#ROW80 Check In: "I Like to Move It, Move It"

This isn't a pun about my move to Connecticut, although it works on that level, too, I suppose. No, this is the theme song for the next month, our last month in this round of A Round of Words in 80 Days. It is direct response to my perfectionism/procrastination blog post from Friday. If I'm moving it (getting stuff done), I'm NOT procrastinating. If I'm moving it, I sending a big, fat raspberry to my crippling perfectionism. PPPPPPPPPPPPFFFFFTTTTTT!!!!! ;)

To start, today I am moving over the entire .txt file of my manuscript into the ebook formatting master and fixing the tabs and formatting in one fell swoop. ****TABS are EVIL. NEVER, EVER use them! Use the ruler at the top to set your indentations, TRUST ME! (PSA over)**** Then, I will go back and start making the penned edits into the computer. I still have about 14 chapters to pen edit. 

I think the methodology might work better for me. I was going chapter by chapter with the copying and pasting from the .txt file, then editing. It's too easy for me to self-congratulate myself that way without seeing how much work to go. This way, I can see the final page count (200) and still go chapter by chapter editing. I can still be proud of myself when I finish each chapter, but still see I'm only up to Page 36 out of 200, or Page 57 out of 200, etc. This gives me a more realistic sense of a progress bar.

So, goals for today: get whole kit and kaboodle tabs fixed.
Finish making computer edits up to Chapter 7
Work on pen edits tonight, get up to Chapter 20.

THAT would put me at about a full 35% complete for both a clean copy AND an ebook file. Remember, I'm doubling duty. I have two weeks to finish so I can print one more time, and pen edit during my move when I will be without Internet (might be a good thing). Then, I will make last few changes and VOILA! I'm ready to publish an ebook!!! 

:Singing:: I like to move it, move it.  


"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

CHECK OUT SOME OTHER AWESOME A ROUND OF WORDS IN 80 DAYS PARTICIPANTS AND THEIR BLOGS!!!! LEAVE SOME LOVE IF YOU STOP BY:

First Chapter Troubles

You only get one chance to make a great impression. And I'm having an outfit crisis it seems with my first novel's first chapter. I have three options:

1. The original first chapter, one scene of Johnathan meeting one-night stand in bar.
2. The original second chapter moved up, Johnathan waking up with her in his bed.
3. A mash up of both, cutting the bar scene shorter, and ending with morning after.

I think I'm going with option number 3. I started rewriting last night at 2 AM (fantastic toddler opted NOT to sleep from 2 AM to 4 AM). I only have a paragraph, but I like it better than anything else so far.


For comparison:


Original first paragraph:

Johnathan Michaels' solitary watch on a black plastic bar chair grew more torturous with each passing minute. He checked his navy blue digital. Fifteen minutes late. If it was anyone else, he'd have already left. 

First paragraph of original Chapter 2, currently Chapter 1:

Tastes of roof tar and rotten fruit filled Johnathan's mouth. Pulling his sticky lips apart with a soft smacking sound, he tried to clear the after-party taste from his mouth with a swish of his tongue. No, he needed mouthwash and a good brushing. 


New chapter 1 beginning written last night:


At quarter to eight, Johnathan Michaels suffered the stuffy one-week-to-Christmas Metro train, then froze his nuts off walking three blocks to a bar along the U Street Corridor. Twenty-five minutes later and killing his second beer, he waited uncomfortably alone on a wobbly, plastic bar chair. Alex and Eric were late. If it had been anyone else, he'd have already left.


In my last year of high school, we spent an entire 9 weeks on college essays, working and reworking four different essays each. One of weekly exercises we had to do was rewrite three of the four essays' beginnings in three different ways. That's 9 different introductory paragraphs, and we had notes on different ways to start, such as with a quote, lyrics, sensory device, in the middle, traditionally, etc. I don't remember all of them.

