Editing madness

A Dream and A Kiss is entering its final stages of development. I recently joined a critique group of local writers and submitted the first few chapters to the group for beta reading and editing. I got some really good and very helpful feedback. Positive feedback included "I feel like you really know your characters," "If you get this cleaned up a bit, it could easily be the best book on my shelf," and "For a first draft, it is really clean."

I must admit, those points made my head swell up at least two sizes.

Critique points included things like my characters acting inconsistently, needing to add action tags to make my characters come to life a bit more on the page, and a few points about clarifying historical accuracy.

Overall, I'd say I fared pretty well. I always feel a bit anxious when I release my work into the universe. I spend so much time with my characters that they become almost a part of me. To hear anything negative about my work is painful for me. I know, I should grow a thicker skin, and I'm working on it. Not everyone will like my work, I know.

So, now I'm gearing up for my second critique group session. I'm feeling more and more confident about the quality of my story and I can't wait for Warner's story to be completed. He is such an intriguing character and he certainly meets his match in this book. He is going to have a couple lightbulb moments along the way and, of course, we'll have a visit from his two brothers later on in the story.

Happy New Year! Welcome to 2016 and the end of the holiday season. Phew! We made it.

In the last four weeks since I blogged last, I have continued to work on my novel, had my 2nd wedding anniversary, multiple holiday parties, holiday travel, Christmas Day and all of the associated binge eating and general merriment, reunions with old friends and family members, more travel. Oh, and I caught a cold. Instead of ringing in the new year with a champagne toast and passionate kiss as the ball dropped, I was snuggled up on my couch in a Benadryl-induced haze. Luckily for me, I am finally feeling better.

I don't typically do New Year's Resolutions. Let's be honest, I'll be all gung-ho for the first few weeks and then motivation will falter and discipline will desert me. However, this year, I resolve to finally finish my current two works in progress. I want to get at least one of them ready to publish and be well on my way for the next to release. I am sorry to report that, per the previous reference to motivation and discipline, both of these qualities have fled in recent weeks. What that really means is that I need to get my butt in gear and get to work, which I am hoping that my newly acquired editor and critique group will be helping me to do. Nothing like a little external motivation to keep things moving, eh?

Therefore, my plan to have A Dream and A Kiss ready to release mid-February may not work out as planned. I can't release it in its current state...that is unless I want to lose all credibility as an author and alienate what little readership I have acquired up to this point. Quite the opposite of my master plan, to be honest. So, I'll simply have to keep pushing back the release date until it is ready.

Now, it's back to work I go...

This year's NaNoWriMo has turned my brain to mush. I crawled across the finish line at about 11:45pm local time and logged in approximately 51,000 words of original content on my new manuscript. Of course the website was overloaded with traffic at the time, causing me a lot of anxiety that I would not be able to validate my word count in time. Cue my techie husband who took over and helped me get around my content loading issues. Love that guy!

And now I'm exhausted. I'm really more of a slow-and-steady-wins-the-race sort of writer. I amble through my stories rather than sprint. I think this is the primary reason why NaNo is such a challenge for me.

I'm not going to lie...I am writing a kick-ass story at the moment. It has so much to love. Bank robberies, Old West shoot outs, indecent proposals, scandal, intrigue, betrayal...OH...MY...GOD. My only regret is that I need to finish editing A Dream and A Kiss before I can really focus on polishing up Book 3 (I'm thinking of a good title for it, but for now it's just B3). They're sequential but don't build on each other, and it really wouldn't make sense to release B3 before B2.

So, back to work I go...

Happy Thanksgiving!

I will try to make this post with as few typos as possible. Not promising anything major since I have a sleeping cat laying on my left arm. He thinks he is helping me write, I'm quite sure of it.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and I have much to be grateful for this year. I have a wonderful husband, two healthy cats who provide endless hours of delight/frustration/amusement for our household, a job I feel deeply passionate about, amazing friends, and a loving family. What more can a girl hope for?

I have my pies baked, my turkey is brining and a sink full of dishes waiting for their turn in the dishwasher. My Christmas tree is already calling to me to put it up (yes, honey, that is happening very, very soon). There is no way I'm leaving my house the day after Thanksgiving, as I don't do the whole Black Friday thing. However, I am fully planning on taking care of some Cyber Monday deals. I really think I should have been born a Christmas Elf. I just love the holidays so much!

I am also finishing another project for NaNoWriMo. I am working on Book 3 in the Western Dreams series (Porter's story). In December I will start editing book 2...now officially titled A Dream and A Kiss. My plan and fervent wish is to have it all polished up, edited, cover art designed and ready for its release by late February. Phew! I am going to have a busy, busy winter it seems. Then I'll be off to finishing Porter's story and doing the editing, polishing, etc on that one...which by the way I am having an immensely wonderful time writing. Porter is such a wonderful character. I really hope you love reading his story as much I love telling it.

I have been quite remiss in posting lately. Admittedly, I have had a busy month, but we all have busy lives, right. Let's see...what have I been up to? Well, my husband and I have taken in another fur-baby. This is Buttons:

    



As you can see, he has a big personality. My other cat, Mo, is not loving his new brother just yet. A good deal of my time this month has been trying to keep the hissing to a minimum. Things are looking better, but it has been a lot of work.

Speaking of work, my day job has been really stressful. I won't go into that too much, but just suffice it to say that my brain is nearly always fried by the end of the day.

I have also been gearing up for NaNoWriMo (or National Novel Writing Month), which begins today, November 1. This will be my fourth year doing NaNo. I will be continuing my Western Dreams family saga. This installment of the series tells the story of Porter Ellis, the rebel of the family who is given a cause. It will be very much an Old West tale. Spoiler Alert: bank robbers, revenge, and old-fashioned shootouts are all going to be included. Actually, all of that will be in the first few chapters with plenty of action to follow. I'm so excited to tell his story.

I'm also putting the finishing touches on the first draft of Book II of the series, now titled "A Dream and a Kiss." I'll be starting the editing process in December and will be going back to fix a couple plot holes that I've noticed. Though it may be ambitious with the holidays coming up, I'm hoping for a February release date.

Stay tuned.