A few weeks ago, I typed 'The End' on next summer's DCI Warren Jones. As any published author will tell you, that's only the first step in a long journey between your Word document and the bookshelf.
I knew as I wrote it, that this would be a big first draft. The nature of the story was such that it had many individual components. Because I write out of sequence, I find it easier to write each component individually, and then stitch them all together at the end.
For that reason, I wasn't overly concerned when the word count surpassed 160,000. For comparison, my full-length novels are probably in the upper half of the genre's typical length, and their word count is between 120 and 130,000.
Getting rid of 25,000 words wasn't that hard. Writing each component separately meant there was a lot of easy to identify overlap, for example, scenes common to each part. I only need to describe them in detail once. Subsequent retellings can be pared down to a paragraph, or even just a mention that it took place. As previously described [TuesdayTips 27, 28, 29 & 30], some darlings needed to be killed. Other scenes that weren't strictly necessary for the plot, but gave good character development, were cut and saved for a later book.
But I still needed to trim at least 5,000 words. My beta-readers were really helpful here. They identified some repetitive phrases, found some more scenes that could be lost without impacting the story, and highlighted some overly verbose sentences.
I was now down to 133k.
Time to roll up my sleeves, save a new copy of the document, and start editing every sentence. But before I did that, I could easily remove some excess baggage.
Excising invisible words.
All writers have their own unique style. But within that, there are inevitably some bad habits. I will state with great confidence that even the world's greatest authors, famed for their beautiful prose, have at least some bad and sloppy writing habits that had to be fished out in the edits.
One of those habits is the over-use of certain words and phrases. We're all different, but we all do it. In these days of Find and Replace, it's not hard to find the eight uses of "misconception" scattered through the document and swap a few of them for other synonyms. But how do you know which words you over-use? Often these words are invisible to you; verbal ticks if you like. A good editor will probably notice some of them and tell you before your readers see the finished product, but why not get rid of them now? You may even trim the word count a little more!
There are a number of online tools that can help with this. All you do is copy your manuscript into a text box and the program will churn through and count every instance of a word. Some of the more sophisticated ones are capable of identifying phrases. I like https://countwordsfree.com/. For ease of use, I copied the output table into a spreadsheet, so I could play with it a little more.
The first couple of dozen words listed contain few surprises. In my books, "Warren" appears rather a lot (1154 times). But so do others, such as "have" (897), "with" (888), "they" (808), "from" (506) etc. There's not a lot you can do here.
But after that, there are other words that are less common and more likely to be a quirk of your own writing style.
For me, they would include "nonetheless" or "interjected".
I can find these easily and replace or delete them.
Then there are the really invisible words, and you'd be amazed how many are unnecessary. The word that shocked me most was "that".
It appeared a whopping 2,430 times in my document!
Of course, it's a very useful word. But it can also be a superfluous word.

"What happened when you told her that she was under arrest?"
"What happened when you told her she was under arrest?"

Would you notice the difference when reading, especially since it is in dialogue? You can't do a blanket edit and delete them all, but you'd be amazed how many you can excise.
I removed over 800 - that's one in three!
Even better, I found that revisiting those sentences to remove that, without screwing it up, identified other opportunities to tighten the prose. It took a couple of hours, but by the time I finished, the wordcount was reduced by about a 1,000.
A similar trick with "just" removed another 60.

There are other invisible words that can also disappear. For example the word "a". Now I'm not going to suggest that you identify every instance of "a" in your manuscript - there's a reason these tools have a filter for smaller words! But as you tighten a sentence, ask if it's necessary.
Here's one I tweaked recently.

"There were a lot of gaps that needed filling"
"There were lots of gaps that needed filling."

Swap the "a" as a standalone word, for an "s" on the end of lot, and you've lost another word!

What about "and"?
Can you replace it with commas? Can you join two sentences with a semicolon?
Although a chore, reducing word count is sometimes necessary to keep your publisher happy. It also has the added bonus that it can make the narrative more punchy, which is especially useful for fast-paced, thrilling scenes.
Caveat.
It's easy to get carried away (not too carried away, that's a tautology, so you don't need the word "too" 🤣). I go by the rule that my narrator can be as concise and efficient as needed, but that for dialogue, you need to consider how people would speak in real life.

Do you have any tricks or tips that you use to reduce your word count?
Feel free to comment below, or on social media.
All the best, Paul.

