Tag: book

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!!)

 

 

 

A short WIPpet for Wednesday

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 23 Comments

Hi all.  My contribution to this week’s WIPpet Wednesday is going to be short as I’m currently in the middle of preparing for an interview for a work placement tomorrow.

So I’m back to my old mean self and I’m only sharing with you 2 sentences from chapter 2 of my current WIP Reunion of the Heart. We’re going back and forth in the novel; here Anna has just arrived at her old school for the reunion:

Anna stumbled a little as she walked; she didn’t wear heels very often.  As they approached the school buildings, memories of being a pupil here flooded back to her.

So that’s it for me for this week.  Hopefully I’ll be able to share something longer next week.  And if you would like to take part in WIPpet Wednesday, just post on your blog a piece of your writing relating in some way to the date.  Then add your details here.

Thank you K. L. Schwengel for hosting. 🙂

Flashback

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 34 Comments

Welcome to a very wet and windy WIPpet Wednesday.  Well it is here in the UK anyway! 😦  Or at least the sun is shining now but it’s been horrible all day until now.  Anyway for this week’s WIPpet Wednesday I thought I’d share with you one of the many  flashbacks that my MC Anna has in Reunion of the Heart.  For the 12th February I’m sharing 12 lines from chapter 2.

In the present, Anna is at her school reunion and she and best friend Melissa have just been reunited with their school friends Lizzie and Rachel who they haven’t seen since school.

In this excerpt, in the flashback, you can catch a glimpse of why they fell out at school and hadn’t made up until now, many years later. I’m not going to say too much more than that.  So without further ado, here’s my contribution to this week’s WIPpet Wednesday:

‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at?’ Melissa had demanded of Lizzie, marching up to where she was sitting eating her lunch at the edge of the school playing fields and tapping her on the shoulder.  Anna was trailing in her wake.

‘I’m sorry, but when did you become the boss of my life?’ Lizzie had replied.  ‘Oh yeah, that’s right, you’re not!’

‘You know what Matt’s like, you know he’s a nasty bastard who’s given our friend hell and yet you still choose to start seeing him.’

‘It’s my life; I can do what I want!’  Lizzie retorted.  ‘And anyway, when are you ever going to let Anna speak for herself?  There she is, cowering behind you…’

‘I’m not cowering,’ Anna said in a quiet voice.  ‘But Melissa’s right, I do have a problem with you dating Matt.  He’s made my life miserable for five years of secondary school.’ 

And if you aren’t taking part but would like to, just post on your blog whatever you’re working on with your writing and add it here, where all the other wonderful WIPpets for this week can be found too.

Thanks goes to the most gracious hostess of them all K. L. Schwengel.

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. 🙂

100 followers of this blog!!!

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 10 Comments

100 blog followers

Just a quick post to say: Yay I’ve reached 100 followers of my blog!!  It’s such a great feeling knowing that there are 100 different people out there wanting to read what I’ve put on this blog, offering me their comments and often advice in my sometimes turbulent life as an indie author.

Thank you to all of you who are following my blog, you don’t know how much it means to me to know that I have your interest in me, my blog and my writing. Having published my debut novel in August last year, it’s been amazing to have the support of my fellow bloggers, many if not most of whom are writers themselves and also on this journey.

And I mustn’t forget to say that I wouldn’t have a blog at all if my husband hadn’t suggested it, so BIG thanks to him too!!

I’m looking forward to an exciting 2014, when I’ll hopefully be publishing my next novel.  So thank you once again and watch this space!

Yay I did it!

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 7 Comments

At the beginning of January I posted on my blog that I was aiming to write every day in January.  And I’m pleased to say I more or less achieved it!

More or less?  I hear you ask, scratching your heads.  Surely you either write or you don’t?  Well I took the challenge that I’d set myself, with the help of a blog post that suggested it, to mean that I needed to do something towards my writing every day.

Most days I did manage to work on my WIP.  But on the days I didn’t, whether I was too tired or busy, I either did a whole load of planning on my next story (I actually began planning it in January) or worked on my blog.

So I can safely say that I achieved my goal.  And now comes the hard part.  Now I have to see if I can keep it up and continue to write/work towards my writing every day of every month.

I know we’re still only two days in to February, but so far I’m doing OK.  I’ll keep you posted on my progress. 🙂

Wow what a wonderful WIPpet Wednesday!

