing the movie by constantly performing bits of business whenever the camera was on him, even at the risk of upstaging and antagonizing its nominal star, Yul Brynner. Rarely can a movie have provided so many stars of the future–McQueen, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Vaughn–with such iconic roles. Even Brad Dexter, the forgotten member (ask any pub quiz team to name the original Seven, and Dexter is the one with whom its members will generally struggle), shines, and I felt a particular pang at the sight of Horst Buchholz, brimful of energy and bravado. I thought, too, that I saw Vaughn respond to the sight of the young actor, now, like all the others, gone from this life, yet still with this enduring memorial to him in his prime. The audience applauded when Vaughn’s character, a gunman tormented by the fear of death, eventually overcomes his dread and kicks in the doorway of a makeshift prison cell, gun blazing, to rescue the farmers imprisoned within. There is a unique joy to be gained from the communal experience of watching a classic movie in a theater, surrounded by people who feel nothing but love for the movie and its stars. I imagine that the experience was very moving for Vaughn; he was there not only in his own capacity, but as a representative of those who had gone before him.
Afterwards, I stayed on to watch another McQueen western, NEVADA SMITH, which I had never seen before. While by no means a bad movie, it seemed relatively minor after THE MAGINFICENT SEVEN, grim, and overlong, and one-paced. THE MAGINFICENT SEVEN is brilliant, NEVADA SMITH merely competent.
Such matters have been on my mind recently, for THE NEW DAUGHTER, the first movies to be made from my work, is nearing completion. Last week, John Travis, the movie’s very talented screenwriter, saw it for the first time in a small screening room, or at least saw 98 per cent of it, as the last fine-tuning is still being done.
John, who is a harsh judge of his own work, emerged hugely enthused. I’m sure that he won’t mind some of his comments being reproduced here:
It's an adult, very well acted and directed, beautifully shot movie with a real sense of dread the whole way through ...smart, well. In fact, it's almost a little Spanish.
Or
maybe it’s like David Cronenberg directed it. It's kind of like A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE, but with monsters instead mobsters...
I’m relieved, to be honest. I wanted it to be good, not only for my sake but for the sake of the people I met on the set of the film, all of whom were kind and talented and deeply committed to the work in hand. Furthermore, the film seems to be a throwback to an earlier era of movie-making, as it has been made without recourse to CGI. Instead it relies on make-up, and actors, and the use of light and shade. I’m looking forward to seeing it.
In the meantime, there’s THE WHISPERERS. Next Tuesday, June 2nd, THE LOVERS is published in the US. I have one TV interview to record this week, and then I leave Portland on a research trip. With luck, I will have the bones of THE WHISPERERS in place when I get back to the city.
Mind you, it still would have been nice to have seen TORN CURTAIN on a big screen...
This week John read
The Secret Speech by Tom Robb Smith
Men of Men by Wilbur Smith
Hundred Dollar Baby by Robert B. Parker
and listened to
Vecatimest by Grizzly Bear
Manners by Passion Pit
Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix by Phoenix
PS
Just a reminder that I'll be signing copies of THE LOVERS at The Great Lost Bear, Forest Avenue, Portland, Maine, from 7pm on Tuesday, June 2nd, the day of publication. Every book bought on the night will receive a special limited edition t-shirt, and will be specially stamped. Advance orders will also receive a t-shirt, as long as stocks last, and a stamp on the book. Further details are available from Books Etc at bookhappenings@gmail.com, or 1-207-781-3784. And check out more tour dates here.
I’m working on THE WHISPERERS, the next Parker novel, and trying to make up for the time that I spent writing THE GATES. In a sense, THE GATES was an indulgence: it wasn’t part of a contract, and there was no guarantee that my editors would like it, but it was a book that I desperately wanted to write. Now I’m paying for the time I spent writing it, to some degree. I’ve holed myself up in Maine, and set a target of 10,000 words over the next ten days to add to what is already done, even allowing for the fact that THE LOVERS is due to be published on day seven, with the three days after that devoted to signings.
The curious thing is that, less than three days into my stay here, I have 7000 words written, mainly because I have no routine beyond that which I set myself, and no immediate obligations to other people. It’s selfishness, admittedly, bordering on rudeness, but necessary selfishness, and it brings with it a certain amount of annoyance to other people, particularly friends who might have anticipated some degree of contact. On the other hand, it does mean that when the mood strikes me to write beyond the day’s immediate target, I can do so without a trace of guilt. Ultimately, I need to get some writing done.
