Self-Editing

Deek and I send our thoughts and well-wishes to everyone affected by Hurricanes Harvey and Irma and to all who are dealing with the fires, especially our friends and family out that way. It's been crazy watching the Pacific Northwest burn, Houston drown, and the East Coast brace for Irma. I'm ready for the weather to settle down a bit. Better yet, can we just have summer back??

I can't believe how cold it's gotten in the last few days. I'm freezing, and it's only September!! Ugh, hurry up and be Christmas and then go back to summer. ;)

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So, I finished the rough draft of my Molly and Ryder story!!! YAY! I worked and reworked the first chapter and then sent it to my hubby and critique partners to see if they thought I'd created a gripping enough opening. If you don't get the beginning right, the rest doesn't matter because no one will get that far.

Like always, my brilliant hubs and Dream Team offered valuable feedback. I've worked in their suggestions, and now I'm trickling that down to the rest of the story. As I do that, I'm making notes to myself along the way. Some of them are very brilliant like "Do better" and "Be more clever here." LOL!

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*Don't worry. If you hire me to edit your work, I'll be much more specific in my instructions. Haha! But I know what I mean when I say that to myself. ;) 

Self-editing is very important. I've heard this crazy notion of people finishing their rough drafts and sending those directly to critique partners and editors, or worse...to publishers and agents. Whenever anyone asks me for my biggest piece of advice to writers, I always say edit, edit, edit, and when you think you're done, edit some more. NEVER turn your rough draft over to anyone. You should edit that thing until you've exhausted yourself. And when you've completed that, let your beta readers and critique partners have a look. Then, edit it again. And when you're like, "Yes, it's as good as it can get," edit it one more time. I'm not even kidding.

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At BookFish and Tenacious, we can always tell when someone hasn't put in the editing effort. You don't want an agent or publisher to think you don't value your work enough to put in the time to make it great. Don't shoot yourself in the foot right out of the starting gate.

Even though Deek and I are both knee-deep in editing (he's working on a sci-fi called The eXtractor), we've taken some time out for a little fun and exploration to keep our minds fresh. Take your own little mental break and join us...

I love this man so hard, I might cheesy grin my lips right off my face!

Editing in the coffee shop all author like

Taking a walk/hike through some beautiful woods!

Amazing corridor!

I feel like this is some weird rock-paper-scissors thing...

Post-run in the pre-Irma wind and rain.

Gawd, I love him!

Every day, I think I have reached the pinnacle of love for this man because it's at an epic high, but every single day, I love him more. It's like the universe, ever-expanding.

This is representative of my life--full of happiness, laughter, and love.

Enjoying a little culture.

Oh yeah! Summer/beach girl in heaven!

The future becomes the present!

Until next time, Trinna has a PSA...

Edit, edit, edit.