Last week I turned in the revised manuscript of ABSENT FRIENDS. Turning a manuscript in means delivering it to my editor, in hard copy. My editor, for those who don't know the system -- this journal is meant as a primer on the book production process, after all -- works for my publisher (in this case, Bantam). (My agent, in contrast, works for me.)

The revisions were made based on my editor's notes. Some of these "notes" came to me verbally, in long discussions with her, and some in what's called an editorial letter. In the case of this book, I went through three rounds of revisions, the first two after meetings, where we discussed major issues involving the tone of the book, the major action, characters' motivations, etc. The third round came after I got her ed letter, which she wrote after a very close read of the revised ms. The ed letter came with a copy of the ms. in which she'd done what's called a line edit. That is, the letter contained her thoughts on large issues that she considered still unresolved after the two sets of revisions already done, and the ms. had more issues, large and small, on every page: words she wanted changed ("this verb is weak"),passages she wanted removed ("good, but not here: stops the momentum"), questions ("Why is he being so nice? He hates her -- let us see that!")

The process of working with an editor is delicate. On the one hand, no one knows better than the writer what the book was meant to be; on the other, the editor is a particularly experienced, focussed, and, in the case of my editor, talented reader. If the editor has a problem in a book -- with a word, a character's action, a whole chapter -- the writer might not like the editor's suggestion on how to fix it, but would always do well to pay attention to the fact that this element of the book gave a reader trouble.

I didn't, in my revisions, do everything my editor suggested. I didn't make her biggest revision, which we disagreed about, nor did I make some of her smaller ones. In almost all the places she wanted revisions, though, I tried to see what the problem was that had stopped her, and to make changes that kept the intent of the book intact while responding to the issue she'd brought up.

Now I wait to see what she thinks, and whether, as I think, the revision process is over.