Take today, for example. Up in Brunswick, which is about a 30 mile drive from Portland, the Frontier Movie Theater was showing, for one day only, Alfred Hitchcock’s TORN CURTAIN. Now, TORN CURTAIN isn’t a great Hitchcock movie. To be absolutely fair, it’s a bit of a misfire, although it does have one brilliant, excruciating murder scene. No Hitchcock movie is entirely bad and, anyway, how often does one get the chance to see one of his films on the big screen? I was sitting in the parking lot out at the mall, having stocked up on supplies, when I began to think about THE WHISPERERS. I’d written about 1500 words that morning, but I knew where I was going with the plot, and there was a coffee shop across the street that offered bottomless cups of coffee. So, instead of heading out to Brunswick, I sat down in the coffee shop, took out my laptop, and began writing. Admittedly, the coffee shop didn’t make much money from my presence there, but 1500 words eventually became just over 3000, and I didn’t feel guilty as I ate a quiet dinner over a book in a restaurant that night.
A digression: I seem to be having a vintage movie week. In New York last weekend, Robert Vaughn, the last surviving member of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, was introducing a screening at Lincoln Center as part of a festival of Steve McQueen movies, and I went along. I sat two rows behind Vaughn, who was gracious and funny in his introduction, and found myself watching his responses to a movie that he claimed not to have seen in many decades. As I did so, I wondered at how it must feel to be watching the ghosts of these men that he had known flicker upon the screen. There was McQueen, stealing the movie by constantly performing bits of business whenever the camera was on him, even at the risk of upstaging and antagonizing its nominal star, Yul Brynner. Rarely can a movie have provided so many stars of the future–McQueen, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Vaughn–with such iconic roles. Even Brad Dexter, the forgotten member (ask any pub quiz team to name the original Seven, and Dexter is the one with whom its members will generally struggle), shines, and I felt a particular pang at the sight of Horst Buchholz, brimful of energy and bravado. I thought, too, that I saw Vaughn respond to the sight of the young actor, now, like all the others, gone from this life, yet still with this enduring memorial to him in his prime. The audience applauded when Vaughn’s character, a gunman tormented by the fear of death, eventually overcomes his dread and kicks in the doorway of a makeshift prison cell, gun blazing, to rescue the farmers imprisoned within. There is a unique joy to be gained from the communal experience of watching a classic movie in a theater, surrounded by people who feel nothing but love for the movie and its stars. I imagine that the experience was very moving for Vaughn; he was there not only in his own capacity, but as a representative of those who had gone before him.
Afterwards, I stayed on to watch another McQueen western, NEVADA SMITH, which I had never seen before. While by no means a bad movie, it seemed relatively minor after THE MAGINFICENT SEVEN, grim, and overlong, and one-paced. THE MAGINFICENT SEVEN is brilliant, NEVADA SMITH merely competent.
Such matters have been on my mind recently, for THE NEW DAUGHTER, the first movies to be made from my work, is nearing completion. Last week, John Travis, the movie’s very talented screenwriter, saw it for the first time in a small screening room, or at least saw 98 per cent of it, as the last fine-tuning is still being done.
John, who is a harsh judge of his own work, emerged hugely enthused. I’m sure that he won’t mind some of his comments being reproduced here:
It's an adult, very well acted and directed, beautifully shot movie with a real sense of dread the whole way through ...smart, well. In fact, it's almost a little Spanish.
Or
maybe it’s like David Cronenberg directed it. It's kind of like A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE, but with monsters instead mobsters...
I’m relieved, to be honest. I wanted it to be good, not only for my sake but for the sake of the people I met on the set of the film, all of whom were kind and talented and deeply committed to the work in hand. Furthermore, the film seems to be a throwback to an earlier era of movie-making, as it has been made without recourse to CGI. Instead it relies on make-up, and actors, and the use of light and shade. I’m looking forward to seeing it.
In the meantime, there’s THE WHISPERERS. Next Tuesday, June 2nd, THE LOVERS is published in the US. I have one TV interview to record this week, and then I leave Portland on a research trip. With luck, I will have the bones of THE WHISPERERS in place when I get back to the city.
Mind you, it still would have been nice to have seen TORN CURTAIN on a big screen...
This week John read
The Secret Speech by Tom Robb Smith
Men of Men by Wilbur Smith
Hundred Dollar Baby by Robert B. Parker
and listened to
Vecatimest by Grizzly Bear
Manners by Passion Pit
Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix by Phoenix
PS
Just a reminder that I'll be signing copies of THE LOVERS at The Great Lost Bear, Forest Avenue, Portland, Maine, from 7pm on Tuesday, June 2nd, the day of publication. Every book bought on the night will receive a special limited edition t-shirt, and will be specially stamped. Advance orders will also receive a t-shirt, as long as stocks last, and a stamp on the book. Further details are available from Books Etc at bookhappenings@gmail.com, or 1-207-781-3784. And check out more tour dates here.
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