State of the Becky

Heyyyy, all! I hope everyone is doing well, and I hope the USians among you are staying safe amid this swath of summer storms.

Sorry it has been so quiet around here lately! I am still around, lurking and reading all your posts, but I have not had much to post lately. It seems I have finally reached the point in my publishing journey where it's better if I just keep my mouth shut about the specifics until I have something concrete to say - which is not a natural impulse for me, having blogged so heavily about my querying process, but I'm getting used to it! So all I'll say is: all is well, my soul remains uncrushed by this business, and perhaps someday in the future I will be running all over the blogosphere screaming news from the rooftops.

In the meantime, I have hammered out my writing schedule for the foreseeable future, and I am really excited about it. There was a significant period of time last year where I had a lot of half-formed ideas but wasn't truly excited about any of them, but now I'm really happy with my line-up and I can't wait to get to work. And, of course, this allows for the prospect of a new idea coming in and sweeping me off my feet, which is always fun.

Here's what I've got on tap, and the order in which I'll tackle them:

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Project #1: Revisionland! Once again. =P I would have thought that revising a single manuscript so many times would be a tad bit disheartening, but it's actually really fun. There's something really fascinating about working on something you know inside and out -just when you think you're done renovating, you find a whole new floor of the house you haven't even touched yet. Working on this one has really been a crash course in how to be a better writer. I'm just waiting on some notes, and then off I go again.

Project #2: Drafting overhaul. I generally don't do this, but Project #2 is a special case - the drafting process got pretty broken up amidst all my trips to Revisionland, and though I had 60k under my belt in the first draft, I realized I was going into Act Three without any of my usual momentum. And since this is probably one of the most heavily structured stories I've done, I need that momentum!

So once those Project #1 revisions are done, I'm going back to the beginning with Project #2. I won't be starting from scratch, but I can change the things I need to change, and keep the rest consistent. And that'll free me up to plow full speed ahead into the as-yet-unwritten denouement!

Project #3: Drafting! FINALLY. Project #3 has gone through two or three false starts since I came up with the idea a couple years ago, and it's finally ready to go. And I couldn't be happier. It'll take me back in a more surreal, fantastical direction (Project #2 is straight gothic horror), it takes place in one of my favorite cities in the world, and if I do it right, it will give people nightmares. So let's hope I do it right.

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So that's what I'm up to, loves. What are you working on this summer?

Distractions

Hello all!

Sorry this blog has been far too quiet lately. That whole sequence of "work on revisions, send revisions to beta, implement beta's changes, send revisions to Secret Agent Man, spend next two weeks terrified about revisions while re-watching episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer" takes up a surprising amount of brainpower.

So I am trying to distract myself. Sadly I am all out of Buffy episodes to watch, but there are other things! Planning my two WIPs. Looking at cute accessories on the internet. Stockpiling tasty-looking recipes. Entering this giveaway for THE NIGHTMARE AFFAIR by Mindee Arnett (and click the link to look at her awesomely creepy cover.) Watching this adorable video of debut author Susan Dennard receiving a copy of her book (okay, yes, that brings me back to publishing again, but in a good way!) Adding upcoming books to my Amazon Wist List, then trying to devise a method of time-travel so I can read them before everyone else. Job-hunting -- oh no, wait, now we're back at terror again.

But you get the idea! As realistic as I am about my chances in the publishing world, it's hard not to daydream - about what my cover would look like, or my first signing, or the fabulous outfits I would wear to BEA (of which I have several!) Sometimes those daydreams are good to have around. And other times, I just need to put them out of my mind. It's much better for my blood pressure.

What do you do when you need to distract yourself?

R&R&R&R

As I do believe I've mentioned before, I don't believe in fairy tales.

One of these days, I may have to alter that statement, but though I am an unflinching optimist in most other walks of life, my realism is my armor when it comes to submitting my work. I started querying my first novel in February 2010, and I had visions of signing my contract before my 22nd birthday in late March. It's been over two years since that first query, and since then I have learned how to take a more measured approach. The submission process is full of rejections and disappointments, after all.

