Judy Waite’s "Game Girls"

This is an excellent read. It tells the story of three girls who go on the game. One is poor, one is over-sexed and one has been abused. These may be reasons not excuses. The surface reason, though, seems to be that they need money – or at least Alix, the ring-leader does and the other two need her friendship. It all becomes complex and dangerous very quickly.
Judy Waite uses a third person present tense narrative and does move though the view points of the three girls. She provides a strong sense of time and place. This with the strong narrative voice gives the reader an emotional closeness to the three main characters. We are able to see them as human and understand why they do what they do.
Waite certainly pushed boundaries with this novel but at least she gives us an honest and open glimpse of something which is of concern for many young women. As well as taking on this very big issue, the author also explores the frequent Young Adult themes of sexuality, relationships, risk-taking and peer pressure.
I personally read this book very quickly and couldn’t put it down.

Editing processes

Veiled or Behind the Veil or Beyond the Veil - or whatever I end up calling it, is almost finished. It's a YA novel. Just two more read throughs, probably in hard copy, and it will start going out into the wide world.
I have a list for editing, which goes from the general, to the precise. The first check is to see that the structure works, the last is a general copy edit. All sorts of things come in between: character, dialogue, showing not telling, pace, emotional closeness and then there are some genre-specific items. Like do the characters look like young adults in a YA novel?
I normally print out the first, the last and the last but one draft, unless I'm going on a train journey, and then it's hard copy to go with me, whichever editing stage I'm at.
I find it best to look for one thing at a time. However, I'll often notice something form a category other than the one I'm currently editing. I've got up a list of fourteen criteria now, and I'm thinking of cutting back a bit, or maybe doing a couple of things in one go.
Then the comes the problem of starting something new and sending this one out.