Whew! What a weekend!
So, I’d done some brainstorming recently to try to get myself back into focusing on my original works.
I’d set my mind on rewriting my completed manuscript rather than editing it. It’s been complete for at least 12 years, and I had it in my head that my writing has changed in that time so a rewrite was the best answer.
Except I wasn’t happy with what I was writing when I embarked on that. This book was written during my numerous sleepless nights after my son, Arthur, died. In some ways I feel as though it’s his book, and I felt the rewriting I was doing didn’t capture the mood I’d originally had.
I went to a meeting of Midwest Fiction Writers, my “local” Romance Writers of America chapter, in Minneapolis this past Saturday. While my RWA membership has never lapsed I did allow my MFW membership to lapse back in 06 or 07. How wonderful it was to be in a room with other writers in various stages of this publishing process. I’d forgotten what that was like!
After talking with a couple of the women there, they asked me why if I thought my book was polished enough to query 12 years ago did I no longer think that was the case?
It was an interesting question, especially since as I said above I found myself not “feeling” the rewrite process.
So on Sunday I brought up the manuscript and by last night at bedtime I’d edited all 94,000 words and feel as food about the manuscript as I did 12 years ago when I last queried it.
It was a great feeling, and a relief because this book has so much personal meaning to me that I couldn’t just let it go and forget about it.
Next step, I have to research agents who are open to queries for romances set in 1924 Chicago. Things have changed since I last did queries. Email and electronic submissions are the norm. One of the reasons I stopped was the cost involved.
Anyway, that’s been my last few days, and it feels like an albatross has been lifted from me.
Cheers!
~apckrfan