Book Rivers provides you with facilities to improve your draft by correcting erroneous beliefs and making words and sentences more explicit, more precise, and as useful as possible.

Thoughtful revision of work can lead to clarification of ideas, a reimagining of images, and sometimes, even a revolutionary rethinking of the way you’ve approached your topic.

The famous writer and mythologist, Neil Gaiman, opines that learning the art of editing your manuscript first draft, is an intricate, gradual process. In Gaiman’s view, editing gives the feeling that you knew what you were doing all along. It requires making sense of a hitherto abstract entity and bringing your work together to form a cohesive whole. It is imperative, hence, as a writer, to get not only your drafts but also hone your editorial skills. Of course, like any skill, it demands time, effort, and would develop over the years.

Nevertheless, there are some heuristics to be remembered while editing. It is advisable to give ample rest of your manuscript. Leave it to breathe and let its shortcomings present themselves to you. Stephen King, the best selling author, too, shelves his first draft for six months before commencing to review it. Next, one could eliminate verbosity by identifying fillers and unnecessary adjectives. That, it exits without saying, makes the text of the novel flow like a river down the mountain-stream. A scrupulous re-interpretation of the text shows misplaced commas. Rectifying problematic punctuations can fix the entire rhythm of the novel. All in all, it is essential to abstain from over-editing, lest the core or basic structure of your novel be lost.