Writing help

What To Look For Before You Edit

While lots of people have lots of different ways of editing, there are some general things to look out for before you move from one draft to the next, whether you're rewriting, revising, or somewhere in between. Because you should know what you're going to change before you start changing it, or your new draft won't be much better than your old one, or at least it'll take you significantly longer and significantly more effort to do it.
So here are some things to look for:

Inconsistencies —
There are a gazillion types of inconsistencies that you can have in your story. You can bring up a plot point and forget it. You can create a requirement that the characters do something and never have them do them. You can say that the world works a certain way and then have it work some other way. Or you can mix up a character name, a description, timing, locations, or (in my case) gender pronouns.

Plot —
You need to make sure to know what your plot should be, and make sure that what you wrote matches what you want it to say. More than that, though, you need to make sure that your plot actually make sense. This spans from overarching plot to small plot points. It can be small plot holes that sink your story as much as big ones.

Setting —
Your setting needs to be at least clear enough for the plot to be understandable. It also needs to match and enhance your plot instead of competing with it. Beyond that, you also need to make sure you don't spend the entire time just describing the setting, no matter how cool it is. Overall, your setting should avoid holes or logic gaps while also being as unobtrusive as possible.

Unnecessary characters —
This is more of an issue in short stories where you have less space for characters, but you should make sure that you actually need the characters you have. I wrote one story where I got to chapter 5, realized a character who was supposed to be important was actually totally useless and ignored him for the rest of the draft. Draft two, he's gone.

Timeline —
Does your timeline make sense? Do scenes follow after each other without obvious gaps? Do they feel like they overlap? Is your timeline consistent? Does your pacing work? Is there enough tension?

Characterization —
Does your characterization match what you want it to show? Are your characters bigoted? Is that intentional? Does their characterization match their background and their experiences? If not, why not? Does their personality change the way you want it to?

Relationships —
Are the relationships what you want them to be? If you say characters have a certain relationship, do you show it? Is there chemistry? Is there tension? Does the way the characters act towards each other reflect the relationships they have?

Grammatical and spelling mistakes