One of the fun things about writing a series is revisiting characters that you've written about before.
It's also one of the reasons that readers will return to an author (and why publishers love a series!). I have a number of favourite authors whose latest novels will always find their way into my shopping cart. In part, it's because they've proven to me in the past that they can tell a good story, but I am also keen to check in and see how my 'friends' are doing in their latest outing.
It's natural for a writer of a named series to assume that the person the series are named after is the one that readers will connect with the most and to expend the most creative effort in crafting this character. But that isn't always the case. I've written before about M.W. Craven's Washington Poe series - Poe is a terrific character, but there are a large number of readers for whom the most enjoyable parts of the books are those featuring his sidekick Tilly Bradshaw.
So for that reason, it's worth putting some thought into secondary characters beyond the main protagonist(s).

These recurring characters can be broadly divided into two groups.
Those that appear in each book and those that appear infrequently, when I need them.
Characters in every book.
For my DCI Warren Jones series, I have a regular cast of characters that appear in pretty much every book. Warren and his team at Middlesbury CID and his immediate family are series staples. Therefore, it's worth putting some time into these characters. Don't simply make them a foil for your lead, give them personalities and a life of their own.
It is normal for a lead character to evolve and change over time. The events in one book may have lasting repercussions for example. But don't forget to consider others. I've written before (Tuesday Tip 39) about how keeping notes on regular characters is important. They will age, they will go through life changes and given that they are probably working alongside the lead during the crises that they face, they too will be impacted by traumatic events. 
Infrequent characters.
As my series has progressed, I also have a few regulars that crop up periodically. For example, I have a civilian Digital Forensics specialist who pops up whenever they need a laptop or a phone unlocking. Pete Robertson typically only has a few lines, and in some books is sometimes only referenced, but over the series we learn nuggets about him. For example, he is extremely tall and thin - almost as though he has been stretched - yet he somehow squeezes into a tiny office without ever knocking equipment flying. We find out in passing that he is gay. It's not really part of a story, but it makes him a little more rounded; maybe it will be important one day, maybe it won't.
In one of the novellas, At First Glance, I needed an officer of similar rank to Warren working on the drugs squad. Lo and behold, I suddenly found I needed him again a couple of books later. He'll be crucial in my two next books, so I now know his family background.
In next summer's book (number eight), I bring back a character that hasn't been seen since book two, about seven years previously. It wasn't a conscious plan, I just realised as I was writing a scene that the as-yet-unnamed officer delivering a briefing played a similar role to a junior officer that worked with the team in the earlier book. I went back to the original manuscript and found their name. Given the number of years that had passed, I decided she was due a promotion and was now a specialist with additional expertise. As a bonus, I didn't have to think up another new name!
The pitfalls of regular characters.
Something that writers need to think about when bringing somebody back is how much space to devote to reminding readers who they are, or introducing them to new readers. It can be a bit of a balancing act.
Similarly, will their appearance potentially spoil earlier books in the series? A few posts back (Tuesday Tip 52) I wrote about how there is always the risk that big plot developments in earlier books can lose their impact if their resolution is referenced in later books. Many readers new to a series read them out of sequence, so if PC Blogs is very clearly alive in book seven, they obviously survived being stabbed in book five. Consequently, you may wish to reconsider if you want to bring back an infrequently used character if it robs that earlier story of its tension.
Bringing back a villain or previous suspect might be even more dangerous. If character X is a key murder suspect throughout book four, then having them out and about in next year's book indicates that they were probably a red herring in book 4!  

Do you have any favourite recurring series characters?
As always, feel free to comment here or on social media.
Until we meet again,
best wishes, Paul.