I'm learning an important lesson: say more with less. In the last paragraph, I given the setting (Washington DC) the time (one week before Christmas) and action. I also managed to keep my male characters' voice. I've realized I neutered him quite a bit in the manuscript, trying so hard to follow different rules, but I don't think it's good writing without my character's view on things. Originally, I had this entire paragraph talking about the freezing December weather, but I think "froze his nuts off" captures the exact temperature. We all know what that feels like. If the story was from Alexis' POV, I would have described the sharp pain in her feet as feeling returned after her frozen three-block walk from the train station.

On Wednesday, I'm driving to Virginia for 10 days. My mother has promised to watch Catie so I can get back on track with my manuscript. I remember one of my Twitter writer friends talking about how she just retypes her first draft from scratch to edit/improve to a second draft. I'm seriously considering it. Maybe not for every chapter, but the problematic ones. I have some awesome chapters later on, but that does me no good if I can't make chapter 1 grab the reader's imagination and hold it until the next one.

I also have a book review due this week.

Beginning to doubt making a 9/22 publication date, BUT, I'm going to keep working towards it. Worst case scenario, I am late by a week or two, but keeping the time crunch until then won't hurt in the least.


"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

#ROW80 Cinco de Fun

Careful, it's school supply season out there..... :)
I have a new system for sanity: three simple composition books. I've had a binder with plastic sheet protectors and loose-leaf paper, but my 2-year-old thinks it's fascinating to take the paper out of the plastic and crumple it. Composition books she opens, but the threading keeps the paper pretty safe. I'm not surprised, remember in elementary school trying to rip a piece of paper out of one of these scarce school supplies? It was the grade school equivalent of ripping a phone book in half!


Book 1: WRITING JOURNAL :  This was recommended on Twitter, but it's mostly a log of things I did on a certain day (when I started, what I accomplished, and a short list of what I want to get done). I cross off items I get done, leave the ones I haven't so they can carry over. 


Book 2: MARKETING : I have been doing a little research into marketing, solidifying my marketing plan. One post that really helped this was a discussion on The Passive Voice Guy's blog about where do readers find books to read? The answers were very surprising, and I made sure to write down all of the blogs and sites listed that suited my genre. The conversation continued here, as well. I LOVE the design and functionality of The Pauper's Book Club, and the creator Damon Courtney is very open to suggestions from other readers and writers about how to improve. He is also looking for ideas on curating the shelves. 


I also researched into advertising on Mommy blogs/family savings blogs. Federated Media (go to marketers) looks very promising as they are professional bloggers with validated traffic and some sites are very affordable. For example, there is a site I'm interested in advertising on that is women's health, beauty, technology, and geek culture. THAT is one slice of my audience (I have robots in my book :) ). They get 170,000 page views per month, and a leaderboard 728x90 for 10,000 impressions (or views by a reader) will give me a 26% voice (meaning my ad would be every fourth one, very good), and I could run it from Oct. 1-13 for only $42.50. I would need 22 sales from the 10,000 people who see the ad to break even. 


So this is what my marketing book is for, I can't act on all of this right this second, but I am looking at various channels and planning the most effective way to use them.


Book 3 : EDITING: Right now I am working on my editing checklists, and I haven't used this book yet. I can't edit CANCELLED for another week, but I already have ideas swirling in my head about places where I know my manuscript is weak. I am going to have to really work on characterization, for example. I know my storyline is strong, and that's a good backbone to have. However, crying my eyes out last night at the last Harry Potter movie (not because the movie was goo, I thought it awful) I was crying for Snape the character in the books, not Alan Rickman's portrayal. In fact, if I hadn't read the books, I would have thought "What the hell is going on?" 


I have a strong place in my book where I cried as I wrote it. Buckets. But that's because I KNOW these people I'm writing about. I need to make sure I can make my reader feel sympathetic, too.


Oh, I also forgot to mention, book 2 officially has Chapter 1 finished. It will probably get cut/be an extra scene. All in all I feel VERY successful this week, and I'm looking forward to this last week of break from CANCELLED before rolling up my sleeves and taking no prisoners!

"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.


OTHER AWESOME A ROUND OF WORDS IN 80 DAYS WRITERS...CHECK OUT THEIR BLOGS!!

