Let's talk about editing/revising. I'm just finishing up my second book for publishing and I feel like this time has been easier. Editing/revising can be overwhelming, especially if you've never done it before. Because of my personality, I have multiple books about editing, so I had something to guide me, but reading about editing/revising and actually doing it are two different things.
With this book, I wanted to create a plan of attack to follow to make things easier for myself. I'm also very visual, so I knew if I listed the specific edits I wanted to do that would keep me on track. To break it down, here is the plan I followed:
The first thing I did was a read through of the whole manuscript, writing down things in each chapter that I wanted to change or add. I didn't actually do any changing during this revision, I only noted what I needed to change. Also, I didn't look at any punctuation/grammar during this revision, only structural/plot issues.
Next, I went through the changes from step one and fixed everything I needed to by chapter. And because it makes me happy, I checked them off once they were completed.
After the larger issues were fixed, I went through and corrected any grammar/punctuation issues.
By this point, I feel things are pretty decent, so now I will put my manuscript into an editing app to fix anything I haven't found. (I use ProWritingAid.) This gives me a little more confidence that I'm fixing most of my manuscript's grammar problems, but be aware that an editing app probably won't find every issue.
Now I'm ready to have my Betas read my manuscript, then once they are finished I correct any problems they've found.
Breaking up my revisions/edits into these steps made the whole thing more manageable and less intimidating. Having a plan to follow made sitting down to work much easier. It wasn't something I dreaded this time. I might even say, I enjoyed parts of my revision process this time.
If you're feeling lost when it comes to cleaning up your manuscripts, I hope my list gave you some direction. Keep working on it and don't give up!