But once in a while, a girl just has to celebrate. It is somewhat hard to celebrate when my work computer keeps crashing every time I try to load a .gif, but I will substitute wacky colors instead.

~*I GOT ANOTHER EDITORIAL LETTER YESTERDAY*~

Whew. Okay. Now that I got THAT out of my system...

We all know about the R&R, or 'revise and resubmit.' This is an R&R&R&R, or a 'revise and resubmit and revise and resubmit.' And you guys, editorial letter #2 is awesome. I wish I had taken a video of my reactions while reading it to put on YouTube; I was sort of worried that someone would come over to my desk and ask what I was doing! In any case, I am beyond thrilled with Secret Agent Man's feedback, and ready to get back to work.

In any case, a huge thank you to all of you for your support, and stay tuned for the continued saga...

Contest linkspam!

Happy March, everyone! Wow - is it really March already? I feel like February just blew by in a haze of hyperventilating and constantly refreshing my e-mail.

Okay, that's an exaggeration. (Sort of.) But since I started my revisions last summer, I got back into that groove of proactively working toward my goal, and now, five weeks after submitting my revised manuscript to Secret Agent Man, I am finally starting to readjust to submission mode. Otherwise known as waiting. Otherwise known as wild swings between periods of extreme optimism and periods of HE HATES IT HE HATES IT OH GODDDDDD. Y'all know how it is, I'm sure!

For those of you in proactive mode, however, I have seen a bunch of super-amazing contests around the blogosphere. If you have a finished manuscript, think about submitting to one of them! I will be there to cheer you on!

Operation Awesome's March Mystery Agent Contest. I can't believe it's been a year since I first entered a one-line pitch here! I did the Mystery Agent Contest a couple of times last year, and I met some really fantastic agents through it. And the Operation Awesome ladies are, to be uncreative for a moment, AWESOME. Slots are going fast, though, so hurry up! And make sure to check the Mystery Agent's desired genres!

The Liz Norris Pay It Forward Writing Contest opens today! Do you want to put your manuscript in front of sharkly super agent Janet Reid, and possibly win a trip to a writing conference? Of course you do. Head over there and check out the rules!

The Authoress' March Secret Agent contest opens on Monday. You'll want to be ready for this one. You can get tons of feedback on your first 250 words, and possibly even a partial or full request from the Secret Agent hirself. Details, including submission windows, are over on the MSFV blog.

Best of luck to all of us!

In which I set my cap at a jaunty angle and ride into battle

Happy 2012, everyone! How were your holidays? Mine were eventful and relaxing at the same time - it kept me busy, but purely with fun stuff. But now it's back to work, both for the book (yay!) and for the day job (... eh.)

Every year, I find it harder and harder to make real New Year's Resolutions. When I was in school, it was much easier: get good grades, and stop screwing around on the internet so much. (Until I realized that the second one would never happen, and I just found a better way to balance studying with screwing around on the internet.) But my goals are moving further into a place where they're not quite in my control. I can't guarantee that I'll make everything happen, but I can promise myself I'll try.

But you know what? I've got some really awesome stuff on tap for this year. My manuscript will be ready to go in a couple of weeks, and I'll be sending it back to Secret Agent Man. I've FINALLY decided on my next writing project, which I will start in February, and I've got a couple fun ideas still developing. I might even see some exciting new changes on the personal front by late summer. It's daunting to have so much I'd like to accomplish, but it's also so thrilling. It's great to be this psyched for what's ahead!

So watch this space. 2012 will be the Year of Getting Things Done. So hopefully I'll have news before long!

Did you make any resolutions?

Accomplishments

Good news, everyone! I finished my rewrites!

