When To Re-Write for an Agent - And When Not

An agent likes your 3 chapters and synopsis and asks to see more. Heart pounding, you send the whole thing out. They love it! Cue champagne...until they ask for some re-writes.

It's YOUR book.

Firstly, you need to judge the scale of what they want changing. Is it small stuff? Or big changes? Will it impinge on the theme or tone of the book? Do you understand the reasoning behind the change?

It's YOUR book.

I made major plot changes to one of my books to make a US sale. I'm not sure that it's better - the change makes the tone different - but I understood why they wanted it changed, and it didn't impinge on the important stuff of theme and meaning. I was happy-ish to make the changes (and very happy to cash the cheques).

It's YOUR book.

But what if you're not yet at that stage, and it's an agent who is wanting changes. I think it still applies: you have to understand what they see as the problem that needs to be solved. If you don't understand what that is, you won't be able to re-write convincingly. You also have to believe and agree that the 'problem' needs solving. If you don't, you won't be able to re-write with any conviction. Re-writing without conviction leads to unsatisfactory writing, and disillusionment and demoralisation.

It's YOUR book.

Re-writing just to please someone else is doomed to failure. In my opinion, if you don't understand why they want changes or you don't agree with their reasons, then you have to question whether they are a good match for you. You have to write from the heart, or it's no good. Your agent really has to believe in you, or they won't be able to convey that to someone else.

It's YOUR book.

However, if you do understand their reasons for wanting changes and think they're good, then go ahead and re-write. In my experience, re-writing when the author understands the perceived problems means a stronger more confident second draft.

It's YOUR book.

The main thing is that if you don't understand, or don't like the direction you're being steered to, then don't re-write. You're not a puppet performing for others, and you don't have to be represented by anyone. Nowadays, you don't need an agent or a publisher to see your work made available around the world. And above all, never forget that it's not their book and you ultimately call the shots because - and don't you forget it -

It's YOUR book.

What To Do If You Lose Your Work

Yesterday I heard on the radio a news story about a blind woman who wrote longhand 26 pages without realising her pen had run out of ink and a kindly forensics officer spent 5 months of lunch hour time deciphering the indentations on the paper to give the woman a transcript.

In the papers the woman, Trish Vickers, is reported as saying "I could remember the gist of what I had written but there was no way I could have written exactly the same way again."

I'm very pleased for her that she has retrieved her work but, in my experience, work always improves when you re-write it from scratch. It would mean less work if you kept the same manuscript and tinkered around the edges (and believe me I'm all for anything that involves less work) but first drafts often need such extensive re-writing that it's best to start again.

That may of course be just my work, and I admit I write very sloppy first drafts, but there's nothing I've done that hasn't been improved by a re-write, and I've seen enough student versions of the same piece to know that re-writes always improve it.

Putting the original draft to one side and starting again is actually liberating. You have confidence and knowledge about the scene because you've written it once before, but now your memory chooses the best bits, the heart of the story, and you end up with something that's much much better than before.

I appreciate that I'm sighted and it's not as easy for Ms Vickers to produce work, but I can't help but think she'd have been better off re-writing those 26 pages.

Problems with Solutions

Something that happens when I'm workshopping someone else's work is when I see a problem and raise it with the author they say something like X has to happen because of Y. Or this character has to behave like that because later on they're going to do B.

I've been in this position as the author getting feedback and what I've discovered is that often the 'problem' was once a solution.

What happens to me is this. I'm writing, and I get stuck. I need to make a decision about something. It might be an event or a characteristic or situation, whatever - it needs to be fixed before I can move on. So I come up with a solution, it seems to work, so I carry on writing.

Aaaages later, and I've finished the draft. I get feedback, and the feedback says they don't like that solution. But, I whine. But it's got to be like that because of X so I can't possibly change it. The person giving feedback will usually back off at this stage and go on with doing more useful things while I do a little light sulking before getting back to work and sorting out the problem.

In A Single to Rome, for example, Natalie wasn't a lawyer for several drafts, she was in marketing because at the time of writing the first draft I didn't know what she did, and randomly picked that career because I know a little bit about it. I clung onto marketing for ages, before I realised it wasn't working and changed it. Once I'd changed Natalie's job lots of other things fell into place and I had one of those whoopee! light bulb moments that make writing worthwhile and the next draft was easy peasy to write.

I've learned enough to know that nothing should be sacred. If it isn't working, it isn't working and it doesn't matter what it is, it has to go. All plots can be re-arranged, and just because something was a solution once it doesn't automatically follow that it's a solution now.

