July Update

It’s July for a couple hours yet. Now I know it took me seven months to fall off of the calendar-coloring bandwagon. Knowledge is power.

For the past couple of weeks I’ve been steadily working my way through a rewrite of my novel for young adults. Unlike my previous, personal edits, this was a little different. Around the time I attended The Writer’s Institute, I made the decision to have my manuscript edited by a professional.

The critigue groups I belong to are wonderful, but over time, due to the episodic nature of our meetings, it can be hard for them to keep up with the story. I needed fresh eyes for a run through so I started asking around. Some suggestions were, quite, frankly, outside my price range, so I kept looking. I eventually conneted with an editor who didn’t think they were right for the piece, but knew of someone who might be and referred me to them. I contacted the referral and they were happy to take on the task of developmentally editing my work.

My editor took about a month with the manuscript and returned two letters and an edited word document of the ms with comments. Then came the task of working through those comments and making my own notes on the suggestions to see what I could do to make my story clearer for the reader. I’ve put a plan together from those notes and am now incorporating the changes and things are going about as well as I could exect them to. It just takes time.

And for the next couple of weeks my free time will be limited. That’s right, I’m going on vacation and there’s no time for fun stuff like writing when you’re busy traveling. A vacation is supposed to be relaxing, right? Then why do I feel so stressed? Now I know why people take vacations and don’t go anywhere.

Here, have a picture of tomatoes from the garden I can’t tend to while we’re out of town.