Manuscript update: I didn’t get too much done in my revision yesterday. Still on chapter one today. A reader left a comment on yesterday’s post about being stuck during a revision. I’ve been there — I’m sure we all have — and it can be so frustrating. You want to write, you want to fix…
Read more
Day five in my reports from the Austin SCBWI conference, and there’s still more to come after this one! Also, although I’m giving lots of great information from these speakers in these posts, I’m only giving a condensed version of their presentations. Reading about conferences is great, but going to them, even single-day conferences like…
Read more
Manuscript update: Three fellow writers have very graciously agreed to read my latest revision, which I finished yesterday. Thank you, to them. Once they’re done, I’ll do one more read-through, going through their notes and fixing anything else I see, then I think it will be ready to send out. So next week’s goal will…
Read more
Revision update: Going well. I’ve been getting up early and doing about a chapter a day. Being the only one to know the full story of my book has been driving me crazy. I think it’s good. I’m excited about it. But there’s always that little voice in the back of head telling me that…
Read more
Revision update: Nada! I’m away on vacation, but I’m going to get back to it soon. Anita Nolan posted a link to character questionnaires from the Gotham Writers Workshop. They’re very useful, and I plan to bookmark the page, but it made me think of how we get to know our characters. I read about…
Read more
Revision update: Finally on chapter 9. Ok, so you know how I keep saying I’ve figured out what I needed to do to fix the problems I was having with my first eight chapters? Well, something was still nagging at me. We were still taking too long to get into the real meat of the…
Read more
Revision update: Still slogging through the first eight chapters, this time with a fine tooth comb looking for word choices, etc. I’m also keeping an eye on Anita Nolan‘s series on beginnings on her blog. Yesterday she had tips to hook the reader, and the first was keeping them curious. This is a good tactic…
Read more
Revision update: I got some good stuff done on Saturday, but nothing Sunday, and nothing yet today. Uh oh. I am still working on my beginning, the first eight chapters, which essentially makes up most of act one. Beginnings are very important, from the crucial first sentence, first paragraph and first page that must draw…
Read more
Revision update: It’s moving along, slowly but surely. I’m on around chapter 6. There’s something wonderful about revising. In the first draft, you’ve mixed up all the ingredients and baked the cake; in the revision, you’re topping it off with the perfect frosting and decorations. Well, sort of. But it is the time when you…
Read more
I haven’t been including my revision update, because, actually, I’m not sure where I am with it. My goal is still to finish by the end of November, but realistically, it might be by the end of the year, with all the holidays and Christmas shopping, etc. We’ll see. But the reason I’m not sure…
Read more