Printing My First Draft

Proof I wrote for 5 months

 I am on a pauper's editing budget. I can't afford to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for editing. Not on this book. Hopefully by Book 2 I can send my book off for editing, if not then definitely Book 3.

I *know* the book needs editing. That isn't an issue. I am going to do my very best and use as many quality assurance skills I can to help improve the methodology.

First, I outlined my plot. I tried to check my story for holes before I ever wrote a word. Okay, before I wrote more than a few scenes. Writing a few scenes helped me feel the tone of the book, which helped in story boarding. There's layers to editing and I have two editing books that list them. Things like plot, setting, characterization, dialogue. Each chapter will get each layer. The book as a whole will get each layer. I am going to make it the best writing I possibly can.

This is how THICK 225 pages is!!!

Here is where I will print again****

Then come the pre-readers. I am thinking about doing a typo/grammar mistake contest with my 5 pre-readers. Whoever finds the most issues gets a $25 Gift card. And everyone gets a signed copy of the paperback. No idea if they will go for this or not....

Then I will check for typos, each chapter, out of sequence, as many times as it takes until I don't see any more. Not over and over again right away. It will be more like Chapter 3 is checked, I find 2 typos, I mark them. I check other chapters. Then, I come back to Chapter 3, I find another typo, so it will get another run, and just do this systematically until I run out of chapters failing the typo check.

Then I will layout. If I catch anything in the layout, I will fix it. Then print the layout (maybe, unless it's cheaper to buy the mock up from Amazon....).

And that's the best I can do on a shoe-string budget. All in all, I should publish this book for about $500 in expenses....




*** Next time, although this is gorgeous, I'm going to just opt to have the pages printed and hole punched for the first draft. That way as I edit I can print at home and insert them. That should cut the cost from $21 to about $15 or less.

"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Confession...I Almost Quit

When I started this blog, it was to help other people serious about publishing their own writing. I figured while I don't have experience, as a newbie, if I chronicled my mistakes, it might help others.


Here's one of my biggest mistakes: My book COULD be releasing this month. I was originally due to finish my rough draft May 31, 2011. I didn't finish until July 13. 43 days late. Thank goodness my publishing contract doesn't have a penalty clause. But maybe it should? Hmmmm, I'll file that away for later.


What caused the 43 day delay? Doubt. Lots of it. Writing is work. I enjoy my work a great deal, but it is work. My eyes become strained, my fingers swell, my neck aches. In the last 3 days, I've written 18,000 words. 23% of my novel. That figure right there shows I *have* the ability to produce. I am not one of those writers paralyzed by a blank screen. Far from it. and if you sat next to me in a public place, I'd also talk your ear off. I bet the two are connected.


Here's the scary thing. I #wordmongering on Twitter which is writing for 30 minutes, off for 30 minutes. I average 750-1000 words per session. Once I outline. Outlining takes 2-3 weeks. That means for 80,000 words, I really only need 80 hours (30 minutes writing, 30 minutes off which is important. I don't produce as well writing straight through. Writing for one full hour, I end up with only about 1200-1500 words). Hypothetically, I could rough draft a novel in three months (I don't have the luxury of writing 40 hours per week, really only about 10). My first novel I rough drafted in 4 months. So not too bad.


AND I ALMOST QUIT.


The major hurdles for me were 30,000 and 60,000 words. 


At 30,000.


My 30,000 word mark was a hodge-podge of scenes and then about 6 sequential chapters. I was shocked that as I wrote, even the planned scene changed. I had to reconcile as a writer how much I want to stick to my outline vs. let organic win out. In the end, both had to compromise. My outline was overhauled twice. Once here, and again at 60,000. A handful of times the characters were doing something weird, and it got boring to me. Those moments were scrapped as it's great they lived their lives, but too boring to be included in THIS story. I saved some bits, either for future novels or outtakes. 


