The End

  • January 24, 2011

NO, not the end of this blog, although my infrequent posting may have indicated otherwise.

I typed THE END a few days ago when I finished my manuscript revisions. I fought the urge to change to a fancy font and use a different color, purple or green perhaps, and just typed it the regular way.

And wow, did it feel good.

I thought I’d post some stats for anyone who is interested in what the process of writing a novel was like for me.

Word count: 77,293.
Pages: 366
Number of months to write first and second drafts: approximately 7
Number of months to revise. approximately 4
Number of beta readers (so far): 2
Number of beta readers who are waiting to read the manuscript: approximately 7
Genre: commercial women’s fiction, written in an alternating first person dual narrative.

So, I’m done right? No. Now I start polishing. The author who has been beta reading and editing for me has provided a line by line critique (because she’s totally awesome) and every time she sends me a batch of pages, I print, 3-hole punch, and put them in a big binder. Her notes are hand-written in the margins. This is now my editing bible. I am going to sit down with that binder tomorrow and read the entire novel from start to finish, making my own notes in the margins. Then I’ll do the final editing. I’m not sure how long that will take, but I’m estimating about 5 weeks.

Also, I have lots of good news to share. First of all, it is very slow at work so I requested a change in my work schedule from full-time to part-time. I am a contract human resources recruiter at a large mortgage company and when those interest rates tick up, everything comes to a screeching halt. My boss is super cool and she said no problem so now I don’t work on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I just changed to the new schedule last week. I couldn’t be happier. Four months of getting up at 5:00 a.m. to write was starting to take its toll a little bit so I am very grateful that I have the flexibility to make these kinds of changes. Now I can put the offspring on the bus on Tuesdays and Thursdays and write until they come home at 4:00.

The other great things are writing related. I follow lots of agents and other writers on Twitter. If you’re writing a novel, Twitter is where you want to be because there are lots of great chats you can participate in. And unlike Facebook, you can follow just about anyone without them having to “accept” you first. I pick up a lot of great information on Twitter by following people in the writing community. One of the people I follow is agent Laura Bradford of the Laura Bradford Literary Agency. She held a drawing on New Year’s Eve and used a random number generator to pick 5 followers (she has 5,000) to win either books, or a critique of their first chapter.

Dudes, I totally won! How freaking awesome is that? Especially because I never win jack.

So anyway, we were supposed to e-mail her to let her know if we wanted the books or the critique. I chose the critique, of course, and told her I’d be sending it on or before the first of March. This is such a valuable prize for someone about to throw themselves into the querying process. Having an agent critique your first chapter, and point out what isn’t working or needs to be changed before you start sending the manuscript out can save you from some rejection heartache down the road. I’m super excited.

Another cool thing that happened is Sara Megibow, another awesome agent, hosted a “First Pages” Writer’s Digest Webinar last Thursday. It was a 90 minute class, broadcast over the Internet, and she talked about what NOT to do in the first pages of your novel. With this webinar, you also receive a critique from Sara of your first three pages. Squee! So, my pages will be sent this week (my beta is taking a look at the polished version and as soon as she turns them around, I’ll send them to Sara). So, having two agents look at your work before you start sending it out is, as I already mentioned, a really valuable thing.

So, that’s whats been going on. I still have some work to do but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. It’s been a good ride so far, and I’ve experienced true joy while writing this manuscript. Writing makes me happy.

And I’m close to checking that item off my bucket list. The one about writing a full-length novel and querying every agent who reps my genre.

And that feels pretty damn good.

Have a great week, blogging friends!

Tracey

P.S. Dear God, I also saw the Eagles in concert a couple months ago and that’s on my bucket list, too. I have lots more I haven’t checked off so don’t be gettin’ any ideas, K?

Hey, Guess What? Time magazine must not think I’m that offensive because they sorta let me be in their magazine

  • January 16, 2010

Last week I wrote a post about TLC’s I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant. You can read it here or you can just scroll down.

I received several nice comments from my blogging buddies and friends. And when I got home on Wednesday, there was one new comment.

Erin G said…
ok this is the funniest thing I have read IN WEEKS. Did you know that Time magazine quoted you today? (that’s how I found you.)

Anyway you’re hilarious and now I need to go read the archives because I am officially in an AWESOME mood. 🙂

Um, what? Me, quoted in Time magazine?

I don’t think so.

But then I googled and on the Time magazine website I found this (as always, click on any highlighted words and click back to return to the post).

I thought this was really cool. It’s one thing to over-share self-publish every random thought that pops into your head but it’s quite another to have a publication such as Time magazine quote one of those thoughts. I almost felt like a real writer.

I was so excited I printed the article and decided to show everyone at work. For those of you who are new to this blog, I have been a stay at home mom for ten years but since the offspring are both in school all day, I recently started working in our school district as a teacher’s associate which allows me to earn a little money and be on the same schedule as the kids. It’s working out well and my only regret is that working doesn’t leave me a lot of time for writing. I will have the summer off though so I’m hoping to write more then.

I had not told anyone at school about my blog because it’s rife with colorful language, rants about my neighbors, and posts about my love of wine and cosmopolitans. And not everyone likes that kind of thing which is fine because they can choose not to read it. But I really wanted to share this news with the teachers I eat lunch with because I had mentioned the TLC show a couple months ago and now I could tell everyone that, not only did I blog about it, but that Time magazine quoted it.

“Guess what guys? Remember when I was talking about TLC’s I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant? Well, I write this humor blog and I wrote a post about it and Time magazine quoted it!” I pulled out the article and passed it around the teacher’s lounge at lunch.

Jill: You should tell our principal so she can send a message out to everyone.

Me: Nooooooooo! I mean, I actually don’t want everyone at school to know about it because it’s kind of, um, inappropriate.

Hillary had her laptop with her so she typed in the address of my blog so everyone could read the post.

ACCESS DENIED. THIS SITE HAS BEEN IDENTIFIED AS PORN.

Son of a bitch!

I just got done telling all the Real Teachers that it was a humor blog and now they were all going to think I was some sort of Internet sex pervert.

“It’s totally not porn!” I said. “It’s probably being classified as porn because I use the f-word so much.” I’m starting to get embarrassed at this point because they probably still think I’m all porn-y and now everyone also knows I swear like a truck driver on my blog. Any legitimacy obtained by being quoted in Time magazine is being summarily eclipsed by my potty mouth and my tendency to write about things that are considered adult subject matter. I’m a bit surprised that my blog would be classified as porn but then I remembered that I did use the word bone in this post. As a verb. Huh.

I’m glad you can’t access my blog from school. I have two children in the district and it’s good to know they can’t pull up anything they shouldn’t be looking at while they are on a school computer. And kudos to the district for having a solid barrier designed to boomerang dirty girls like me right back to the seedier side of the interwebs where we belong.

Anyway, I am still feeling pretty good about the Time magazine article. I did decide to moderate blog comments though in case any pissed off pooper/birthers found me and wanted to give me crap about the post. So far I haven’t received any.

I did have one comment for moderation but it was somebody thanking me for the information on hydroponics. I have used the word hydroponic twice on this blog but both times I was referring to Trish’s douchebag ex-boyfriend and the fact that he wanted to grow pot hydroponically in the spare bedroom of her townhouse. So I’m not sure what the person who commented meant by “providing information”.

I’m a little curious about it though. If you read this post, or this post, you might think this is a blog about something other than f-bombs and vampire sex. And I’m starting to wonder if the next publication I might be featured in is High Times magazine.

But that’s okay. I wouldn’t mind. And I’ll always be able to say that Time magazine once quoted me too.

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