title: Words'Worth: a fiction writer's guide to serious editing
author: Ms Jane Riddell
description: Jane Riddell writes contemporary realistic fiction novels and humorous novellas. Her books are available in kindle and paperback on Amazon. She does her own editing!
zlib_text: > Dear Reader,
  
  >  _A Precious Jewel_ is that book of mine that insisted upon being written
  > even though I knew it was quite impossible to write. Sir Gerald Stapleton
  > was a minor character in _The Ideal Wife_ , the hero’s best friend, who
  > several times bemoaned the loss of Priss, his longtime mistress, after she
  > had left him to marry another man. I had no intention of writing his story,
  > much less of writing Priscilla’s. I was writing traditional Regencies at the
  > time and could hardly have a working prostitute as a heroine and a beta male
  > as a hero! When I tested the idea on a few fellow authors at a writers’
  > convention, they agreed with me wholeheartedly.
  
  > But I was haunted by those two characters to such a degree that finally I
  > had to write their story anyway. And I couldn’t put it down once I had
  > started. I completed it in two weeks! Then I put it up on a shelf to gather
  > dust for a while, quite certain that my editor would have a fit of the
  > vapors if she read