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

... of course, now comes the editing and polishing of the rewrites, but I'm giving myself a week off first. I am super happy with the way things worked out: I definitely need to sand off the rough edges, but this is much closer to the original book I had in mind in terms of themes, worldbuilding, and voice. It is also much longer, which I knew it would be, but I'm still going to chop off as much as possible.

In any case, I e-mailed Secret Agent Man and told him I'd be sending him the finished product sometime next month. I am pumped and terrified at the same time.

Every writer needs a support group, and I have a wonderful one. My friends and family have been absolutely fantastic from the get-go. There's something they always say, though, and until recently, I just thought they were being nice: "I'm so proud of how far you've come."

And I'd always think, "But I have so much left to go." I hadn't reached my goal yet, and when I thought about my progress, that was all I could see.

-- of course, that's incredibly silly. It's my dream to be a professional author, and if I can get that far, there will always be new goals. Even if I'm lucky enough to sign with Secret Agent Man, I'll still have to go out on submission. Even if I'm astronomically lucky enough to get this book published, there's still the next book to worry about. And as with any goal, I'm sure there will be unexpected setbacks and changes that need to be accounted for - few things ever turn out exactly the way they do in your head.

And that's why I decided to make a point of celebrating when the smaller goals are met. Finishing rewrites was a pretty big one, but there were all sorts of goals in-between, too. I celebrated when I got ahead of my set schedule. I celebrated if I was having a particularly tough day but I managed to write something anyway. I celebrated when I managed to pull off a tricky scene, when I nailed down an elusive plot point, or when I finally wrote out a moment that's been in my head for months. These celebrations typically just involved me, a rented movie, and some sushi, but it allowed me to take some time just to feel happy about what I'd accomplished.

I know writers are a pretty driven, self-critical bunch, but I don't think that should preclude us from feeling good about ourselves. So no matter what happens with this manuscript, I'm going to be proud of it. Because even if it isn't The One, I've learned so much from writing it!

What goals have you accomplished lately? (Non-writing goals totally count!)

What do you want to hear about?

EPIC BECKYFAIL. I'm so sorry for the radio silence. Revisions, day job stuff, holidays, and various technical difficulties have combined in the best and worst ways possible over the last couple of weeks. I also received my first blog award, courtesy of the awesome S.L Hennessy, but since I haven't had a chance to pick my own set of winners yet, you'll hear more about that later.

Revisions are actually ALMOST DONE, which fills me with joy and indescribable terror at the same time.  I made it official by e-mailing Secret Agent Man the other night to let him know I'd be finished by mid-January, and now I have permanently entered freakout mode. I've been revising in my own little corner for so long, I'd sort of convinced myself that I was calm and with-it and used to the submission process. Not so, as it turns out.

Since November was pretty hectic, I want to try and update on a fairly regular basis until the holidays... but first, I want to hear from you! What do you want to see on the blog? If there's anything in particular you're curious about - the manuscript, the Tokyo subway system, my recipe for salmon risotto, anything goes - leave a comment, and I will write a post to that effect!

Various and sundry

First of all! Thank you so much to everyone who commented on the flash fiction piece! You guys are awesome. I was grinning all last week!

Well, my holiday weekend got off to a slightly inauspicious start: my laptop's power cord shuffled off this mortal coil on Friday afternoon, and I had set pretty lofty goals for my revision work. But after the requisite wailing and rending of garments, I figured out a few ways to stretch out the remaining battery power, and it looks like I'll be fine until the new one gets here. I didn't end up falling too short of my goal, either, since I knew I didn't have time to procrastinate on the internet and I got straight to work. And I got to relax with some new books in the name of conserving battery power! I read WITCH EYES and ANNA DRESSED IN BLOOD, both of which I thoroughly enjoyed. The latter will be the subject of my Dark YA Blogfest post this week!