So, if you ever find yourself saying, I can't change X because of Y, pause, rewind, and ask yourself "Has a solution become a problem?" And then look and see how you can fix it.

Killing Your Darlings

I knew my first novel was a work of genius. It was obvious. So it was a bit disconcerting when my MA tutor suggested that, while writing it had been a good learning curve, it was time to put that book to one side and start another. Even more disconcerting was the experience of sending it out to agents. My sample chapters returned so fast the envelopes had scorch marks down the side.

I tried sending the novel to a book doctor. But when the report came they too didn't think it was a work of genius.  Humph - whoever wrote that report was clearly an idiot and their opinion was not worth considering. 

Rejection hurt.  A lot.  But above the pain of rejection I was genuinely baffled. How could they not spot the gloriously wonderfulness that was my novel?  I sulked. I sulked for six months. And through my grand sulking the notion gradually percolated - perhaps the novel wasn't so great after all.

I looked again at the book doctor's report. They'd seen a problem and suggested a solution that seemed complete madness. It was still a daft solution, in my opinion, but perhaps the problem they'd spotted concerning the four viewpoint characters had some validity. They wanted three of those viewpoints given more strength.  I knew that solution was wrong.  It was obviously wrong!  But how to deal with it?

I sulked a bit more. And then I came up with my own solution: what had been written from four viewpoints should be changed to a single viewpoint because, in truth, I was only interested in one of the stories I had interwoven. But that meant cutting about 50% of what I'd already written. I did some more sulking, and then went and sharpened my axe.

I lost 90% in the end, but once I'd made the decision to go for wholesale slaughter the process wasn't that bad. In fact, it was almost enjoyable. I knew the book wasn't a work of genius as if had been before, but I suspected I might have something publishable.  

The result? Well, when I sent the novel out again it took 36 hours from slipping the ms into the letterbox to have my first offer from an agent. Others followed, along with the publishing deal.  That book ended up being published around the world. 

Which only goes to show: sometimes mass murder is the right thing to do.

Self-Correction for Writers

My daughter bought a horse last year, an 8 year old, 16hh bay Arab.  She's hoping to train him in dressage, and has been taking lessons from one of the scariest women on the planet.  Occasionally I've sat in on the lessons - I say sit, but actually I'm bolt upright and watching my diagonals, such is my obedience to this woman with a dressage whip even though I am neither a horse nor a rider.  

One of the terms the teacher uses is self-correction.  This is when the rider learns to correct themselves.  It's essential because the horse needs training every day, and obviously the teacher can't be there watching at each session.  

I think the concept of self-correction is a useful one for a writer.  As I'm writing this blog post I'm constantly tweaking, choosing a different word, selecting a better verb for example or correcting my grammar, making it better, or clearer, or more effective all the time (I hope).  

It's second nature to me - I've been a professional writer for over twenty years.  If this were my creative writing, rather than a blog post, I'd be doing the same.  And then I'd write a second draft with more self-correction, and then probably a third.  At that point I show it to my outside readers.  

But our first reader is ourselves, and the more we learn to self-correct the easier the transition process will be from idea to page to readable page.  

Being a Flexible Friend to Your Writing

I whiled away a few minutes the other day looking at an old piece of writing and counting the number of structural errors in it.  It had begun from a writing exercise I'd been set in the writing class I used to go to.  We were given the beginning half of an opening sentence and had to take it from there.  I had done, and made a nice little story from it.  

The trouble was my starting sentence came pretty close to the end of the chronological story, so much of it had to be done in flashback, and worse, flashbacks within flashback.  (Shock horror!  Yes, the woman on a mission to eradicate flashback from prose was once an offender.) It made it hard to follow what exactly was going on on the first couple of pages.  I vaguely remember being aware of that, and trying to signpost exactly where the reader was in the story.

It never occurred to me to change where I'd started.  And yet, why was I so wedded to that opening sentence?  The first words of it weren't even mine.  It was because my writing mind lacked flexibility.  The story started there because that was where it had started in the writing class exercise and that was that.  

First draft writing is about getting those initial ideas down.  Re-writing is about being flexible.  Why shouldn't this bit go there, rather than stay where it is?  Does John have to be an engineer?  Could John be Joanna?  What if Rover the dog was a cat called Pushkin? What if we set this scene in a fish market instead of a tea shop? Does the story need John/Joanna at all?  

We get hooked on the initial ideas and images that inspire us to write and become rigid when change is mentioned.  But writers need to be flexible when it comes to looking at our work a second time.  I like the opening line of my old short story.  It's a good one.  But it screws up the rest of the story telling and then I lacked the flexibility to change.  

