One Journey Completed

On July 21st, I typed The End on my book, Journey of a Broken Writer. Y'all, I'm silly. The editing was an emotional journey, too. I cried for so many reasons. I learned more about myself, my life, and writing in the editing process than I had expected. 

I couldn't afford to hire a professional editor, and even if I could have, the process likely would have taken much longer than the two weeks I spent working through the manuscript with AI.

Don't think for one minute that it was easy. The AI didn't "fix" things. It flagged potential issues chapter by chapter. I reviewed each one, decided whether I agreed, revised the manuscript myself, and moved to the next chapter.

"Surely it couldn't have been that hard if you used AI to assist?" 

You would be incorrect. This was what I can only call an Editorial Event. And it took multiple sessions. In fact, I think that's what I'll call this from now on. I have three more books to edit.

Below is a breakdown of what each editorial pass examined. 

Structural Editing — Does the book work?

Developmental Editing — Does each chapter work?

Line Editing — Does each paragraph work?

Copy Editing — Is the manuscript technically clean?

Publication Editing — Is it ready for readers?

Thematic Analysis — What is the book really about?

Author Reflection — What does the book reveal about its author?

AI didn't just give me a list of things to fix. It reviewed every chapter through seven different editorial passes. I reviewed the findings, made the corrections, and asked for the next chapter. The work contains 62 chapters. This took days. Long, tiring days that left my neck, back, and butt aching and the rest of me exhausted. By the fifth pass, I wondered what else had to be checked. Couldn't I stop there? No, I needed all of them. 

And I especially needed that last pass. 

The revelations from that pass were encouraging and heartbreaking. It didn't just read my book. It read me. Those words won't be in the book. And that is where I put The End and cried. 

Oh, maybe that sounds silly to you. It does to me when I reread it. But you don't know what it took for me to arrive at this spot. You can't know what I had to do to write Journey of a Broken Writer. 

I don't know if anyone will buy or read this book. I wrote it to encourage other writers who have experienced discouragement at some point. By the end of this editorial journey, I understood I was writing it for someone else. I wrote for a 15-year-old girl who had seen her dreams crushed. 

I wish I could go back and tell her they were mistaken, that she had been a writer all along. I can't. So, I think I'll write another book.

Fighting Back and Hitting Targets

I think the title works. I usually save the title for last, to make sure it fits the post. It feels like I've been fighting with myself. Months of writing and walking every day while depressed and in pain have taken a physical toll, but I will admit to a bit of pride here. These are not things I can normally do on a good day. 

Writing is still predominant, even though I've been unwell. I'm now in Book 2 of the Dream Stealer series. Then I remembered that I had finished Journey of a Broken Writer last year and need to get it ready to publish. Well, why not? So, I've been working on the edits for that. Be nice if I could get that up in the next 90 days. 

Most of that was in June. I mentioned some of the health stuff in the last posts, so I won't rehash it here. Things have been uncomfortable. I was also battling a lot of depression. The only time I seem to come out of it is when I'm writing. I told someone it was easier to live in the fictional world I built than the real one I live in.

So, July is ten days in and I am finally not in pain. On the first I went in for an epidural of steroids. It wasn't really painful. The numbing shot hurt worse than anything else, but it wasn't unbearable. 

Listen, I had an epidural when I had my second child. The first one, born in 1979, was a Lamaze baby. Natural childbirth was a thing, and I was a typical 70s girl. Let's do this. Honestly, I was only in labor for five hours and had less pain than when I ruptured the disk in my C6-7 vertebra. When I had that first epidural, it required I sit bent over; and when combined with a significant front baby bulge, it's uncomfortable. You can't get around the baby. This time epidural was a piece of cake. They let me lie on my stomach.

The results have been surprising, but a relief. I still have mild-to-moderate pain in my cervical spine area. I have to take frequent breaks to prevent pain in my upper back because I sit too long when writing. I'm probably not going to be chopping wood or lifting bales but I didn't do that anyway.

Today, Mike came and cut my lawn, and because he has some pain problems of his own, I stopped writing to help him cut the yard. I love working in the yard, but for months I haven't been able to do much of anything. Since February, I've worked my way up to walking 1.6 miles. Then I had the setback with the back pain. After I helped him today, I realized that I may not be doing much cutting the yard.

Now, never in my life have I set goals. Until today. Because I have to. If I'm going to get this done in the time I have left. I need to have targets. Maybe targets are better than goals. Hmm. I like it. 

So, my targets are:

• Finish the edits of Journey of a Broken Writer and get it published under my brand. (Yes, I have one now.)
• Finish book two of the Dream Stealer series.
• Work on getting my blogs in order. 
• And exercise more because I can't stand not being able to do what I need to do.

That's it. If I can hit those targets, I'll be on cloud nine. Well, until it rains.