I also hit 90k on the revised draft, with more sure to come. My original draft was a relatively modest 74k, and most of my complete manuscripts fall around that length. I always assumed that, if I were to do revisions with an agent, I would either be chopping scenes out or rewriting and restructuring in general. There's a bit of that, and I imagine there will be more to come, but this draft is definitely the Add All The Things Draft. The number is giving me a mini-heart-attack - I think I have some sort of word count mental block - but the best thing about my editorial letter is that it's basically giving me permission to expand. I'm really enjoying the chance to dig deeper into the worldbuilding, characters, and themes.

But anyway! That's what I've been up to. How about you?

NaNo Open Thread

You guys! I'm so sorry for my epic fail for the first week of the Dark YA Blogfest. My excuse is not a very good one - I couldn't choose a favorite book. D: I definitely intend to join in again this week with the flash fiction prompt, though.

But enough of that. Let's talk about NaNo! I can't do it this year because of revisiony things, but I still want to join in the excitement, so I will have to live vicariously through all of you who are. It's always fun to hear about what my friends are doing - I know someone who's aiming for 200,000 words, and is up to 30k already. (Yeah, I can't even comprehend how efficient she is. If I hadn't seen some of the novel in question, I would think she was re-enacting a scene from The Shining. "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy...")

So for this post, if you feel so inclined, tell me about your NaNo! What's it about? What's your main character like? What is your word count goal, and what are you up to now?

On a revisiony note, I am plugging along over here. Factoring in my current pace, the holidays, and additional read-throughs/beta edits, it looks like I'll be sending it to Secret Agent Man in January. Eeeeeek!

Open thread

First of all, welcome to all you fabulous new people from the Blogfest! I hope to get to know you all better soon. Thanks to everyone who visited Tiffany, Katrina, and Casey's blogs as well!

My posts here have been kind of sporadic as of late. As you new people will learn quickly (seeing as I never shut up about it), I am in the middle of extensive revisions that are basically eating up all my free time. In two chapters, I'll be halfway done - with this pass, at least. I definitely want to do another pass before sending it off to my betas, and then I imagine that I'll have several more tweaks to make before sending it off to the agent.

So yeah. No pressure or anything. But I'm loving every minute of the process, even if it's completely and utterly terrifying.

Anyway! I wanted to open up this post for introductions, Q&A, and whatever else strikes your fancy. If you'd like to know something about me, ask away! And if you'd like to tell me a little about yourself, your WIP, your favorite cheese, or whatever else, that would be really awesome!

(I'm only half-kidding about the cheese, by the way. This cheeseaholic is always looking for something new to try.)

Have a fantastic day, everyone. I'm off to get a closer look at some of these new blogs!

The rhythm of writing

Good morning, all!

As I prepare for my holiday weekend excursion (off to Boston, hell yeah!) I am trying to get ahead on my rewriting. It's going pretty well so far: normally I revise very quickly, but I'm retyping almost everything to imbue the narrative with a little more voice. I just finished chapter four rewrites, and I'm happy, even though I'm sure I'll make more tweaks on my second pass. Since I've spent most of my time so far expanding the beginning, I'm just now getting to some of the creepier scenes in the story, which comes with all sorts of fun new challenges.

Writing something scary can be so tricky, because horror is such a visual genre. You don't have a lot of the same tricks that, say, moviemakers do: you can't show the reader the terrifying face of your monster, you can't really make the reader jump, and you can't add a creepy score to the scene. The best horror novels I've read rely instead on a steadily building tension throughout the story. One way they build this tension is through rhythm.

It's hard to describe what a talented writer can do with this technique, but when they pull it off, it's amazing. It's like the text itself is imitating the protagonist's heartbeat. These scenes start off slow, normal, and innocuous enough. As the readers start to get hints that something is wrong here, the scene starts to pick up, move faster. The sentences might get wild and breathless or choppy and frantic, but either way, the readers find themselves tearing through the scene because they can't stand not knowing what happens. Finally, when the tension reaches unbearable levels, it breaks, usually with what TV Tropes would call a 'Wham Line.' (Which is pretty much just how it sounds: a line of text or dialogue, usually a single sentence, that reaches out and smacks you in the face.)