Now I try to write with as much flexibility as possible.  Everything is up for change, depending on the demands of the story.  I try to keep the writing as fluid as possible until the last moment, which means I have moments of despair as I survey the utter mess that is my novel. But I remember the fable about the sapling, that can bend with the storm, growing next to the mighty but rigid oak, that topples in the wind.  Flexibility is good.

Cherry Cake Pacing

On the few occasions I’ve made a cherry cake I’ve carefully followed all the instructions, stirred in my glace cherries (full of E numbers, but stickily delicious), carefully spooned the mixture into the cake tin, then popped it in the oven. Half an hour or so later the cake is ready. Then the first slice…and all the cherries have ended up in one glutinous lump at the bottom. It’s a bit like pacing a novel. The best scenes – the cherries – need to be distributed evenly throughout. The easiest way to check your novel for pacing is to use index cards, one scene per card. 

Start with a big table or a clear floor. Draw a few imaginary lines, one for normal, one for exciting, one for incredibly dramatic. Now lay the cards out scene by scene, according to where you think they are on the scale (depending on your novel, the scale may be normal: scary: scariest, or normal: emotional: tempestuous, etc). When you done the lot, step back. Ideally the novel should follow the line of a series of hills and valleys, with the hills getting higher as the novel reaches The End. Of course, not every novel follows this plan – The Lovely Bones is one best-selling exception – but it’s a good one to aim for. 

It’s about pace: readers need the contrast in fast and slow, between the heights and the depths, with the ordinary stuff connecting the best scenes like cake mix. If your cherries are clumped into a sticky mess, then spread them out. In cake making the answer is to dredge the cherries with flour before dropping them into the mix. For novels, the answer is some dismantling and rearranging. I love this bit. The hard slog of the first draft is over, and now it’s like cooking: necessity, pleasure and craft are all mixed up together and the result is…mmmmm.

(Another one from the archives...)

Re-Write? Or Write Another?

So your manuscript has gone out, and come back more than several times.  You've had feedback from friends, fellow writers, possibly some comments from agents, perhaps a book doctor.  Do you re-write - AGAIN - or do you put it in the bottom drawer, and start another?  You know that persistence is key, but does that mean persistence with this novel, or persistence in getting on and writing another?

I think this is a very hard decision to make and it's one that only you can find the right answer to, but here are some pointers to help you along the way.

1.  Have you put the manuscript away so you're coming to it fresh?

You need distance to work out what you're doing wrong.  The easiest way to get distance is to put your ms away for at least 4 weeks, more if you can bear it.  Up to you whether you start a new novel project in this time, but I'd definitely recommend writing something else.  

2.  Can you see what needs doing?

If the feedback you've already received doesn't make sense to you, then there's no point in fumbling around trying to rewrite.  You have to write with conviction; if you don't understand the fundamental problem you won't be able to correct it.  I'd be inclined to write something else in this situation and wait for time (and experience) to show you what wasn't working.

3.  Does what needs doing involve a lot of work?

I've been there.  I realised what needed doing would involve a major rewrite and put it off for several months because I didn't want to do the work before deciding to just Do It.  I've seen other people decide against re-writing because they didn't want to do all that work.  Your call, but I think if you understand what needs to be done, then it's a lot less work to fix that than it is to write another novel.  Plus you will learn a lot from the re-write, and maybe won't make the same mistakes again...

4.  How many times have you sent it out?

One of my writing friends has sent her novel out twice, and has had encouraging responses both times - but no acceptance.  She's now re-writing it, which I think is daft.  Another, even dafter friend hasn't even sent it out because she thinks it's not quite right yet, despite everyone telling her it's fine. (You know who you are - get on with it!)  I think you need to send it out at least 6 times before you can begin to judge where it stands in the market place.  Leave the novel alone until you've had that feedback, and get on with writing something else.

5. How much have you written before?

It always amazes me that people launch themselves into writing a novel with no previous writing experience, knock it off in a couple of months (or even weeks) and then think it's finished to a standard that someone else should give them thousands of pounds for it.  You wouldn't treat any other creative discipline in the same way, such as painting or pottery.  Get real!  Yes, it's possible you may have written a masterpiece without any previous experience, in the same way that buying one ticket might win you the Lottery jackpot, but it's not very likely.  And the chances are you won't understand why your work isn't up to the standard required which will lead to frustration.  Re-writing will teach you a lot, as will writing something new.  Going to classes, reading lots of novels (both in and outside your genre), joining a critique group will also teach you more about creative writing.  

