Book News

Excerpt from a letter I sent this morning to a friend:

Quick note: This morning, Thursday, November 6, 2014, at 8:23 CST, I finished the full version of the novel about the Wiccans in Whoville. Now I have to go back and read through from beginning to end several times:

1. Make sure the story now hangs together with all the additions.
2. Catch gaps, duplications, contradictions due to all the additions.
3. Correct all the things discovered in 1 and 2.
4. Do the regular proofing and editing.
5. Format it for publication and scan* pages for problems. 
6. Get a cover design done.
7. Send it off ... for production.

I wish I could say that the above steps can all be done quickly, but there is no way to know in advance. It should, at any rate, be easy to complete before Thanksgiving, which was the goal I had set for myself.

One thing that should be fairly quick is the cover design. I plan to use an image Tom produced for an e-book version of a novella that will be included in this volume. I need to compose new copy for the back cover and come up with a title, but that will not be too bad.

The finished volume will contain the novel, the earlier novella (which concerns the same main characters in the same general setting) and a brief humorous story with only a loose connection but that I like and that is all that matters. 

Now for a bit of rest  before hitting the keyboard again!

“I went for years not finishing anything. Because, of course, when you finish something you can be judged. I had pieces that were re-written so many times I suspect it was just a way of avoiding sending them out.” – Erica Jong

*Scan: look at all parts of something carefully in order to detect some feature:

1. "He raised his binoculars to scan the coast."
   synonyms: scrutinize · examine · study · inspect · survey · search · scour ·