Tag: beta readers

Call for beta readers

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 7 Comments

Hi everyone.

I’ve finished the first round of editing of my novel Reunion of the Heart and I’m currently reading through it again, correcting and amending as I go.

I would like to send it out to beta readers soon, so if you would be interested in reading it and letting me know what you think, please get in touch.

I only need a few people to beta read, so really it’s on a first come, first served basis.  This novel is very much a romance, so won’t be to everyone’s taste.  But if you think you might like to be a beta reader for me, please let me know.

My email address is: elaine (dot) jeremiah (at) gmail (dot) com

Thank you! 🙂

When to send to beta readers?

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 22 Comments

Question

I’ve just finished my first round of editing my novel.  I’m wondering when would be the best time to send it out to beta readers (who I’ve yet to find!)?

Do I go over it myself as many times as possible before I get to that point?  Or is it better to send it out now and get the feedback I so desperately need as soon as possible?

There’s a certain element to my novel I’m not sure about.  Not going to say what it is but I definitely need some guidance.

So I’m asking all of you who’ve written a book (admittedly this is my second novel but I’m still unsure about this) what you’ve found to be the best time to send your novel out to be beta read and get those all important second opinions?

I must confess I’m not great at making decisions.  Also, if you all tell me a million different things, that’s going to be even more confusing!  But I’m willing to take the risk with this cos I really need to know.  And even if you don’t have a definitive answer, I’d be interested to hear your stories about editing and how it all went for you.

It’s definitely an exciting time for me having the publication of my second book on the horizon less than a year after the first one was published. 🙂

I’ll keep you all posted on my progress.  Book number three is in the planning stages… (BTW it’s not a series!!)

 

 

 

Well I’ve finished my book… kind of

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 10 Comments

This week I hit a new milestone on my journey as an author.  I finished the first draft of my second novel which I’m calling ‘Reunion of the Heart’.

It’s been a lot of fun to plot and then write and I’m looking forward to sharing it with the world. 🙂  But as the title of this post suggests, it’s not finished yet.  Those of you who are writers will recognise that I  need to edit, edit, edit before I release it.  And of course I need to have other, dispassionate eyes on it so that I can make it the best that it can be.

So at some point I’ll be putting out a request for beta readers, but NOT YET!  There’s lots that I need to work on by myself first.  I may well tweak scenes and/or insert scenes.  I realise that as a story it does need a lot of tightening up.  I feel like there’re potentially a lot of holes in the plot, things I haven’t caught yet in my writing process.

Yes, I know that’s where beta readers come in, but I want to finish reading it all through first as my initial edit.  I want to make sure I’ve ironed out any obvious mistakes before I (fearfully) hand it over to be read by other people for the first time.  That’s a scary process, for sure – handing over your precious WIP to be scrutinised by other eyes for the first time.

If you’re a writer, I’m sure you’re familiar with that feeling.  You desperately want your WIP to be read by other people… and yet at the same time you’re scared ****less at the thought of other people who aren’t you reading and potentially being critical of your work.

But it needs to be done and so I’m working towards that point when I can finally hand it over to some generous people to read and make comments on.  I want to be the best writer that it’s possible for me to be.  I feel I’m improving and growing in confidence as a writer all the time.  As I’ve said before, the online community of writers has transformed the way I write and my confidence in myself.

So thank you once more.  And I’ll keep you all posted as to my novel’s progress.

By the way… are any of you working on editing?  How are you finding it?  I’d love to have your comments. 🙂

When the words just won’t come

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 21 Comments

Words

I will be honest with you that the title of this blog post isn’t entirely true of my writing right now, although it has been in the past.

But I have been finding that the flow of my WIP is slowing at the moment. Before I began writing I made a comprehensive plan of the plot and in which direction I wanted my story to head.

Of course in actually coming to write it things change and I’ve found that the characters I’d planned have evolved and taken new paths. That’s all well and good. But sometimes you get to a stage in writing a story where things just go a bit stale.

As I said I know where I want to take my story ultimately but I want it to flow seamlessly, with one scene merging into the next so that the narrative doesn’t feel forced.

Right now I’m feeling my writing’s a bit barren. I’ve had a lot of things to focus on apart from this WIP because among other things,as you may have seen from other posts, I’ve been promoting the publication of my debut novel The Inheritance. So I’ve had plenty of distractions.

That’s not the real reason for this dryness in my writing though, I don’t think. I just need to somehow regain a bit of momentum with it, to really tell the story and focus on the general plan I originally came up with and not get too bogged down in dialogue between characters which doesn’t go anywhere.

When I’ve got past this difficult stage of trying to sew the story together seamlessly somehow and I eventually finish the first draft, I’m actually looking forward to sending it out to beta readers and getting their opinions on what’s working and not working, particularly in this part of the story.

Ultimately I want to be able to finish and publish this story by the end of next year but I’m not sure I’ll manage it. Especially seeing as writing a new post for my blog feels a lot easier than moving the action in my WIP along with no visible seams!

What do you do when you’re finding it hard to find the right words to carry a plot forward?