There are plenty of successful novelists out there who wrote several novels before they got published - I personally know at least 4 novelists who are now doing very well who have 6 or more unpublished novels in their bottom drawer.  Writing something new worked for them. 

I was advised to treat Adultery for Beginners as a learning experience and start another novel.  I did an extreme re-write instead (in the end, about 90% was substantially re-written).  So extensive re-writing worked for me.

But - and this is the big but - I understood exactly what the problem was, and could see how I could fix it.  If you don't, writing another novel may be the learning experience you need.

Sometimes You Don't Write What You Think You've Written

I'm currently working on the second draft of a novel.  This book has been a bit of an uphill struggle, and I've done a lot of playing around with the characters and the structure (and I think there's much more to come).  

Anyway, my workshopping group read the first 25,000 words or so a while ago, and gave some feedback.  Their main point - agreed by all - was that my main male character was creepy.  'Yuck', I think was the overall verdict, accompanied by a shudder.  Of course I pretended that that was funny - ha ha ha ha ha, I chortled - but inside I was appalled. How could they think he was creepy?  He was utterly gorgeous and wonderful and seductive.  

Yesterday I started rewriting the bits where he appears and...shock! horror! - he's a creep!

How could I not have seen it?  It's been like going out with some bloke who you think is the love of your life, then he dumps you, you dissolve into a soggy, broken-hearted mess for a few weeks/months, then a year later you bump into him again and think - What was I thinking of?  How could I?  He's so short/fat/ugly/boring/miserable/creepy...

My eyes have been so opened to my character's creepiness that I've decided I can't rewrite his sections, I'll have to completely write those scenes afresh without looking at the first draft just in case his latent creepiness creeps in again.  It means lots of new work, which is a nuisance as I really want to get this novel moving along, but there it is.  

What I thought I'd written wasn't what I'd written.  It took a) feedback and b) time for me to see it for myself.  Sometimes you don't write what you think you've written, and that's just something a writer has to accept.  

How to Re-Write a Novel 5

And now it's on to the last stage of this lovely meal. The cutlery has disappeared and you're now going to add the finishing touches. Sometimes writing is perfectly OK, there's nothing technically wrong with it, but it can feel bland or dull - Janet and John writing, for those old enough to remember that reading scheme. I've written about adding Pzazz before, but this is it, your moment to check that your writing is as good as you can make it.

Look for opportunities to add colour and edge. It could be a bit of neat description or an amusing metaphor, a nifty bit of dialogue or a pacy bit of action. I go through my texts with a highlighter pen and mark all the bits I think add pzazz. There have to be at least 5 on each page and if not, I add some. Ideally, there are many more than that. They may be small, but the accumulated effect is of energy and colour. (I hope.) Here are a few of mine, all of which I know I added at this stage.

* He was wearing short sleeves, but the ghosts of leather patches circled his elbows like wreaths of pipe smoke

* A laugh dirty enough to plough

* Steve looked mildly surprised, not dissimilar in expression to a Hereford bull suppressing hiccups

* Dancing to the rhythm of the music (though not entirely with it), spiralling away like a drunken daddy-longlegs.

* A knife sat in an opened jar of peanut butter, like Excalibur waiting for King Arthur

Or you might need to up the pace by making a quick cut from one scene to another...

And then Briony split up from Jerry.

'To be honest, it's a relief more than anything else,' Briony said, apparently without a concern in the world, as they made their way through a group of French school children cluttering the pavement outside the Abbey. 'Jerry asked me if I was shagging Simon, and I said yes - was that a problem?'

As well as getting the pace going quickly it has the added advantage of some insider info - if you live in Bath you know all about parties of French schoolchildren cluttering the pavements.

And then when that's all done, sit back and bask in glory. And then get ready to send it out.

How to Re-Write a Novel IV

The previous re-writes were very much about getting the novel into its finished shape. Once I'm happy with the outside shape and feel, I'm now moving closer to the substance of the novel: the scenes. This is where the meat of the novel is.

Rather as I looked for problems with the novel's overall structure, I'm looking for problems with the scene as a whole - outside working in again.

* is it clear where and when the scene takes place (preferably contained within the first para)?

does the timing make sense, do people have long enough to go from A to B, or conversely, if A and B are close together, do they cover the ground quickly?

* are people active throughout or are there any bits when the characters are waiting for something to happen? Do I need to re-write to correct this?

* is it clear what the characters' attitudes are to each other, the location, the situation?

* are any patches of description too long? too wordy? too complicated?

* is there enough description of setting etc?

* if I have to describe a place or an action, is it easy to understand what's going on?