"I'm playing all the right notes, but not necessarily in the right order."
The comedian Eric Morecombe's famous retort to the conductor Andre Previn, when his attempts at playing a concert piano fail dismally during the 1971 Morecombe and Wise Christmas special, have passed into TV legend.
Unfortunately, I often find myself wincing when reading the attempts of a writer without a scientific background to convey complex scientific ideas to their readers. I paraphrase Morecombe's famous catch-phrase thus:
"I'm using all the right scientific vocabulary, but not necessarily in the right order."
Now, first of all, I want to make it clear that this is not going to be a cheap shot at writers who get it wrong. I'm a science teacher - I spend my professional life helping others understand science, so it would be deeply hypocritical of me to laugh at another's expense. Besides which, I'm sure there are plenty of police officers and other specialists who read my books and shake their heads.
From what I have observed, there are two ways in which the science in books can fall down.
Knowledge and Understanding. Leaving aside the complexities of modern forensics, a story that requires scientific concepts for the plot to work can suffer if the writer is unsure of the basics. This is equally true whether the story is grounded in reality, or whether it is an 'extrapolation' of existing science. A tale about future applications of genetics might be largely fantasy, but it will still fall apart if the author muddles up how DNA works with how proteins are formed. The pseudoscience rattled off in Star Trek always worked best when the writer had a basic grounding in physics, even if the warp drive or the transporter don't really exist.
Comfortably writing the science. Whether it is in dialogue or prose, all too often a writer will "Use all the right scientific vocabulary, but not necessarily in the right order." The result feels and sounds clunky. It's a bit like writing a scene set in a foreign land using Google Translate and an out-of-date guidebook. The moment anyone with any knowledge at all of the place reads it, it will come across as fake.
The key to avoiding this trap is research and expert help. Both of these sound scary, and difficult, but they don't have to be.
First of all, knowledge and understanding:
You don't have to become an expert on a subject to make your characters sound realistic. The first thing to do is make sure you understand the basics.
For example, lets assume you are writing about DNA. It could be because your plot centres on a DNA match in a police procedural, or because your lead character is a genetically enhanced super-soldier two hundred years in the future. Understanding the basic principles of what DNA is (and isn't) to the level expected of a secondary school pupil will usually give you a sufficient grounding before you delve a bit deeper for your book.
I am going to recommend one of the best resources on the web - BBC Bitesize. We use it all the time in school and I regularly recommend pupils peruse it.
Simply Google "BBC Bitesize" and the broad topic that you are writing about (eg genetics) and the top hits are likely to be what you are looking for.
For a bit more in-depth knowledge, there are lots of webpages that cater for writers wanting to know something about a topic - again, try using Google and appending "for writers" or "the basics" or "for beginners" to the search.
If you want a handy go-to guide, then there are lots of books. A series that I particularly like is the "XXXXXX: A Very Short Introduction", where XXXXXX is the topic. These are pocket-sized books written by experts in the field and very digestible. I have several, including the Forensic Science edition by Jim Fraser.
YouTube is also a useful source of educational videos. Try putting "KS4" or "GCSE" or "Grade School" (the term used in the United States) into the search terms to limit the results to those pitched at school pupils. Again, I use these when teaching.
The next hurdle is making the science sound comfortable.
This is where you should try and enlist an 'expert'. You can certainly try emailing a leader in the field - they will often reply; they typically love their subject and want it to be portrayed correctly. If they do reply, you could see if they would be willing to proof read some of your text to see if it sounds right to their ears. BUT DON'T SEND THEM THE WHOLE MANUSCRIPT. They aren't going to thank you if a 100,000 word tome lands in their inbox. Instead, be choosy. Send them short extracts - perhaps a conversation, or a couple of paragraphs of explanation. Be sure to tell them what to expect - if they don't realise that your book is set fifty years from now, or is speculative, they are just going to tell you it's fantasy and dismiss it out of hand.
If that all sounds a bit daunting, then do you know any science teachers? We are used to reading complex text and making it accessible to learners, as well as spotting common errors and misconceptions.
Finally, there is social media. There are plenty of forums on Facebook with experts happy to answer questions. But again, don't expect them to proof-read your book. Send them the premise or selected passages.


Finally, don't despair if you get something wrong. Most readers aren't experts, and if the book is well-written then they almost certainly won't spot it. Two books that I have read in the past twelve months involved DNA/Genetics. One dealt with the subject extremely well, the other had a couple of dodgy sentences where the author had used the wrong words. My enjoyment of the latter wasn't ruined, and I still happily recommend it to others.
Do you find writing science daunting? Are there any good guides that you use?
As always, feel free to comment here or on social media.
Until next time,
Paul.

To celebrate the release of DCI Warren Jones, Out of Sight, as paperback and audiobook, I decided it would be a great time to sit down with Malk Williams, my long-time audio narrator, and have a chat about what it takes to turn a novel into an audiobook.
The full conversation was kindly hosted live on the Facebook page of UK Crime Book Club and is archived on their YouTube page. You can watch the whole thing here, and hear some of Malk's favourite accents, as well as some of his stories about being a narrator.
But as this is a #TuesdayTip, I have distilled some key bits of advice from this conversation, plus other tips that I've picked up in previous chats with Malk.

