Asking Better Questions About an Editor Before Submitting
Ask what matters before you commit
prompt.txt
Act as a practical specialist helping me with asking better questions about an editor before submitting. My context: [current setup, goals, constraints].
1. State what I need to know and why
2. List the questions that matter most
3. Flag red flags to listen for
4. Suggest how to follow up on weak answers
Use my details, not a generic example. If a fact needed for the plan is missing, ask for it or mark the assumption. Keep the result ready to use.
#writing#better-questions
💡 Replace the [brackets] with your details — the more specific, the sharper the answer.
Ten real starting points for the thing you cannot start.
Act as a writing coach. What I need to write: [article / essay / story / post / report]. Topic: [topic]. Audience: [who reads it]. The point I want to make, if I know it: [thesis or 'help me find it']. Material I have: [notes, links, half-thoughts — paste anything].
Kill the blank page:
1. If my thesis is fuzzy, give me 5 candidate theses, each one sentence, each arguable — and tell me which has the most energy in it.
2. Ten opening moves: a scene, a confession, a contrarian claim, a question, a statistic, a quote-subversion, a mid-action start, a definition flipped, a 'most people get this wrong', and one wild card. Write each as 1-2 actual sentences in a voice that fits my audience.
3. The skeleton: 4-6 section headings that would carry the piece, ordered.
4. The permission slip: remind me in one line what a first draft is for (it is not quality).
5. My first 20 minutes: exactly what to do when I sit down, in order.
Sentence-level surgery that tightens without flattening your voice.
Act as a line editor at a demanding magazine. My draft: [paste the text]. My voice in 3 words: [adjectives, or 'figure it out from the draft']. Audience: [readers].
Edit it:
1. First pass — the cut list: every sentence or phrase that earns nothing, quoted, with the one-word reason (redundant, throat-clearing, hedge, filler).
2. Second pass — the rewrites: my 8 weakest sentences rewritten tighter, each with a one-line note on the technique used (verb upgrade, cut preamble, split, merge).
3. Voice check: any rewrite that made it tighter but less ME — flag it and offer a voice-preserving alternative.
4. Rhythm report: where the sentences drone at one length, and where one short sentence would land like a hammer.
5. The fully edited version, clean.
6. My 3 recurring habits to watch for next time, named so I can spot them myself.
A plot skeleton that holds weight, from Pixar's own bones.
Act as a story editor. My story idea: [genre, premise, characters as far as you have them]. Length: [short story / novel / screenplay / video]. The feeling I want readers left with: [emotion].
Build the spine:
1. Fill the classic structure with MY specifics: Once upon a time... / Every day... / Until one day... / Because of that... (x3, escalating) / Until finally... / And ever since then...
2. The protagonist's want vs need: what they chase vs what the story knows they actually lack, and how the climax forces the collision.
3. The midpoint: the event that turns reaction into action.
4. Three candidate endings: the expected one, the earned-sad one, the twist-that-was-always-true one — with the setup each requires planted earlier.
5. Stakes check: what is lost if the protagonist fails, stated so a stranger cares in one sentence.
6. The 5 scenes I cannot skip, in order, each described in 2 lines.