* are characters moving about, or are they static - worse, are they drinking tea? Could I move it to another location which would add a new dimension to the scene?

* if there is flashback, is it justified? Is it adding to the storytelling in an active way? Is there any way i could incorporate the information into the narrative?

* am I moving the story forward?

* is the scene anchored in reality or has it floated off?

* does the balance of white space to text work?

* is the scene too long or too short? Is there enough going on, or too much?

* does it end at the right place?

* would a reader want to read on?

* does the scene have the right pace, is there a good shape to it?

* does something happen? Or is it just events?

* are the characters plausible, consistent, believable, sympathetic? Would I like to spend time with them?

I go through every scene in this way and re-write until I feel I've dealt with all the queries, issues and problems. This may involve moving bits around, cutting and adding. That done, it's on to pudding...

How to Re-Write a Novel III

Now we're moving onto something with a bit more protein. I've decided roughly on the scene order and if there need to be any new scenes, or if some are being taken away, or combined. I'm now thinking about the characters.

The main character starts the process. I'm looking at their development - is it logical? Do they make any sudden jumps that are inconsistent? Have I explained where they're coming from? Do they have enough conflicts? Should I add another level of difficulty to their lives? They carry the story, so they need to be strong enough. If not, they need extra scenes to show how and why they're changing or behaving in the way they do.

I expect my main character will be present in all of the scenes as I usually write from a single viewpoint, but if I was writing from a multiple viewpoints I'd be checking that everyone their fair share of the story-telling. When I did this process with Adultery for Beginners, I discovered that one character dominated the story telling. I decided they deserved to take centre stage entirely and took out the other characters' viewpoints. This involved a serious rewrite - I eventually changed about 90% of the scenes. Painful, but necessary.

But even though I write from a single viewpoint, I want to make sure that the secondary characters have their own story. I don't want them to be just hanging around for the main character to show up, they need their own lives. For example, Lorna in Kissing Mr Wrongchanged to Briony in the subsequent drafts and got a life. She goes through her own development and her own story and her life has changed by the end of the novel. As a writer who is a former actor, I like to think that there aren't any duff roles in my books.

I'm also looking for gaps. In Nice Girls Do for example Anna goes up to London to stay with her boyfriend Oliver, who she's completely besotted by, and everything else gets left behind including the lovely Will who isn't mentioned for pages on end. Now it's reasonable for Anna not to think about Will as she throws herself into Oliver's luxurious lifestyle, but I didn't want the reader to forget him. So I had to add a couple of quick scenes to keep Will, if not physically around, then present in Anna and the reader's consciousness. You'd do the same thing if, for example, you had two main story lines but one of them was on the back-burner for a while.

By now the index cards are getting a bit messy. If I remember I use one colour initially, then use a different colour for added scenes. I staple scenes together if I'm going to combine them, make lots of notes, rewrite the card if it's getting v untidy. Finally I've got a stack of index cards that I'm happy with. At this point I re-write the novel from start to finish using the cards to guide me. When I started writing novels I needed to do this process several times. When I'm happy with the shape it's on to the next course.

How to Re-Write a Novel II

The first course is soup, a lovely liquid mass. It's contained within the bowl, but can flow anywhere. Look at the cutlery and choose the spoon furthest away from the plate - you're working from the outside inwards, remember.

The reason I say go outside inwards is it makes no difference how beautiful any individual sentence is, if the whole thing is wrong, if the story telling doesn't work, if there are problems with structure, then no one is ever going to read that perfect sentence. So, the story, the structure, the shape has to be right before you start fussing over adjectives and verbs.

At this stage I like to put the story down on index cards, one card per scene. On the card you write the setting, characters present, the purposes of the scene and the main action. This is one I wrote for an early draft of Another Woman's Husband.

Setting: Don't actually know! next page, B's house somewhere. Also, not dated.

Becca and Lily. Becca dreaming of Paul, Lily wanting to go out late clubbing. Frank rings, wants Becca to go round and help. NB Frank last mentioned/seen when? Pages ago.

And a couple from Kissing Mr Wrong...

Setting: Lorna's place. Dinner party. L's invited Marcus for Alex. Other people there NB should have been mentioned in opening scene. Skiing trip mentioned - Alex will need to find the money. Lorna offers her job in the gallery.

Setting: ????? Alex and Lorna. Alex talks about a) career, she's gone adrift b) Marcus as perfect man c) what to do about photograph. Lorna a) tells her M's going to Glasgow b) suggests Gus as possible re photograph

Obviously, as I was writing out my index cards I realised there were some problems which would need to be addressed should the scenes remain in the next draft and made notes accordingly. But that's for a future stage. Right now I'm checking that it's clear what the purposes are for each scene and how they move the story on.

