Nickel's Worth of Free Advice

Friends of fine, fine literature...

Well, I'm moved into my new house. It's strange how much the idea of an impending move can make you literally brain-dead. So much so, that I haven't had the urge to write much of anything in the last month or so.

Okay, that's not completely true. I did start another off-shoot project that I'm not sure where I got the idea from, but I think (and have been told) it's got merit. We'll see.

But yeah, Book 3 (the poor sucker) suffered because of our move and has been postponed because of the packing, planning, moving, unpacking, etc. Well, I'm happy to say we've gotten into our new place, we're about 3/4 of the way unpacked and it's starting to feel more like a 'home' as opposed to a 'house.'

I didn't get a chance to write about the Festival of Children's Writing that I went to at The Loft back in April. Terrible, I know. The thing was basically a month ago and I didn't write squat about it, which is dumb because I think I made some good connections.

I discovered there's a publishing company in the town where I live. I talked to the editor and sort of 'mini-pitched' my proposed YA series (as if I don't have my hands full already) and he said he'd be interested in taking a look at it. I also got to hear the first page of Book 1 read aloud by an editor for Atheneum Books. She loved my opening 'grabber' sentence, but didn't like that I stepped back for some explanation.

I do that a lot. I throw something exciting at my readers, then I pull them back a bit to fill in the gaps. I need to work on that. I see it happening in Book 3, even. I hope to remedy that in the 2nd draft, especially since I don't like to go back and 'tweak' until I've gotten the first draft done. Many a writer has spun their wheels constantly fixing and polishing their work...and end up working on the same book for 7-8 years.

Don't let this be you!

Finish the damn thing and worry about making it crackle later. Keep in mind, no matter how polished you think your first draft is, it's gonna get butchered and reworked until it's that much better.

Don't you just love all this free advice from an unpublished author?

You're welcome.

Anyway, I'm still hoping to have my rough draft done by summer. Book 3 will be completed this year. I SWEAR IT!