HELLO!

Welcome to Chapter Five of The Happy Book. In this chapter, I'll be welcoming friend and author and editor extraordinaire, Irma Gold. We'll be chatting about the editing process-how to edit your own work, how to work with an editor in a publishing house, and thoughts on hiring an editor.

Irma will have priceless tips from her decades of editing experience, and between the two of us, there may or may not be some grammar Nazi stuff going on! You're going to learn A LOT.

Fire up your device, cram in those earbuds and enjoy this foray into the magical world of kids' book creation. If you have any questions or comments, you can say hello at [email protected].

I'm Tania McCartney and I'm an author, illustrator and editor of children's books. I've always wanted to live inside a book, and now I practically do. Welcome to The Happy Book.

GUEST - IRMA GOLD

Irma Gold is an award-winning author and editor of books for adults and children. Her short fiction has been widely published in anthologies and Australia's best literary journals. She is also the author of a collection of short fiction called Two Steps Forward, and three picture books. A fourth picture book, Seree's Story, is in the works with Walker Books. Her recently completed literary fiction novel won the Writing NSW Varuna Fellowship and was awarded both CAPO and artsACT development grants. Irma has worked as an editor for almost 20 years and in 2014 was awarded a special one-off award for Outstanding Service to Writing and Publishing in the ACT and Region. She is currently Convener of Editing at the University of Canberra and Ambassador for the Chief Minister's Reading Challenge.

SHOW NOTES

00:35 Introduction

01:36 About Irma

02:25 A cup of dandelion coffee and an Earl Grey tea

03:33 How Irma began her editing journey

06:02 Irma's current editing roles

07:48 Editing between several genres

08:37 Irma's favourite genre

09:03 Are there texts that are uneditable?

10:30 What does Irma most love about the editing process?

12:12 So many people create a book, not just the author

13:10 The difference between structural editing, copy editing, proofreading

15:03 Editing a picture book

16:42 Not wanting an editor to 'change' your work

18:10 The editor/author relationship is a dialogue

18:34 The editor's role is not to tell you what to do

19:22 What happens at the structural editing stage

20:42 The author/edit standoff-picking your battles

22:55 The author won't always be right, the editor won't always be right

24:04 Should brand new authors hold their tongue on edits?

25:55 Emerging authors rejecting every single change

26:33 Voice

29:46 When an editor tries to rewrite your work

31:56 What punctuation and grammar mistakes do authors make over and over again?

33:47 Manuscripts with structural issues: prepping to send to a publisher

35:22 The importance of reading in learning how to write

37:18 How are picture books edited?

39:06 Are picture books easy to write?

40:37 There's a big difference between a story and an account

41:22 Picture book resolution

42:20 Should writers edit as they go?

44:50 Writing is a process of discovery

45:46 How does an author know when to stop self-editing?

47:11 Showing your manuscript to too many people

48:18 Advice on working well with an editor

50:28 Editing for the market

52:24 Subjectivity in editing/manuscript assessments

55:55 Editing and proofreading courses

57:15 What does a typical day look like for Irma?

59:51 What's...