The art of gently setting fire to your favourite sentences
There’s a dangerous myth among writers: once you type The End, angels descend, your laptop glows briefly, and a fully-formed novel plops into existence like a ready-assembled IKEA bookshelf. No extra screws. No leftover parts. No mysterious plank you swear wasn’t in the instructions.
This is, of course, a lie.
The End isn’t the finish line. It’s the moment the real work shows up, lights a cigarette, and says, “All right. Let’s see what you’ve done.”
Editing is where your book stops being your emotional support project and starts becoming a functional piece of narrative machinery. It’s also where many writers discover their magnum opus is less “polished novel” and more “ambitious pile of narrative compost.” This is normal. This is survivable. But it does require strategy.
Let’s talk about what editing actually asks of you.
1. Finish the Draft First
Don’t edit while drafting. That’s a trap. You’ll end up with a folder full of polished fragments that never become a book. The first draft’s only job is to exist. Let it be clumsy. You can’t fix what isn’t fully written.
Polishing Chapter One before Chapter Twenty-One exists isn’t refinement. It’s procrastination disguised as artistic genius. You buff one paragraph to a catastrophic shine while the rest of the book remains a vague, frightened rumor. Finish the ugly thing first. All of it. Especially the chapters that make you want to hide under the desk.
2. Edit in Layers, Not in a Panic
Trying to fix everything in one pass is like attempting a full home renovation during an earthquake. You jump from sentence rhythm to plot logic to typos to character motivation and get nowhere.
Edit in layers. Start with the big things first: structure, plot, character arcs, point of view. Then move on to scenes. Then language. Then polish and refinement. Otherwise, you’ll spend three hours perfecting a metaphor for a scene you’ll delete without ceremony. It’s like polishing a Chippendale antique chair before you’ve checked that it can support a human bottom.
3. Cut Before You Add
Your drafting self was generous. Your editing self must be brutal.
Most first drafts are padded with repeated emotions, explanations, and atmospheric throat-clearing. The same idea is introduced, reinforced, clarified, rephrased, and then gently beaten to death with a pillow.
When revising, don’t reach for the “add more” button. Cut first. If a paragraph doesn’t move plot, character, or tension, it isn’t sacred. It’s clutter with emotional attachment. You can honor its service. Then give it a quick burial.
4. Your Opening Is on Trial
Readers aren’t patient. They aren’t kind. They aren’t your mother.
They’ll give you roughly one page to prove you deserve the rest of their attention. Your opening has to raise a question, create instability, and promise a particular kind of story. It shouldn’t explain the geopolitical history of your invented empire, no matter how proud you are of it.
Backstory isn’t a hook. It’s furniture. Move it in only after the guests agree to stay. If your opening bores, annoys, or confuses, nothing else you do matters. You’ll have failed before you’ve even begun.
5. Kill Weak Verbs Without Mercy
Weak verbs don’t offend anyone. That’s the problem.
“Walked,” “looked,” “went,” “felt.” They’re like community theatre actors. They function, but they don’t perform. Strong verbs carry tone, intention, energy, and emotional context without needing an entourage of adverbs.
You don’t need to “walk slowly with hesitation” when you can simply creep. Precision reduces clutter. It also makes your prose feel like it knows where it’s going. Unlike most of us. And remember this. If a sentence drags in verbs that do nothing it’s like inviting a dull speaker to narrate a car chase. Painful and avoidable.
6. Every Scene Has to Want Something
Scenes without desire are just well-lit waiting rooms.
Every scene should have a character who wants something, something standing in their way, and a shift at the end—gain, loss, threat, discovery, complication. If no one wants anything, nothing resists, nothing changes, you’ve written tasteful narrative wallpaper.
Moments of rest matter. But even stillness should be shaped by pressure. Otherwise, you don’t have pacing. You have drift. And drift is what sends readers to Instagram instead of page ten.
7. Hunt Your Personal Tells
Every writer’s got a tic. It could be favourite words, phrases, rhythms, or little obsessions that sneak into every chapter like a drunk guest at a dinner party. Maybe it’s a repeated metaphor, an action, or a flourish you swore no one would notice.
Your job in editing is to hunt these down. Decide whether they actually serve the story, or just stroke your ego. If a sentence exists only to remind you how clever you are, it goes. Yes, even that one you wrote at 2 a.m. thinking you were channeling Hemingway. Editing’s about the book, not your personal literary karaoke session.
8. Let the Book Rest Before Final Judgment
Fresh eyes are brutally honest eyes. After weeks, or months, immersed in your own words, you’ve probably forgotten what the reader doesn’t know, what’s confusing, and what’s just bad. Step away. Let the book cool off.
When you come back, your beloved sentences will look less like gold and more like slightly suspicious chunks of toast. That’s the point. Distance reveals clutter, over-explained ideas, and sentences that were “fun” at 2AM but now scream, get out of my story. It’s nothing personal. Your book is just being honest.
9. Read for Momentum, Not Beauty
On at least one pass, forget pretty phrasing entirely. Read only for pacing, tension, and narrative drive. Does the plot sag? Does dialogue drag? Does the reader pause to check their phone for survival tips?
Beautiful sentences that slow down the story are like expensive shoes that pinch. They might look great in isolation, but they kill the flow. Keep momentum king. If the story drags, the reader drifts. No one remembers your clever line when they’ve stopped caring what happens next.
10. Trust the Reader More Than Yourself
You’ll want to explain everything, justify every choice, spell out every emotion. Don’t. Readers are smarter than you think. They’ll fill in gaps, connect dots, and infer intentions you didn’t bother to write down. Over-explaining kills curiosity.
Hint, don’t lecture. Suggest, don’t narrate. A sentence that teases invites the reader in. A paragraph that explains everything is a polite shove out the door. If they can guess the next step, fine. If they’re slightly afraid of what comes next, even better.
Editing: Where Fantasy & Physics Collide
Editing’s where your book stops being your personal diary in costume and becomes an object capable of surviving other people.
It’s hard. It’s often lonely, sometimes painful, and occasionally makes you question your life choices. But done well, it’s transformative. You’re no longer just your own cheerleader. You’re a merciless curator, a sculptor, a demolition crew with a red pen. You’re the person who makes sure the book readers finally hold in their hands isn’t a vague, frightened rumor—it’s the story you meant to write.
It’s where fantasy collides with physics. Where effort replaces enthusiasm. Where discipline quietly outperforms inspiration while inspiration pretends not to notice. You’ll cut things you loved. You’ll defend things you shouldn’t. You’ll briefly believe the book’s irreparably broken at least twice.
So finish first. Cut ruthlessly. Read aloud. Strengthen your verbs. Interrogate your scenes. Delete your darlings with formal apologies. Then step away long enough to forget what you were trying to prove.
When you return, the book will still be waiting.
Slightly embarrassed, but ready for work.
This essay is one of a collection of pieces documenting the bedlam involved in writing and self-publishing my ongoing genre fiction series, The Misjudgements of Andy MacKay, available on Amazon.