Sometimes the littlest issues become big during editing. Take for instance what I spent most of this past week on: a word. Yes, a word. Lol. Some of my critiquers felt I shouldn’t use a generic term like “monsters,” and I realized they were right. So began my search. The problem became in the Native American world, though they believed in them, there was no word I could pinpoint for use. Especially since, there are so many different types of monsters in my story. My tribe is not very old, less than 200 years to be exact, and so being that they specialize in hunting the supernatural, I began to work on what word they might use for them. Finally, happily, I came up with one two days ago. Did you know Native Americans don’t believe in vampires? But they do have versions of zombies, werewolves, and ghosts to name a few. It’s amazing how a group of people are revealed to us more and more as we study them. I admire Native Americans. They’ve been through such heartbreak and still they have such a strength inside them. Other editing issues: I struggled with whether to call a place by what people in town did or describe it as Native Americans did. Often they referred to somewhere by an animal or the meeting of such and such rivers instead of by a name alone. For example, “rabbit place,” for Gregory Bald. I decided to just go by what the townspeople called it because I though it might be too confusing for me to say, “where the foxes’ burrows lie,” even though this is the way they would actually relay the information. I hope I made the right call on this, though I’ll find out when I have it beta read. Challenging, yes, and I’m sure I’ll face more of the same in the days ahead but I’m LOVING it right now as it helps to “solidify” the writing in my mind by making these choices. On I go to do more. Hope your writing/editing is going well. Good luck on your projects.
Where Genres Collide Traci Dowe YA Author 
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