I just sent off the fourth round of edits for my second fantasy novel (upcoming from Samhain press). It really got me thinking. With an understanding (insistent but not demanding) prompt, or two, or ten, my editor got me to see some weakness in my writing. In fact some pretty serious, repetitive weaknesses. To be honest I doubt I would have faced up to some of these issues without some outside and somewhat authoritative input.
It got me wondering, how do you get that when you self-publish?
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I have a couple of people who read my stuff for flavor -- one of them is not a published author, but the other is (albeit on a small scale), and they usually have a lot of positive feedback. For the most part I'm pretty merciless with my own copy, though -- a habit I developed in my day job.
Well, some self-published folks don't get that, and it shows.
Others, notably those with goals of getting bigger publishing deals, find a way. I recently joined a writers' group for just that reason.
Working with writing groups, having more than just a family member review the book - and if necessary paying someone to edit it. I find it a lot easier to get people to review/edit my book if I give them a rough draft printed like a normal book, versus a three ring binder of 200 letter sized pages. I review it myself at least twice before bothering to hand it off to anyone else, to try to eliminate the obvious errors. And there are always errors!
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