When I've gone through the whole of the novel I've got a stack of index cards. I lay these out on the bed (I work a lot in bed). This is the easiest way to 'see' the novel as a whole. I'm looking for various things, all concerned with structure -

* is the 'shape' of the novel right, with exciting stuff happening throughout (the cherries - see earlier post)

* is there a good balance between active and reflective scenes (ie pace)

* do scenes flow ie have I set actions up

* are there any obvious holes - a character goes missing for a while, a plot strand is unresolved

* is the timing right? eg if someone becomes pregnant in Jan, do they have the baby in the autumn? At this stage I work out exactly when each scene takes place and note any bank holidays or other events that may affect the story.

I move scenes around, I add them, I take them away, I combine them. Anything. It's a fluid process (it's soup!). When I'm happy with the shape of it, it's on to the next course.

PS It's my birthday today!

How to Re-Write a Novel I

Have you ever been to a posh dinner and been presented with a vast array of silverware spreading in ranks either side of your plate? Re-writing is like dealing with all those forks and spoons without getting it wrong and spilling soup down your front, or using the butter-knife to eat your peas. The simple answer is to start from the outside and work your way in.

I'm a BIG fan of rewrites. I think the quality of the rewrites is the difference between getting published or not getting published. (I can hear the planners clattering away at their keyboards about to lay into me for wasting time and not being efficient enough to do a decent piece of work first time round but hey - this is my blog, right, and what I say goes.)

The first thing to do is put the book away for as long as you can manage. The longer you leave it, the more distance you have. The more distance you have, the more you read like a disinterested reader, and the more you're able to spot problems. There's what you think you wrote and there's what you actually wrote, and if you're too close you can't see if there's a gap.

When I did this on my first novel the gap was about four months, mainly because I was incensed that the world hadn't realised what a startling work of genius had just landed on their doorstep and turned it down. Cue metaphorical flouncing out of the room and mega sulks from me. When I did finally go back I was ready to concede that the world might have a point.

So imagine spreading your starched linen napkin across your lap, gearing up for the lovely meal ahead. You've been thinking about it for ages, you've got various ideas as to what you might expect to see but you're open to whatever turns up on your plate. You know it's going to take time to get through all the courses and you're ready for that. Psychologically you're prepared for it to take as long as it needs. Ready? First course coming up...

Editing in Action

My most recent novel - Kissing Mr Wrong - came back from the editor with the request that I 'looked again' at the opening scene. It's a big party scene, with two plot-important conversations (A and B) interspersed with an inconsequential - but I hoped, funny - interchange (X). So the scene went, intro, X A X B. The editor wanted for the X scenes to be joined, or cut, or moved, or in some way changed as she felt the flow wasn't right.

I started a long email explaining why I'd chosen that configuration. There needed to be a run up to conversation A, and you couldn't have A and B right next to each other, so X A X B was the absolutely perfect order. As I wrote my justification, I thought as a concession I'd try XAB, but that obviously didn't work. I tried A B - no, it definitely needed the X in-between. AXB was on the surface the straightforward choice, but that would mean rewriting the intro, rewriting the X interchange, writing a completely new run up to the A conversation. As I wrote explaining why my first choice had been the right one, I could feel this new scene in action, how it would flow.

I looked at my long, long email full of self-justification and realised: I didn't want to change the order simply because it meant more work. After a short bout of internal wrestling I deleted the email and wrote another, shorter one. You're quite right, I wrote to my editor. I'll do it.

And I did. And it was better.

Dinner Party Editing: Coffee and Petits Fours

And now it's on to the last stage of this lovely meal. The cutlery has disappeared and you're now going to add the finishing touches. Sometimes writing is perfectly OK, there's nothing technically wrong with it, but it can feel bland or dull - Janet and John writing, for those old enough to remember that reading scheme. I've written about adding Pzazz before, but this is it, your moment to check that your writing is as good as you can make it.

Look for opportunities to add colour and edge. It could be a bit of neat description or an amusing metaphor, a nifty bit of dialogue or a pacy bit of action. I go through my texts with a highlighter pen and mark all the bits I think add pzazz. There have to be at least 5 on each page and if not, I add some. Ideally, there are many more than that. They may be small, but the accumulated effect is of energy and colour. (I hope.) Here are a few of mine, all of which I know I added at this stage.