This is, of course, a lot harder than it sounds, but I am practicing in the hopes that I'll get better at it. When I write a scary scene, I try to imagine the 'beats,' like a drum that starts off steady and even and gets wilder and quicker with every sentence. I can't say if it's working or not, but I really, really hope it does!

Do you incorporate rhythm into your writing?

On time management

When I talk to many of the people I knew in my high school or college writing programs, many of them will say to me, "You're so lucky. I really want to write, but I can't find the time." 

As an administrative assistant, a lot of what I do is scheduling. I take the things that my bosses want to do and I distill them into a controlled chaos. I try to make everything fit, even when it's not perfect - especially when it's not perfect. Sometimes I get lucky, and things work out. And the rest of the time I can often be heard saying things like "Did you have your heart set on eating that day?" or "How much do you hate that hotel?"

So I spend most of my weekdays doing that, and then I go home and attempt to be my own scheduler. I am generally much less successful.

I would like to take a moment to express my deepest admiration to those of you who have spouses and kids. Y'all have superpowers. Or barring that, Time Turners. As a 23-year-old single woman, I have very few responsibilities, but even I don't have enough hours in the day. I get off work at 5:30, I get home around 6:30, I make myself something quick for dinner, and then I get straight to revisions. Even though I've been out of college for more than a year, I feel like I'm still trying to nail down the rhythms of post-collegiate life, to varying levels of success.

Some nights I'm much more productive than others. Sometimes my brain is on, sometimes it's off. It's certainly off by the time I'm done writing for the day. And then other things get ahead of me. The apartment's upkeep gets ahead of me. Laundry gets ahead of me. Comcast crashes again. My exercise regimen gets shot to hell. I abruptly remember that I need to allow some social time so my friends and family don't think I'm dead. That sort of thing.

The strange thing that happens with these busy days is that people get so overwhelmed with everything they have to do, they'll just leave all of it undone. They can't do everything, so they won't do anything. Some days I feel like that, and I know that weekdays are going to be haphazard. But that's why, on Fridays, I act as my own scheduler and I plan my weekend. Besides writing, what am I going to take care of? What two or three big things am I going to catch up on in my free time?

That simple method just makes everything feel more manageable, and getting non-writing things done lets me get so much more work done on writing. Productivity just creates so much energy and confidence. Instead of lying around and watching bad television all weekend, I feel like I can do anything. I can finish this tough rewrite! I can figure out what I want to do with this scene! I can go buy a shoe rack! (Don't judge. That's the best purchase I've ever made.)

So I tell my former classmates that I understand. It's hard enough to figure out how to function as an adult without adding writing to the mix. It's not an easy thing to settle into at all. But I'm learning how to be my own scheduler. I take the things I want to do and I distill them into a controlled chaos. I make everything fit, even when it's not perfect - especially when it's not perfect. And that's how I find the time to write.

I'm still trying to figure out where sleep fits into all this, though.

I've been tagged!

Good morning, all! I had a wonderfully restful weekend, and I'm feeling vaguely human again. And as it turns out, I have also been tagged by the lovely Tiffany to post ten random facts about myself!

Since I did post some facts not too long ago (bad Becky, getting ahead of yourself), I'm going to do something slightly different with this. Since last week sort of made me want to punt my desk through a wall, I'm going to post Ten Things To Be Happy About Today! So without further ado, here I go.

1. I finished my line-by-line notes this weekend, and I'm going to start rewrites tonight! I'm really happy, because this is the fun part. I feel like the reread was some kind of editing triage: figuring out which passages would be okay with a little patching, and which ones needed more intensive rewrites. But now I actually get to start fixing it. I can't wait!

2. My favorite time of the year is quickly approaching! I may be alone in this, but I think that October, November, and December are the best months of the year. I can't wait to bust out the sweaters and scarves, and I especially can't wait to curl up with some hot chocolate or a pumpkin spice latte.

