No time like the present

It’s spring! Birds are busy courting. Seeds are busy sprouting. After a few hours of weeding my allotment I sat down to consider my progress. Then my attention was drawn to a huge bumble bee who was buzzing around the cornflowers on the borders of my veg beds. Cornflowers are so tiny, they sit on

Wrapping Up and Moving On

The third edit of my novel is finally complete and I’m starting that long journey of finding agents who are looking for light, sentimental, romantic summer reads to sell to publishers who are looking for the same. I remember reading that it can take about 18 months from getting a publisher interested to final publication

What to do with the Feedback?

I was still struggling with some of the feedback I’d received from trusted readers. All very different. It took a while for it to sink in. Each friend I’d asked to read the book had reacted to it in a way that totally reflected their own character, their own concerns and their own view of

Waiting for The Book Editor’s Report

I’d had some feedback from a few of my trusted readers but real life and Christmas took precedent so I’d felt the need for professional help. It was New Year’s Day and I was counting the days until I would get the Report from the Book Editor. I’d sent my manuscript off four weeks earlier.

And Finally – I’ve Sent My Book To My Trusted Readers

Two years after first putting pen to paper and one month after finishing the second edit I have finally sent my novel to my four trusted readers. What took so long? Starting the Compilation I wrote the book as individual chapters, each in their own Word document. So my first task was to compile them

The End of the Second Edit

Hurray! I have finally reached the end of the second edit of my novel. At the start I had 80,000 words and 39 chapters, now I have 92,000 words and 50 chapters. I realised as I went through that I still had many sections that were just the bare bones of the plot which have

Jump-starting the Second Edit

Yesterday, while browsing in the local market, I stopped to talk to a man who was selling a self-published autobiography. Adopted as a baby, he spent his whole life wondering why his mother gave him away. His book tells how he set about finding his birth mother and birth father. He said when he finished

Tackling the Second Edit

19th August 2021 So there I was with some great advice from a Literary Agent and a Screenwriting Webinar and could I get started on the second edit? No. I did spend a lot of time weeding, picking and pruning on the allotment, mending the clothes in the sewing pile, entertaining two lots of visitors

How Professional Advice and Feedback can Inspire You to Carry on Editing.

18th July 2021 This month I’ve been lucky to spend some time with a Literary Agent and take part in a one day webinar on ‘How to Write an Attention Grabbing Final Act’ as part of the London Screenwriters’ Festival. It was good timing, as my inspiration to carry on working on my Rom Com

When to Show Your Story to Strangers

20th June 2021 After finishing the first edit of my Rom Com novel I felt a great urge to send it out to the two trusted readers that I had lined up. I went back to the start intending to read it through in one go myself, to get up the courage to send it