Not being very good at building suspense, please don’t feel this is a sad attempt to do so, as it’s honestly not.

I just felt like blogging and so here I am. I received the Proof Reader and Publisher massive edit of Bonnie’s Story, pouted a bit at it being nearly 700 words shorter than I thought it had been last time I saw it, and then had a general whinge on online social media at all the red (and blue as they’d both been ruthless) changes.

Still, I knuckled down, spent my weekend ignoring the kids, yelling at the husband to take the kids away so I could ignore them better, and really just went through it all. Thankfully most of it was punctuation changes. I seem to never get my commas in the right place. And, strangely, I seem to have a blind spot for the word ‘that’ and tend to leave it out a bit.

Then there was all the standardising of how things were said. Was it red haired or red-haired? Cow pat, cow-pat or cowpat? Was the dog Mr Doodles, Mr Doodle, or did I really still want the dog? I stood my ground on a few things and removed them from being removed, but generally went with the flow and do hope it makes for a better read. You’ll never know, but at least all your cowpats and red-heads should look in order. 😉

So, Saturday I read it and dealt with all the changes. That night I started re-reading the first 50,000 words I’ve written on my new MS tentatively called Isis, Vampire and Ghosts – Oh My! and then went back to Bonnie’s Story on the Sunday. I found it interesting to chop and change between the two as they’re both written in first person, and yet I’ve done my damnedest to make the heroines as dissimilar as I can. Hopefully Stephanie will turn out just as interesting, but not identical, to Bonnie. I have, however, discovered that in all my stories (these two and Grey currently being reviewed by Hague Publishing) my characters do tend to snort and roll their eyes a lot. I am told it is a trait they have picked up from their creator. As well as the tendency to tell people to go bite them… Oops?

Monday morning, I bid Bonnie’s Story a fond farewell and hoped I wouldn’t be seeing her to be edited again. I could seriously just keep picking at it and changing it forever. But I’ve put my pens down and handed it in at the front of the class and hope it’s all acceptable.

Adding to the total lack of suspense this blog post provides – I have seen the near finished covered and it’s brilliant! Now, I know you think I’m going to say that no matter what as it’s my book cover. But, you know what? I’d give this book a look from its cover, even if I’d not written it. It’s all down to Dean Harkness and his ability to turn my whims, wishes and ideas into basically what I wanted. Woo hoo!

The other important things I’ve done to for my soon to be finished book is I chose the vignettes (can also be known as those curly things you put under the chapter number to make it stand out), wrote an ‘About the author’ that was so very cringe worthy, and did the dedication. All I will say on the dedication is it is to one person only… and if I’ve not contacted you about it, it’s not you. Surprise!

And to put all my family and friends at ease, or worry them more as the case may be, I do hope there will be more books and I will do my best to squeeze in a dedication to you there. Just be nice, as not all dedications have to be. 😉

Okay, so that’s this week’s update. I should find out on the weekend how badly my response to the editing actually was and then move forward from there.

Enjoy and have fun until next time!

Janis.