3. I am flush with fantastic reading material lately. Besides all the great books in my to-read pile, I plan to pick up Wildwood (which is going to have a stop-motion movie adaptation, BE STILL MY HEART), Possess, and Isle of Blood. Two horror novels and a quirky fantasy - that's pretty much all I need to be happy.

4. After my sudden burst of productivity over the weekend, my apartment is sparkly clean. This is more monumentous than I care to admit.

5. Inspiration struck last week, and now I think my next project is all set to go. I may still change my mind while I'm revising this one, but I think this new idea fills in the gap that had been preventing me from getting invested.

6. It's so wonderfully quiet today. I am taking the opportunity to bask in it. 

7. I talked about writing with non-writing people yesterday! And they didn't look at me funny! I have always been a bit nervous about discussing my writing with people for the first time, but my friends seemed genuinely interested in the manuscript and are cheering me on. I was going through some slight revision panic that day, so it was good to hear.

8. Maybe as a result of all the things above, I am feeling relaxed and confident. And that's always a wonderful thing.

9. I have you guys! When I started this blog, I thought I'd have one or two subscribers, but I managed to find some really great people. I love logging on in the morning to check your posts, and I'm really enjoying watching you all follow your dreams. I can't wait to see where you end up!

10. I am buying brie tonight. And yes, that totally belongs on this list. Brie is delicious, y'all.


Tagged: I think most of you have already done this (or have already been tagged) but feel free to share a random fact/something that made you happy/etc in the comments!

Revisions. Revisions forever.

It is a very good thing that I had a relaxing holiday weekend, because I have gone right back to my 'office by day, revisions by night' schedule of unholy doom. And as if to prove a point, in the middle of writing that sentence I was dragged off to negotiate with florists. (Oh, day job. You give me such interesting life skills.)

I'm working very late tomorrow night, so I want to make sure to get lots done tonight. I've got four chapters left to mark up and make notes on, and my outlines and lists of new/extended scenes grow longer every day. Right now I am mainly focusing on the gaps where I can weave in the new material, and the areas that can be rewritten to strengthen voice. Making the exposition and worldbuilding richer is going to be tons of fun, but the real work will be giving this manuscript a beating heart.

And that all hinges on my protagonist, Kalinda. Oh, Kalinda. I know she's not the cold fish everyone thinks she is, and I know she wants to look that way because she thinks people will take her more seriously. I know how desperately she wants to be the hero, the knight in shining armor, and I know how deeply rooted her fears, doubts, and insecurities are. I know that she has a crush she emphatically does not want to have, and I know that she keeps her mouth shut because when she doesn't, all the awkwardness just pours right out.

But Kalinda? Just because you're reserved doesn't mean you can hold all these things back from me.

The challenge here is going to be to really break that character open and let the readers see her as she is, not how she wants to appear. That's the main focus of my reread right now. And I think that if I nail that in the rewrites, my MS is going to be so, so much better.

So, y'know. No pressure or anything.

On an unrelated note, I'm loving all the writing excerpts around here lately! I'd love to join in the fun, but I don't know what I'd post. Do y'all have any suggestions/things you're curious to see?

Ego Boost Friday

When you're revising, it's pretty easy to lose track of what you like about your own writing. Last night I reread the pivotal chapters at the midpoint of the manuscript, and the number of notes I took and passages I marked up was a little overwhelming. I know a lot of you are going through revisions as well, and I'll bet some of you are sitting there and thinking about your flaws, just like I am right now.

Well, don't get me wrong, it's so important to stay critical of your writing. But every so often, I think it's important to remember that you're not some hopeless, worthless hack. So I declare today Ego Boost Friday! How do you participate in Ego Boost Friday? Easy. Just comment here and tell me one thing you like about your WIP. It can be as tiny or significant as you want. Feel free to send your friends over to play, too!

As for me... hmm. I'm probably happiest with the reveal in chapter ten - I marked up comparatively few passages in the last scene. And in general, I'm excited for some of these new scenes I'm going to write!