At 60,000 


I sat at 60,000 words for almost a month. Well, it took me a month to move from 55,000 to break 60,000. I learned I hate writing between the second crisis to the final crisis. Maybe one day I will pioneer a story structure that skips that. Then 2,000 years from now the writing books will say "Up until the early twenty-first century, the classical three-act story structure reigned as king from the days of Ancient Greece. All of this changed with the West Wham-Bam-Thank-You-Ma'am story structure that truncated the rising action between the second and third crisis, keeping the reader on the edge of his or her proverbial seat...."


Then the story about SPAM on Amazon's KDP broke and every Tom, Dick, Harry, and Sally Sue with a blog remotely relating to writing was 100% against self-published material. I mean nastily against. The Cliff's Notes version is that we were out to destroy the world and every cute little kitten. But mostly just destroy the world. 


I was upset. I was angry. I ranted. Then I got over it. 


When you have a goal, anything really, you just don't have time for the naysayers. You don't. You don't have time to correct their misinformed opinions, you don't have time to worry if they're right. Who cares if they are? Destroy the world hmmm? Well, I always wanted to be a dictator, that's why I had kids...... 


I'd share the words of genius comic Kat Williams, but it just wouldn't be appropriate. But basically, it is a hater's job to hate. That's what they do. My job is to do what I need to do to make my living in this world (which for the record, I'd rather NOT destroy).


READY FOR THE AD NAUSEUM ADVICE?


Here's what it took for me to finish my first draft. It's not easy. It sounds easy, but it's not. It sucks. And when I say it sucks, I mean remember those days where you hate your job, hate your boss, hate your life, everything goes wrong and you want to stick your head in a microwave? It's worse than that. Because right here is where it all rests on you, baby. There is no boss to gripe about, there is no co-worker you can blame the missed deadline on.


You have to sit your butt in a chair and say "I'm going to finish you." And type. And after you eat, sleep, or use the restroom, you sit back down in the chair as say "I'm really going to finish you!" And type. Over and over and over again. When you get to the point of it's either me or you (you being the manuscript), it physically hurts. I typed until my fingers swelled. My eyes closed two nights in a row with an eye-strain twitch. 18,000 words in 3 days. That's what it took for me to kill that story. 


It really came down to me or my manuscript. If I didn't finish, I would be embarrassed not just to myself, but to all of the friends and family I told I was writing a book. Most importantly, I'd look foolish in front of my husband. The man who graciously enough understood when the laundry wasn't done, or dinner was phoned in. If I ever make any kind of decent money on this, I'm taking him to Italy. :) 


In my head swirled a million and one questions about my ability, my motivation, even my prioritization! Was this just going to be another "big idea" I have that I just can't seem to finish? Was this going to be another time my perfectionism got the better of me? No. It wasn't. 


And after i got my butt in the seat, here's the last important part... I gave myself permission to suck, and got it done. And looking back, I know I'm a stronger writer because of it.


"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

#ROW80 AMAZIIING Milestone

At 11:28 AM on Wednesday, July 13 

I FINISHED MY NOVEL'S FIRST DRAFT

In the recent tweets by @KarenDelabar, GGGGOOOOOOOOAAAAALLLLLL!!!!

The 225 page document is off at Officemax right now being printed and bound so I have a galley type object to edit. The cost to print the document was $25. I pick it up tomorrow. Another benefit of printing it out is that I can take it with me anywhere to work on it. 

I am *very* excited to start editing, but I'm going to wait two weeks. I might break this rule and edit Chapters 1 and 2 ahead of time, but they are months old, so I am not attached at all. In fact, I really can't wait to overhaul Chapter 1. It's even technically teetering on being cut altogether. I LOVE my Chapter 2. I find it far more interesting. It has more tension, and grabs the reader more, I think. However, this decision can't be taken lightly, as it would change thing. Unless..... I use the dreaded flashback to just highlight a few important parts.

Other major progress this week on my SOUVENIRS. I figured out an easy, low cost way to make some content on my reader site only available to those who buy the book! 

Finally, I have blog post coming on about a pricing idea. :) Oh, and I have two versions of the back copy for my printed version. So I am on track there. I realize the ten day delay in "travel documentation," my first draft, puts me behind on my editing schedule. I'm not going to panic and move the dates around. Instead I want to see what happens when I start editing and see if I can't make that time up by working weekends.

