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WHAT I MEAN TO BLOG

What an Interior Designer Taught Me About Humanism in Editing

24/5/2022

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A book with a blue hardback cover and two small glass vases with round, yellow flowers in them sit on an end table with a dark brown, circular tabletop. To the right of the table, part of a sofa with blue patterned upholstery is in frame, including an arm and a square cushion.
Photo by Kari Shea on Unsplash
I recently started watching the Netflix documentary series Abstract: The Art of Design, and I am enthralled. Each episode in the series focuses on a designer who is innovative in their field – costuming, bio-architecture, toys, even typesetting (I haven’t gotten to that last one yet, but I suspect it will be relevant to my interests). I started with the episode on interior design because I’ve often wanted to learn more about what makes a room feel comfortable rather than cold and bare or cluttered and claustrophobic. I was even more inspired than I expected to be, and I was surprised by how many of the insights also apply to my editing practice.

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Editing erotica: my interview with author Nicholas Tanek

22/12/2018

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This week I was interviewed by the lovely Nicholas Tanek of Your Kinky Friends. We talk about writing and editing erotica, unsexy words for body parts, Fifty Shades Of Grey, Story Of O, representation of kink and non-traditional relationships in literature, and more.
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The content is NSFW (unless your work is like mine, that is!).

Check it out at: http://yourkinkyfriends.com/2018/12/20/mayaberger/
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Making the Case for Diversity When Editing Fiction

24/10/2016

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Imagine that you're editing a novel, merrily making your way through a story that you quite like. It has memorable characters, an engaging and well-paced story, beautifully described settings, and is altogether an enjoyable read. But something about the story feels tiresome, and at first you can't quite pinpoint what it is. You look over your character notes, and somehow you feel a certain narrowness of perspective from the characters, as fleshed out and distinct as they are. Then it hits you: this is a story about white guys.

I'm hardly the first person to bang the drum for more diversity in literature, and in recent years there has been wider recognition of the value of hearing different stories from different types of people with different perspectives. Some people may still miss the point and kvetch about 'heavy-handed message fic' taking over genres like science fiction and fantasy, but with thankfully little credibility.

Perhaps this is why I feel disappointed when an otherwise good story is populated with a cast of cisgendered, heterosexual, able-bodied, white, male-identified characters. Sure, it may have a couple of characters who don't fit that profile as love interests or to help or hinder the white guys in their adventures, but ultimately the stories are not theirs. We've all heard this complaint before, and as readers the only way we can encourage diversity in literature is with our wallets.

As an editor, however—and especially as an editor who works with independent authors—it's my job to help shape the story (and not just in a postmodern 'Death of the Author' kind of way) before it reaches the general public. The question then becomes one of remit: I am the editor of this story, not the author. Ultimately the author has the final say over the content of their text, and a story about a white guy may be the story that they want to tell. Of course, anyone wishing to write that kind of story—and anyone wishing to read it—is perfectly welcome to do so. To mangle a phrase: some of my favourite literary characters are white guys. My job is not to tell authors that they can't, or shouldn't, write about white men.

My job is to make each text as clear and appealing to its intended audience as possible. And if I'm doing developmental or structural editing on a work of fiction then that job can include tactfully querying whether it's vital to the story that all the cis, het, able-bodied white dudes possess all of those characteristics. I might mention the fact that their story could attract a wider readership if more readers saw themselves represented in it, and I might point out that their work is more likely to stand out if it's not confined to an over-saturated market of white-guy stories.

But the best reason to write greater diversity into a story, in my opinion, is that it reflects the diversity of the real world. Even if your story is set on another planet or in a fantastical universe, your readers are right here and they have to live in the world as it is, with all its diversity. Fiction can let each of them tell their stories.
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