* He was wearing short sleeves, but the ghosts of leather patches circled his elbows like wreaths of pipe smoke

* A laugh dirty enough to plough

* Steve looked mildly surprised, not dissimilar in expression to a Hereford bull suppressing hiccups

* Dancing to the rhythm of the music (though not entirely with it), spiralling away like a drunken daddy-longlegs.

* A knife sat in an opened jar of peanut butter, like Excalibur waiting for King Arthur

Or you might need to up the pace by making a quick cut from one scene to another...

And then Briony split up from Jerry.

'To be honest, it's a relief more than anything else,' Briony said, apparently without a concern in the world, as they made their way through a group of French school children cluttering the pavement outside the Abbey. 'Jerry asked me if I was shagging Simon, and I said yes - was that a problem?'

As well as getting the pace going quickly it has the added advantage of some insider info - if you live in Bath you know all about parties of French schoolchildren cluttering the pavements.

And then when that's all done, sit back and bask in glory.

Dinner Party Editing: Pudding

And now we come to the bit that most people think of as re-writing, editing. This is the point when we examine every line and justify its place in the scene, and then having justified the line, we consider every word.

Reading out loud is a great help at this stage, checking that it reads smoothly. The big proviso is that you must read accurately - I notice that quite a few students read what they'd like to see rather than what is actually on the page. Words get cut, contractions are made which simply aren't there. (Contractions are things like I will becoming I'll - we do it in speech, but some people tend not to when writing. It depends on the writing style, but no contractions can make the writing appear very stilted.)

Two books I'd recommend at this point: The Elements of Style by Strunk and White, and Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Browne and King. I've got a long line-editing checklist that I hand out to students, and I might post some chunks of it at some stage when I'm feeling waspish but a simple version is...

* cliches (heavy heart, golden curls)

* autonomous body parts (her lips curved into a smile)

* active description

* strong verbs

* strong nouns rather than adjective plus weak noun ( a breeze rather than a light wind)

* check dialogue attributions

* be direct rather than passive

* use specific words

* name names and be consistent

* watch out for similar character names (I write as someone who once had Pat and Patrick in the same novel

* delete qualifiers - a little, very, just, kind of, sort of, quite, rather

* watch for repetition

* check grammar, spelling and punctuation

* vary paragraph and sentence length

* vary starting words (it's all too easy having a whole para filled with sentences beginning the same word)

* avoid unnecessary punctuation eg exclamation marks and italics, capital letters, underlining.

I could go on, but read the books and you'll come up with your own list.

If you're really lucky you have a nit-picky friend who'll happily edit your work. A friend like this will sometimes make you say 'thank you' through gritted teeth, but remember that you don't have to change anything and it stops you having to do as much work. Edit, edit, and edit some more until it feels like your eyes are going to fall out and go splat on the manuscript. But it will be worth it and soon pudding will be over and it's time for the last stage, coffee and petits fours.

Dinner Party Editing: Meat

The previous re-writes were very much about getting the novel into its finished shape. Once I'm happy with the outside shape and feel, I'm now moving closer to the substance of the novel: the scenes. This is where the meat of the novel is.

Rather as I looked for problems with the novel's overall structure, I'm looking for problems with the scene as a whole - outside working in again.

* is it clear where and when the scene takes place (preferably contained within the first para)?

does the timing make sense, do people have long enough to go from A to B, or conversely, if A and B are close together, do they cover the ground quickly?

* are people active throughout or are there any bits when the characters are waiting for something to happen? Do I need to re-write to correct this?

* is it clear what the characters' attitudes are to each other, the location, the situation?

* are any patches of description too long? too wordy? too complicated?

* is there enough description of setting etc?

* if I have to describe a place or an action, is it easy to understand what's going on?

* are characters moving about, or are they static - worse, are they drinking tea? Could I move it to another location which would add a new dimension to the scene?

* if there is flashback, is it justified? Is it adding to the storytelling in an active way? Is there any way i could incorporate the information into the narrative?

* am I moving the story forward?

* is the scene anchored in reality or has it floated off?

* does the balance of white space to text work?

* is the scene too long or too short? Is there enough going on, or too much?

* does it end at the right place?

* would a reader want to read on?

* does the scene have the right pace, is there a good shape to it?

* does something happen? Or is it just events?

* are the characters plausible, consistent, believable, sympathetic? Would I like to spend time with them?

I go through every scene in this way and re-write until I feel I've dealt with all the queries, issues and problems. This may involve moving bits around, cutting and adding. That done, it's on to pudding...

Dinner Party Editing: Fish

Now we're moving onto something with a bit more protein. I've decided roughly on the scene order and if there need to be any new scenes, or if some are being taken away, or combined. I'm now thinking about the characters.