My To Do list this week:

*** Take a break!!!!

*** If I feel like writing, work on something else!

*** Create a master scene list from the manuscript for editing checklists. (Grading, line editing, typo verifications 1, 2, and 3, characterizations, etc.)

"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.

Other GREAT #ROW80 Participants!

Self-Published Author Lesson Learned: Don't Become TOO Attached to THAT Ending

"And they lived happily ever after...THE END."


Writing a draft isn't hard. FINISHING a draft is Herculean. 


I have learned a very hard lesson after weeks of dragging my feet, ignoring my manuscript... just willing it to be finished. That doesn't really work, by the way. There is no Jedi Mind trick to make the book write itself. 


Result: I was too committed to my ending to finish my book. 
I write out of order. The first scene I ever wrote of this current incarnation of CANCELLED is the final crisis where the baby is born. Then I went back and wrote the beginning. Then I wrote a few pivotal scenes in the middle. Then wrote more of the ending after the baby is born. And finally, hunkered down to fill in the gaps sequentially. All with a master outline that had each scene where it is supposed to go. It was kinda like a jigsaw puzzle. I had the final picture (the outline), but I needed to write the pieces one by one, thus sticking them in the puzzle. I began with the edges first (the major scenes that couldn't really change in subject matter or function without dramatically impacting the story).


Then I got to the part of the puzzle where you are almost done, only three or four pieces left but you only have two in your hand. Where did those two lost pieces go? You check under the box, under the table. Finally, after a few minutes you find you were sitting on them, or they were under the puzzle itself. Except my 5 minutes was a few days.


Here was my solution. Reduce the number of pieces I needed. OH NO! THAT'S REARRANGING THE ENTIRE PUZZLE!!!! No, it's not. My story is strong enough that it took it like a champ. A few details will change here and there, but now I get from where Johnathan's fiancee finds out about the baby to the time the baby is born MUCH quicker, just by adjusting when Johnathan is told about the baby by two months. The easiest way to shift this is now my first scene doesn't happen January 27, but December 17. Now, the story remains the same, Kellie still tells Johnathan about the baby, but it's not until March, after she has confirmed without a doubt she is pregnant and likely to carry the baby to term. Now, Alex still finds out about the baby at the end of June, but the baby is born the third week of August, not the third week of September. And most importantly, I can STOP trying to fill a month's worth of "story time" with silly scenes that feel forced, even to me.


If I had an agent, or a publisher, I probably would have had the resources earlier to tell me "Elizabeth, this is too big of a gap from second crisis to final crisis." As an indie, I had some writer friends on Twitter who sparked the solution.


Now, just because changing this major aspect in my story is convenient, doesn't automatically make it the right thing to do. But I've checked against my characterizations. Moving the timetable a little makes Johnathan look a little less like a monster when he keeps the secret from Alex. It fits with Kellie's personality as well, and her fears about what Johnathan might or might not do. Plot wise this strengthens many scenes that I had arranged as kind of a stretch. For example, after celebrating his birthday and having the one-night stand, he leaves to go on vacation with his stepmother in France. This happening over the Christmas holiday makes more sense, and intensifies the jealousy his mother shows at the end of Chapter 2. It also underscores the importance of Johnathan and Anna to one another, especially after the death of his father four years ago, without coming across as oedipal. And when she brings a boyfriend along, and he is jealous because he doesn't have a loved one at Christmas (and who doesn't feel that way being single on the holidays), it intensifies his desire for Alexis. 


Therefore, keep nothing sacred in your first draft. Not even the most important plot element in the story. But, make sure a change isn't just convenience for convenience sake. The change must make the story a stronger and more compelling tale for the reader.  :)


Now I get to dive in and make a ridiculous amount of changes, and close up that little hole left by two missing puzzle pieces.


"CANCELLED" arriving SEPTEMBER 2011. A robotics engineer asks his business partner to marry him, but a previous one-night stand is having his baby.