Monday, February 22, 2016

Editing and the Insane Writer

This morning, DH and I had to "bug out of our apartment because of bugs" as he told a co-worker. We just needed to be out for a couple of hours so we weren't accidentally poisoned along with the intentionally poisoned six-legged and eight-legged critters. So we packed up our respective materials and headed to Panera's for breakfast.

Except as we headed for the car, DH looked at me askance and said, "Where's your laptop?"

"In the apartment."

"Won't you need it to work?"

"No, I'm editing a manuscript." I blew his mind because I took--wait for it--PAPER!

You see, I printed out the files for the first five Bloodlines books back in 2013. The intent was to go through them in preparation for the paper version and fix the typos that were missed in the original pre-publication editing passes because yes, even editors miss shit. I take missing shit as a compliment because more than one of them has mentioned that they get caught up in the story and forget they are supposed to be looking for mistakes. And...

Well, as you all know, a lot of shit happened between the summer of 2013 and now. I'm slowly but surely picking up the pieces I dropped with the house drama and family drama.

Not to mention, I find myself looking back through the first five books while writing Zombie Goddess (which, by the way, crossed the 42K mark on Thursday) because I can't remember shit. Yes, I'm putting together a series bible as I go so I won't have to deal with this on the last three books.

Anyway, I brought the first eleven chapters of Blood Sacrifice with me. I'm sitting in the booth, laughing at some parts, irritated with myself at others, but even I, who is supposed to be looking for typos, am getting caught up in the story again.

Like someone else wrote it. Not me.

And I'm wondering if I'm crazy and if I actually have a split personality.

Maybe I do.

Or maybe I offer a bounty to readers who find typos.

4 comments:

  1. I know it's supposed to be some sort of shameful thing, but I love reading my old stuff. [hides under keyboard] So I for one don't think it's at all weird that you're getting caught up in your own story. :)

    Congrats on getting back to the writing, and good luck with the editing.

    Angie

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    1. I'll be honest. I write for myself first. If the story entertains me, then there's someone out there in the world as warped as I am. *grin* But yeah, slowly and surely making progress.

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  2. Sweet. Entertained by your own stuff. I love it!

    It might have been me that put you over the 42k mark with Zombie Goddess. :-)

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