Fall 2023: Thoughts on the journey of writing a book.
Can you believe we’re already halfway through fall??? It seems nuts to me that the end of the year is coming so fast, and there is still so much to do!
November Author Update
I’m still in the throes of finishing edits for book 2. As a result, book 3 has been on a quasi-pause.
I’m working through my Beta’s feedback, which was so helpful! Here’s some of what she told me:
“Well paced and quick”
“I’ve learned to expect the unexpected”
“Lots of moral ambiguity”
“Strong theme of ‘power corrupts’”
“Fantastic squeal!”
I’m so close to being done with edits, only 12 chapters away, and then it’ll be off to my editor for the deep dive of copy editing and polishing.
Normally I’d be WriMoing right now, but it just didn’t workout this year. BUT…if I can finish up book 2 this week, then I think I’m going to roll up my sleeves and jump into the NaNoWriMo scene.
With that said, let me provide a little update on book 3: it’s been a bear!
I’ve psyched myself out for this one like a dumb-dumb. Everything is written but the finale, and I know how it’s all going to end. For all intents and purposes, the first draft of this book is done. But it is a VERY ROUGH draft, people. Very, very rough.
It’s WAY TOO long (by about 50k words), too convoluted, too windy, and sections of it are too boring. It needs a major overhaul. Some serious cutting action needs to take place, along with some major re-writes. I’ve hit a plotting problem that I’ve been scratching my head about for the last 2 weeks. I even considered tossing out the entire manuscript and starting over.
But…necessity brews ingenuity, folks. And Ingenuity has struck. A long convo with my hubby, as well as some brilliant strategizing with my daughter (yes, my 10 y.o. is brilliant!), I have a solution I’m excited to try out, and that might be my Wrimo project.
The Plan: November Writing Goals
So, let's talk goals for November.
Finish editing Bk2 and submit it to my editor
Begin (and possibly finish) secret Wrimo project
That's the plan! Let's see what I manage to get done.
See you in a month!
P.S. I've been sharing snippets of Dissent on my social media accounts, and revealing different themes that pop up throughout the story. Be sure to follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and Goodreads to catch little tastes of this upcoming dystopian romance.