(or… the post you’ve been waiting for)
So, dear readers–all 5 of you (and that guy in the back who just admitted to his wife that he’s read a romance novel. I see you waving)….
My to do list now looks like the following:
- Cover art: DONE
- Reverse blurb: DONE
- Ad copy: DONE
- Manuscript edit: DONE
- Front and back matter: DONE
- FInal revisions: DONE
- Last readthrough: DONE
- The Comma Conundrum: its complicated…
For all intents and purposes, book 2 is DONE and waiting for format.
This means the ebook should be available within the next two weeks with print editions to follow—if the universe has heard my prayers and there are no more issues, that is.
In my defense for the two months of delays, I’m pretty sure the four rounds of editing it needed to clear out sophmoric writing issues from 2020 were trying to kill me and that cover? Lord, i’m glad my cover artist didn’t have a melt down and quit after the third (or was it forth?) revision. Lucikly for us, he’s a darn nice guy who does his best work when he stops listening to me—”I’m a doctor not an artist, man!” (sorry Ray)
My very patient copy editor didn’t fire me as a client when I got this manuscript back after round one, cursed it to the bowels of hell, and threw it across the room. This happened somewhere around the text formally known as chapter 9.
(…on what was supposed to be my “quick” read through where all I really had to do was accept her changes. One job…)
Here I learned something very important: if my editor can’t smooth out the cadence and style so you aren’t cringing as you read, the problem is my writing. Luckily, my writing is the one thing I can fix—and that’s how the two rounds of editing became three. Oh, don’t worry, she’s not mean, I totally deserved it.
I underestminated exactly how much writing experience I’ve gained in a short time. I type extremely fast and work in most of my free time so the skill has evolved a tad rapidly. Some parts of Rescued were written when I was still in elementary school (as far as this series is concerned). The parts that were written in my current voice are… so astronomically good by comparison they made the troubled sections stand out like me at a school dance… trying to look casual studying a potted plant.
Brief semi-related interlude brought to you by Clarity…
Ahem.
So after my editor was finally able to work her magic on a version of this book actually worth her magic, it went for one more round to “proof” the final copy with a second editor.
The Comma Conundrum…
Confession time: I like commas a little too much.
So, a true addict, I drop them in like glitter and that’s… not exactly how you should use them.
Editor 1 didn’t mind the issue but editor 2 has a different eye and now it can’t be unseen… at least not for me.
I do much of my editing by the “looks kinda right” rule rather than basing it on any real sort of… i don’t know… actual knowledge regarding technical grammar.
The good news is fiction allows for creative expression.
The bad news? I really don’t like having a hole in my knowledge large enough to toss a manuscript into.
(sigh)
The answer is in the Chicago Manual of Style, so allow me to provide you with a (somewhat overwhelming) example:
Right.
We can start with the things I don’t understand in the glossary entry.
Such as: main clause, suspended hyphens, and my favorite part: see also “punctuation.”
I’m not ready for that entry. I might end up hiding under my desk where all the great pretenders conceal themselves from readers…
It may come as a shock to all of you who think I’m just a freaking genius that I’m really more of a good observer.
I stare at words all the golly gosh darn time. In journal articles, textbooks, my own writing, charting software, google searches, other people’s books, closed captioning (I have difficulty following TV storylines without them #weirdbuttrue)… All. The. Time.
My “it looks right” o’meter is pretty accurate, but it’s based on nothing but pattern recognition.
Thus begins my journey to master the humble comma… we’ll find out how it went in book 3.
May the Maker have mercy on my editors.
Love and gratitude,
