Pinch punch it’s the 1st of the month which means I have just 92 days until my final submission date for my completed book, to my publisher. Scary! Less than 100 days to go. But I’ve been on a roll in between the day job, nappy changes, nap time and any other time I can steal to sit in this very spot behind my lap top;  I am more than confident that I’ll make it. Also booked a holiday just 2 days after my submission date to have some quality time with my family, and make up for all the hours spent right here behind this lap top solidly writing. I can’t wait for both dates, submission and holiday.

I feel the next 92 days will probably be the most important 92 days of my life! And so I will share here and there my progress, thoughts and experiences in the run up to submission day.

A few weeks ago, something so surreal happened to me, I walked into Waterstones (the UK’s number 1 book store you could say) on a busy Saturday morning, as usual my eyes lit up as I took in the shelves and tables piled high with books, new releases and special offers etc. I head to the lift and stopped dead as I entered (literally); my eyes bulged open wide as I  thought wow in a few months MY book will be available in Barnes and Noble in the USA, maybe just maybe someone will take time out from their busy Saturday schedule, to  head to the book store on a mission to find and buy MY book, also MY book will be available on the shelf of  a well respected book store for others to brows, pick up and indulge in a little romance and suspense .

I stepped into the lift with some very normal people, who I’m sure were a bit unsure just how normal I was as I had the biggest smile on my face and I actually let out a little laugh with excitement, inside I high fived myself. I’m sure they thought I was laughing at ”the voices” in my head or I was some kinda crazy as there really was no reason to let out a laugh, in a packed lift, on it’s way to the 5th floor…. Hey what do I care! I was high as a kite on excitement and adrenaline. 

Today, I realised just how much I’m really eating,sleeping and breathing my characters. While preparing my son’s breakfast in mid stir of his porridge this morning, it came to me that last night I had mistyped my Heroine’s date of birth; the year I typed would have made her 30 during the time frame /scene I was writing, not 32 as originally planned/mentioned so far in the story. I wrote this scene at about midnight last night, and at 8.00am this  morning I remembered an error I had made?? It just popped into my head like a mental note that I need to buy some milk LOL.

Of course, mid stir of my son’s porridge I did what all women and mamas out there do, I multi tasked…. one hand reached for the lap top, the other stirred  the porridge I located the paragraph and edited the DOB for my Heroine phewwwwwww!  One less thing to edit.

 If you’re a writer reading this has anything random like this ever happened to you while writing your manuscript? Do you go into complete eat, sleep, breath characters mode in the final throws of completion?

Speaking of editing, I read a really interesting article about ” how to” edit your manuscript before you turn it in to your agent or publisher as a completed piece of work. This article  described a good editing process as the ”5 Re-read Program”. You may even know you it yourself, but as this is my first ever submission experience it’s new to me!

The program suggests writers read their completed work 5 times and look for 5 different things each time 1. content 2. enhancement 3. sentence level 4. the little things 5.audible read.I’ve decided I actually will try this process myself as it seems pretty detailed, have you heard of this? Or even tried it yourself? How do you go about your final edit process before you submit if you’re a writer reading this?

So on to progress then, well the count down begins and at day #92 I have hit 60,000 words! I think I underestimated myself as I had in my head that my total word count on completion would be about 50-55,000, obviously when it comes to the editing process the count will probably reduce but I’m about just over mid point in the story and already hit 60,000 I have surprised myself! I’ve also learned that when you plot out your synopsis  for a story, it really is hard to say how it will transfer into a word count.

Right now, I’m at the point where the scenes/plots  have built up ready for me to bring all the drama I have mapped out for my characters towards the middle and end, and really develop  the emotional aspect of the story; I’m at a more challenging point of writing (I feel personally). Now I’m writing different points of views and really need to become these characters in order to  write their scene/POV the best I can and more importantly as realistically as I can.  I’m also bringing the drama to the story and this in my head and on paper is perfect, but getting it right in words is a challenge- that I’m really enjoying; may be I’m just being too hard on myself about how I’m writing ? I’ve found  that I’m  reading and re-reading, chopping, adding and all sorts but I guess it’s all part of the craft.

I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences on some of the things I’ve mentioned if you’re a writer or published author what was / is your experience? And if you’re not a writer but have a POV let me know!

So as I enter day 92 of the count down, the focus is POVs and building some  (more) drama in this romance/suspense story I am just loving writing.

Catch you soon