The Editor’s Notebook
Notes on Story, Structure, and the Craft of Editing
The Editor’s Notebook is a collection of essays drawn from more than twenty-five years of editorial experience - observations on narrative architecture, character, dialogue, revision, and the choices that shape a story.
Some explore the principles behind developmental editing. Others look closely at books, films, screenplays, and other narrative works to examine craft in practice. Together, they reflect a way of reading developed over decades: looking beyond what a story is doing to understand how - and why - it works.
Character
Essays exploring how characters reveal, challenge, misunderstand, and reshape one another - and how their relationships give a story its emotional and narrative architecture.
The Craft of Editing
Reflections on the judgment, pattern recognition, curiosity, and accumulated experience behind developmental editing -and the craft of learning to see what a story needs.
Stories in Practice
Close readings of books, films, screenplays, and other narrative works, examining the choices beneath finished stories and what they reveal about character, structure, dialogue, and craft.