Why Have Your Books Narrated?
Over the past few years, audiobooks have increased massively in popularity. Once seen as a niche market, increasing numbers of people have been turning to them when commuting, or as a way to while away the hours when doing other things, such as housework. Audible is owned by Amazon and books are often synced with the Kindle version of the novel, allowing readers to switch seamlessly between reading and listening. Depending on the price-point that the royalties for eBooks and audiobooks have been set to, audiobooks often come with a greater revenue cut. Although, it should be noted that the higher price of audiobooks is in part necessary to recoup the additional costs needed to produce the recording. 
How Is It Done?
As with everything these days, authors can in theory create the audiobook themselves. But it should be noted that to create a professional-sounding recording, you will need a decent microphone setup, somewhere that can act as a soundproof booth, and appropriate editing software. Furthermore, you really need to consider paying for an editor, and that reading for twelve to sixteen hours takes its toll (a decent-sized novel might take a couple of weeks of full days)! Furthermore, not everyone's voice is suited to reading aloud. Audio narrators are skilled professionals.
The process itself is somewhat more complex than it may seem - it isn't just a case of sitting in a sound-proofed room, pressing record and reading. The specialist software is needed to help you edit out mistakes, balance sound levels so that each chapter is a consistent volume, and artefacts such as throat clearing or fluffed words are removed. The finished recording typically consists of a number of individual sound files - one for each chapter - which then need to be correctly packaged.
For most writers, paying a professional is the most sensible route to go down. In the same way that self-published books where the author has designed the cover themselves, edited it themselves and typeset and formatted the eBook/paperback, tend to stand out and look amateurish, self-recorded audiobooks are similarly difficult to produce. It's up to you to decide if the investment is worth it, but if you are serious about producing a polished, professional product that will turn a profit, you need to think about hiring professionals. See the section below for more information about how you can get your books narrated.
The process.
There are several steps of which reading the text aloud is only one.
A typical work flow might look like this:
Pre-reading. The narrator reads through the manuscript. They make notes about which voices they will need to do, identify words that they need to verify the pronunciation for, and think about accents. Malk sometimes contacts me here.
Read each chapter and record it as a separate MP3 file. If they are working with a producer, they may send each chapter to them as it is completed.
First pass editing. Experienced narrators will probably do this themselves. They make sure there are no obvious errors and it all sounds even and clear. Often the narrator will pick up an error as they are reading. They can mark the error by clapping and continue reading (this creates a spike in the waveform, that can be easily located later) or they can "punch and roll", where they press a button and the software rolls back a few seconds, so they pick up the narration before the error and just record over the mistake and continue.
Proofreading. Just like writers, narrators can miss small errors. The proofreader will return corrections, which the narrator re-records. An editor will then insert these corrections into the audio file, as well as cut out background noises or coughs and other artefacts and unnecessary pauses.
Mastering. Here the volume etc is balanced across the files so chapter one isn't louder than chapter two etc.

Dos And Don'ts.
(or how to be kind to your narrator!)
When I started writing my DCI Warren Jones series, audio narration wasn't something I had ever considered. I was four books into the series before it was even mentioned. With the benefit of hindsight, there are things I would have done differently.

• The biggest error I made, was failing to mention until several books in that one of my characters has a distinctive regional accent. I knew from book one that DS David Hutchinson was a Geordie from Newcastle. But I somehow neglected to write this down until a third of the way through book 5! Obviously, it was too late to correct this. I managed to get around this by mentioning in subsequent books that he'd spent most of his adult life in the Hertfordshire, and so his accent has been buried, only to resurface after a few pints or if he has been watching Newcastle United playing football. Malk and I still laugh about this now 🤣. If you can, give some clues early in the text as to how you'd like the character to sound. That way, they'll sound the way you want them to off the bat.
• Don't give the killer dialogue in the prologue! It seems obvious, but your narrator will have to speak that dialogue in the killer's voice, giving away their identity on page one! I dodged this bullet after a chance conversation with Malk - I subsequently rewrote the prologue of the book I was about to submit, so the killer's identity was concealed.
• Another classic error from that first book was including a load of data in a table! The team had the phone records for a number of unknown mobile phones, which they were using to construct links between different people. This is a commonly used data analysis technique and reproducing the table for readers seemed like a sensible thing to do. It worked beautifully for the eBook and the paperback - but presented a challenge for Malk when he narrated! Fortunately, he has a background as a technical writer and so was able to succinctly describe the table for listeners, but it could have gone horribly wrong. Narrators are often asked to record textbooks etc so they can describe graphs, images or tables, but if you need visual data in your book, consider writing a few lines of description for your narrator to read out - they'll appreciate it!
• A final faux pas from that book was the inclusion of a written note by a person with dyslexia. The text on the page was spelled phonetically, with the incorrect use of some homonyms (words that sound the same, but are spelt differently with different meanings - eg there and their or bear and bare) and it was obvious to the reader that the writer was dyslexic. Fortunately, my forensic linguist character discussed the note in detail, so listeners didn't miss anything. If I do anything similar in future books, I will have to put some thought into how my narrator can make it obvious to the listener, without me patronising readers.
• Read your manuscript aloud to yourself. It's amazing how we often read what we think we wrote, not what we actually typed! Reading aloud will pick up many of these mistakes, and so is good for editing generally. But it also highlights tricky sentences with complex punctuation - whilst a five-line sentence may be grammatically correct, will your narrator actually be able to read it aloud in one breath!
• Finally, emojis. These are available in character sets for printed material now. Malk assures me that he can deal with them, by reading a sentence and describing the relevant emoji eg "I'd hate for something to happen to you 😉" would be spoken as "I'd hate for something to happen to you, winking emoji".

