Posts Tagged ‘editing’
So much for attempts to post here on a regular schedule. I have many excellent reasons for slacking—some of which I plan to blog about in the near future.
For now, know I’m neck-deep in edits for BREAKING ALL THE RULES, my spring 2015 Turquoise Morning Press release.
Yes, I prefer to make edits by hand. Maybe it makes me a dinosaur, but I see things differently on paper. Besides, it feels more real somehow. I love the heft of a pile of manuscript pages.
There’s only one problem with editing this way: Sometimes—OK, more often than I care to admit—I can’t read my hand-written scribbles.
Ahem. The trick, of course, is to finish edits and get them back in my typewritten manuscript quickly enough that I can still remember what I was trying to say.
That’s the goal, anyway.
I’ve slowly been whittling down the to-be-edited pile. As of Saturday afternoon, it’s officially a shorter stack than the already-edited pile.
Progress!
It’s the small victories, right? I need a few of those in my life right now.
To celebrate the release of my third book, SLIDING INTO HOME, I’m embarking on my first blog tour.
I’ve enlisted the wonderful Alex Rosa of Wanderlust Book Tours to run it and keep me organized—no small feat, let me tell you. Somehow the gal who used to turn in papers two weeks early in college now bumps up against every deadline she meets. (You can read my lament on that subject here.)
She created this gorgeous banner (currently my Facebook Author Page header).
The tour starts tomorrow; the schedule is below.
May 5th:
May 6th
May 7th
May 8th
An Aussie Girls WILD Book Addiction
May 9th
May 10th
May 11th
May 12th
May 13th
May 14th
May 15th
May 16th
Stop by for chances to win free ebooks or a fabulous gift basket that includes an autographed print copy of DIVA IN THE DUGOUT (All Is Fair in Love & Baseball 1), as well as $5 gift cards to Dunkin’ Donuts and Amazon, baseball-themed trinkets, an iPhone 5 case with my logo and some Cracker Jacks. (Gotta have snacks while reading, right?)
I picked up the basket at Safeway before Easter, thinking it’d be perfect for the giveaway. Only when I snapped this photo for Alex did I notice the typo, front and center.
What the heck is a “perfert game”?
Further proof, if any was needed, that everyone needs a proofreader. 😀
I wrote this post for the Editor’s Note in the Sept./Oct. issue of the NARWA newsletter, High Country Highlights. However, I liked it too much not to share it here on the blog, too.
Since I’m trying to get in edit-mode for the Golden Heart, the subject is dear to me right now. Here goes:
When it comes to progress on my writing, July and August have pretty much been a wash for me.
A vacation from the day job ended up being a break from writing, too. This happened despite the fact that I toted a big binder full of “Blind Date Bride” with me.
It never even left the (very heavy) suitcase. And the few times I found myself with computer time, I spent it catching up on my blog reading (and writing) … and, of course, Twitter.
How did the world ever get along without new tweets to read every few minutes?
At the risk of sounding like a fogey, I’ll say we were all probably a lot less distracted.
But change is good, so we all need to embrace the technology of the future. Right?
Right.
I’ve recently discovered that I don’t like change all that much. Oh, I suppose I should have realized this about myself years ago, when I balked every time the school cafeteria tried to serve me waffles and sausage for lunch … or when the thought of changing the way we do something at work makes me grumble both loudly and repeatedly.
Well, I finally got it: Given a choice, I prefer things to stay the way they are. Even when things aren’t quite perfect, I’d rather not alter them. Better the devil you know …
I suspect my aversion to change is also why I have trouble editing my writing.
Of course I know there’s room for improvement, because there’s always room for improvement.
But where I have no trouble thinking of ways to change someone else’s prose, I often come up empty when I try to improve my own. Sure, I might tweak a word here and there, but I rarely do a complete overhaul.
I like to think it’s because I spend enough time crafting sentences the first time that they already sing.
In reality, I’m probably just being a little lazy and a lot resistant to change.
I’ll say it again, mostly to convince myself: Change is good.
As I delve into preparing for the 2011 Golden Heart contest, I’m going to keep that in mind.
Do you have any fail-safe, foolproof editing tips to share?
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