Your turn, bloggers!

On self-doubt, bravado, and revision goggles

Happy Monday, everyone! I had a rather interesting weekend. I was thankfully spared the worst of Irene - the wind and rain was pretty intense, but my electricity hung in there the entire time. And in further good news, my very first editorial letter arrived on Friday night!

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!

You guys. It's the best feedback I've ever gotten. You'd think a critique that clocks in around 2,500 words would be at least a little soul-crushing, but this letter pointed out the story's shortcomings in an extremely helpful and constructive way. This is the sort of critique I strive to write for others: one that does not discourage the writer, but makes them excited to press on.

So I jumped to work on my own set of notes. I brainstormed ways to implement the suggestions made, and I made a list of scenes to add and extend, of which there will be quite a few. The best part about these revisions is that I get to explore entirely new facets of the worldbuilding, mythology, and characters, and I'm already having so much fun thinking it all through.

There is, however, one thing I kept putting off all weekend: the first reread of the MS. Finally, I forced myself to look at the first page...

"Oh God. This is terrible."

The revision goggles are a fearsome thing. I know it can't be as bad as I'm making it out to be, but once I put those goggles on, everything seems wrong. It's like one of those sci-fi disaster movies where the grizzled scientist (played by Bill Pullman) looks at the man-made calamity and grits, "We can't stop it. It's self-sustaining now."

This is where the doubt sets in, through no one's fault but my own. At that moment, I felt the disconnect between what I want my work to be and what it is right now. Can I really make it as amazing as it needs to be to succeed?

For a lot of writers, this is the tricky part. We need some of that self-doubt to keep ourselves grounded. But in order to succeed, we also need a little action hero-style bravado. We need to recognize our shortcomings, but truly believe that somehow, we're going to conquer them. As daunting as challenges can be, they can also be pretty exciting, right?

So for the record: my manuscript, as it is, is not as awesome as I want it to be. But I'm going to make it awesome. I'm going to work hard, and I'm going to put in as much time as it takes. And no matter how this works out, I'm going to be better for it.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to set my cap at a jaunty angle and charge into battle. 

What challenges are you facing right now?

Revision timeline

First of all, thank you all so much for coming to play with me yesterday! I had such a good time getting to talk to everyone. A special thanks to Katrina for the wonderful introduction!

And now, onto today's post...

I like to keep moving. I'm the type who prefers walking to work over sitting on a bus trapped in morning traffic. Sure, the bus might break out of the gridlock and get ahead of me, but it'll still feel like I got there faster.

When I'm not writing, I'm thinking about it. I'm outlining, or plotting, or sometimes I just walk around my neighborhood and let the scenes play out in my head. Revisions are the same way. I can make very big changes very quickly, so my instinct is to charge full speed ahead.

That works out for me sometimes. But as I wait on my revision notes, I know that's not something I want to do this time around. This agent's clients are amazing. I really want to step up my game and make these revisions the best they can possibly be. I want to think through every angle of each suggestion before I go ahead and make the changes.

It's daunting, but I don't think it's impossible. I mean, if I managed to turn myself from an impulse buyer to a frugal shopper, nothing's impossible! But it helps if I give myself steps to follow. Here are mine:

- Don't touch the manuscript until you get the notes! But maybe write up some supplemental material for the mythology and such.

- When you receive the notes, read them over carefully, then reread the MS with those notes in mind.

- Set aside two weeks to just think about the edits, and write up a set of notes of your own. Don't start the changes until this period is over.

- Once this period ends, begin changes, and hope that you didn't tear too much of your hair out in the interim. Give MS a couple more passes on your own, then ship it off to betas for their opinion.

- Do a victory dance. Background music to be determined.

Easy enough, right? In theory, anyway. I think it'll be so worth it in the long run.

What about you guys? What kind of reviser are you? What kind of reviser do you want to be?