How Can You Get Your Books Narrated?
If you decide that you would like your books narrated, then there are a few steps you can take.

• First, make sure you possess the legal rights to audio narration. If you have been published by a publishing house, check your contract. You may have granted the rights to audio narration etc to the publishing house, in which case you would need their permission to record the book. When signing a new contract, look at the terms - get it checked by a lawyer or join the Society of Authors and get them to vet the contract. If the publishing house is a large one, and they have already produced audiobooks of other authors' work, then you might be better off speaking to them about whether they would be willing to have them recorded (that way, they'll pay for everything!). If you are independently published, then you probably own all your rights, so there's no need for permission.
• Once you have the rights secured, you will need to choose a narrator. ACX is the talent exchange owned by Audible, but others exist. They have a database of performers that you can search to find a match that suits your book. They detail their skills and availability, list previous books that they have worked on and have samples that you can listen to.
• If you are looking for specialists in the British crime genre, there is a newly formed collective of experienced, award-winning narrators. Malk Williams, my long-time narrator, is a founding member, but between them they have contacts for most of the narrators working in the UK. Check out www.raconteurs.co.uk.   
• Payment methods vary. You can pay them a one-off upfront fee, or you can enter into a royalty-share agreement, whereby they get a cut of the royalties earned. As you can appreciate, this is a gamble for them - if the book doesn't sell, they won't get paid, so don't be disappointed if they want some sort of fixed-payment upfront to cover the time they will be investing. A novel may take two to four weeks to record and is a full-time job, meaning they can't do other paid work. If you register your book for PLR (the payment system for UK library loans), they will typically get a share of that also.

How Can You Get Into Audio Narration?
If you fancy getting into audio narration, be warned that it isn't for everyone. I know a couple of voice actors who steer clear of audiobooks. They've done them, but didn't especially enjoy the experience.
Malk cites the voiceover coach Sean Allen Pratt (paraphrased):
If you think audiobook narration might be for you, then go and sit in a cupboard. Choose a book to read. Start at the beginning. If you make a mistake, go back to the beginning of the sentence and start again. If you come across a word you are unsure of, stop and look up the pronunciation online - don't guess. Continue reading for several hours. Do that for several days in a row, until you've finished. If you haven't gone mad by the end of it, then maybe the job is for you.
To get work, you should record some samples and post them on ACX or similar.
When you have recorded a few books, then you may be able to apply to join a production company, whose casting directors might put you on their books and start contacting you, rather than the other way around.
As with anything in life, professionalism is key. Don't over commit to unrealistic deadlines. Make sure you are clear about any limitations (eg if you can't do Scottish accents, say so upfront, don't embarrass yourself and the writer). Keep a portfolio of work you are proud of.
It's also worth noting that at the moment, because of Covid, the market is saturated with out-of-work stage and screen actors.
Home-based narrators with their own studios, like Malk, were fortunate during Covid to be able to continue working, however, you don't need to commit to that sort of outlay. You can hire studio space as well as editors and producers.
Your Voice Is Your Tool.
Like all professionals, you need to take care of your work equipment - namely your voice.

• When I started my teacher training, we were taught how to look after our voices. For example, if you need to speak at high volume, practise this (there are tutorials on YouTube) - otherwise you can strain your vocal cords.
• Keep your voice well-lubricated. For example take regular sips from a bottle of TEPID water (cold can constrict the vocal cords) - use a bottle with a screw lid, not a glass, to avoid any expensive accidents!
• Take regular breaks when you try not to speak for a while - your vocal cords are muscles and will need periodic rests.
• Try not to start recording "from cold" eg as soon as you wake up. Speak a bit to loosen your vocal cords before recording, otherwise the pitch might change as the muscles warm up.
• Some suggest that coffee might dry your mouth, but it's not an issue that Malk has ever found a problem.
• If your voice is feeling scratchy, try a spoon full of manuca honey to soothe your throat.

So there you are. I have been delighted with my audiobooks, I love them! There is something special about hearing a skilled professional like Malk bringing my characters to life. Even if you aren't considering having your books recorded, I hope you've learned something and please do check out the video, Malk is an entertaining speaker.
Until next time,
Best wishes,
Paul.