The main character starts the process. I'm looking at their development - is it logical? Do they make any sudden jumps that are inconsistent? Have I explained where they're coming from? Do they have enough conflicts? Should I add another level of difficulty to their lives? They carry the story, so they need to be strong enough. If not, they need extra scenes to show how and why they're changing or behaving in the way they do.

I expect my main character will be present in all of the scenes as I usually write from a single viewpoint, but if I was writing from a multiple viewpoints I'd be checking that everyone their fair share of the story-telling. When I did this process with Adultery for Beginners, I discovered that one character dominated the story telling. I decided they deserved to take centre stage entirely and took out the other characters' viewpoints. This involved a serious rewrite - I eventually changed about 90% of the scenes. Painful, but necessary.

But even though I write from a single viewpoint, I want to make sure that the secondary characters have their own story. I don't want them to be just hanging around for the main character to show up, they need their own lives. For example, Lorna in Kissing Mr Wrongchanged to Briony in the subsequent drafts and got a life. She goes through her own development and her own story and her life has changed by the end of the novel. As a writer who is a former actor, I like to think that there aren't any duff roles in my books.

I'm also looking for gaps. In Nice Girls Do for example Anna goes up to London to stay with her boyfriend Oliver, who she's completely besotted by, and everything else gets left behind including the lovely Will who isn't mentioned for pages on end. Now it's reasonable for Anna not to think about Will as she throws herself into Oliver's luxurious lifestyle, but I didn't want the reader to forget him. So I had to add a couple of quick scenes to keep Will, if not physically around, then present in Anna and the reader's consciousness. You'd do the same thing if, for example, you had two main story lines but one of them was on the back-burner for a while.

By now the index cards are getting a bit messy. If I remember I use one colour initially, then use a different colour for added scenes. I staple scenes together if I'm going to combine them, make lots of notes, rewrite the card if it's getting v untidy. Finally I've got a stack of index cards that I'm happy with. At this point I re-write the novel from start to finish using the cards to guide me. When I started writing novels I needed to do this process several times. When I'm happy with the shape it's on to the next course.

Dinner Party Editing: Soup

The first course is soup, a lovely liquid mass. It's contained within the bowl, but can flow anywhere. Look at the cutlery and choose the spoon furthest away from the plate - you're working from the outside inwards, remember.

The reason I say go outside inwards is it makes no difference how beautiful any individual sentence is, if the whole thing is wrong, if the story telling doesn't work, if there are problems with structure, then no one is ever going to read that perfect sentence. So, the story, the structure, the shape has to be right before you start fussing over adjectives and verbs.

At this stage I like to put the story down on index cards, one card per scene. On the card you write the setting, characters present, the purposes of the scene and the main action. This is one I wrote for an early draft of Another Woman's Husband.

Setting: Don't actually know! next page, B's house somewhere. Also, not dated.

Becca and Lily. Becca dreaming of Paul, Lily wanting to go out late clubbing. Frank rings, wants Becca to go round and help. NB Frank last mentioned/seen when? Pages ago.

And a couple from Kissing Mr Wrong...

Setting: Lorna's place. Dinner party. L's invited Marcus for Alex. Other people there NB should have been mentioned in opening scene. Skiing trip mentioned - Alex will need to find the money. Lorna offers her job in the gallery.

Setting: ????? Alex and Lorna. Alex talks about a) career, she's gone adrift b) Marcus as perfect man c) what to do about photograph. Lorna a) tells her M's going to Glasgow b) suggests Gus as possible re photograph

Obviously, as I was writing out my index cards I realised there were some problems which would need to be addressed should the scenes remain in the next draft and made notes accordingly. But that's for a future stage. Right now I'm checking that it's clear what the purposes are for each scene and how they move the story on.

When I've gone through the whole of the novel I've got a stack of index cards. I lay these out on the bed (I work a lot in bed). This is the easiest way to 'see' the novel as a whole. I'm looking for various things, all concerned with structure -

* is the 'shape' of the novel right, with exciting stuff happening throughout (the cherries - see earlier post)

* is there a good balance between active and reflective scenes (ie pace)

* do scenes flow ie have I set actions up

* are there any obvious holes - a character goes missing for a while, a plot strand is unresolved

* is the timing right? eg if someone becomes pregnant in Jan, do they have the baby in the autumn? At this stage I work out exactly when each scene takes place and note any bank holidays or other events that may affect the story.

I move scenes around, I add them, I take them away, I combine them. Anything. It's a fluid process (it's soup!). When I'm happy with the shape of it, it's on to the next course.