When I wrote my blog post last month, I thought I had only one more chapter to write in Book 2 of my Edgemont series. My characters had other plans. I kept trying to tie up their story and cram it into a specific space, and they weren’t having it. So I listened to them, and it worked. I’m happy with the way it turned out, and even though it took a little longer and I ended up writing a whole additional chapter, it is now finished, and I’m moving on to my favorite part—editing. I’ve long enjoyed editing the work of others, but I particularly love molding and sculpting words that I’ve written into a clean, cohesive, and (hopefully) entertaining tale, so here we go!
I do a good bit of editing as I write, but this next step will be my first editing pass at the book as a whole. Many writers advise turning off your inner editor when you are working on a manuscript and just getting words on the page until you have a rough draft. I have tried this, but I can’t completely turn off my inner editor—nor do I want to—and I have found that works better for me. I recently read Ann Patchett’s essay collection These Precious Days (a wonderful book!), and I was delighted to learn that my writing process is similar to hers. I’m paraphrasing here, but she basically works on a paragraph or a page or a chapter until she gets it the way she wants it and then she moves on to the next. I’m a little looser with my rough drafts. I go back and do more editing and tweaking after writing it, but it was validating to find that editing along the way works for other authors, especially one as talented and successful as Ann Patchett.
It was this writing process that got me to the end of both Simply Mystical and Book 2, and it’s only appropriate that I finished the second one today, which is my mother’s birthday. She was the biggest supporter of my dream of being a writer from an early age in my life. I think there was a period of time when she single-handedly kept Writer’s Digest in business because she bought any and every book on writing they published that she thought might help me. She was one of the sweetest, most loving people in the world, and I miss her every day. I’m thankful to be able to honor her through my writing.
I do have one other update for you today. That “trace” of pins-and-needles feeling that remained two weeks after my recent dental procedure turned out to be more than a trace and has lingered over the last month, for a total of six weeks. It improves incrementally every day, and there is now truly just a trace of numbness, but progress is excruciatingly slow. Nerves don’t play! Apparently they, like my characters, have a mind of their own and heal in their own sweet time.
Hope your days are bright and you’re confidently marching to your own unique beat in following your dreams and doing your thing.
Take care!