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 30 Comments

Argument

OK so last week I promised you a longer excerpt from Reunion this week.  Using my clever WIPpet maths, I’ve come up with 4 paragraphs from chapter 14: 2+2=4 (amazing that, I can do maths!!) and obviously chapter 14 for the year. 🙂

I have something to tell you that made me frown.  I’ve told ReGi already… I did some searching on Amazon just to check and there’s another book out there called Reunion with a plot that’s not completely dissimilar to mine. 😦  ReGi was kindly trying to help me come up with another title.  My husband reckons it doesn’t matter too much if I have a subtitle with it.

But… aargh!  I kind of get the feeling that if I don’t change the title and the plot stays the same (that’s one thing I’m not changing for love or money!!) then I could land myself in some hot water.  *Sigh*  It’s so difficult coming up with brand new inspiring titles.  I need help!!  Any more suggestions??

All right then, on with today’s WIPpet.  This scene takes place just after Anna has had a row with her now-boyfriend Peter.  These are turbulent times for her…

Waving goodbye to Peter as he made his way to the platform to catch the train back to London, Anna felt relief wash over her.  Relief quickly replaced by guilt.  She shouldn’t feel relieved that he was going – he was her boyfriend for goodness sake – but she was.  Turning away from his disappearing form, she began to make her way out of the station.  The cold dry weather they’d been experiencing had turned to cold wet weather and it was beginning to rain.  Anna pulled her hood up and dashed to her car.

She used the journey home to brood over Peter’s visit and how it had made her feel.  Remembering their love making, her face grew hot.  There was certainly nothing wrong in that department.  But why oh why had he felt it necessary to try to bestow expensive trinkets on her?  And more importantly, why should it matter to her if he did? 

As these thoughts were whirling around her head, Anna was startled by a horn blasting at her.  Shocked, she realised she’d been drifting into the opposite lane on the road.  Get a grip, Anna, she told herself.  Forget about Peter and concentrate on driving if you want to make it home.  She banished the troubling thoughts from her head and focused her attention on getting home safely.

When she reached the safety of her driveway, Anna turned the engine off and sat there for a moment in silence, staring blankly at her garage door.  I could have been killed, she thought.  This obsessing about Peter could have cost me my life.  Slowly, she got out of the car and leaned against it for a moment as if for support, ignoring the cold of its metal shell. 

Thanks as always for having a look at my work, all comments gratefully received!  Anyone can take part in WIPpet Wednesday.  All you’ve got to do is share a bit of your work that relates in some way to the date. Then add your details to this.  Be sure to take a look at what the other WIPpeteers are sharing.  Thank you, thank you, thank you K. L. Schwengel for hosting! 🙂

How I write

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 6 Comments

Writing

Just a quick post to update you a little on how I’m getting on with writing every day this month.

Not bad so far. I’ve written properly, working on my WIP Reunion, most days. The days I don’t have given me the opportunity to start planning my next story – which to me counts as work on my writing.

That’s been really nice, to get back to planning which I always enjoy. But doing work every day on my writing has made me compare how I’m doing now writing/working on writing every day with my usual ‘method’ of working on it most days but not every single day.

The highest word count I’ve managed in one day, writing this way, is about 600 which for me isn’t bad. However a few times before this month, when I wasn’t working on my WIP every day, I could do well over 1000.

So the question I’m pondering is this: is it better to write every day and do less each time, but have the total add up to quite a lot, or is it better to write a bit more sporadically but write in heftier chunks?

I’d love to hear your thoughts! 🙂

Ups and downs on the self-publishing journey

~ Elaine Jeremiah ~ 10 Comments

I’ve been experiencing the different sides to being a self published author since I published my debut novel The Inheritance in September.

It was selling quite well to begin with and I was really encouraged. Then it slowed right down. I wasn’t doing very well in the US until I did my free promotion over 5 days from the end of October to the beginning of November. I had nearly 9500 free downloads during that time, the vast majority of them in the US.

But after that I came back down to earth with a bump. My novel was selling much better in the US than before the free promo, but worse in the UK. My sales in other parts of the world weren’t good either. Eventually my sales dived again and now I find myself selling one or two copies here and there.

Well I guess one or two is much better than none! It is quite disheartening though. I do feel that The Inheritance is a bit tricky to place in a genre, which could be partly why it’s not selling hugely.

And then I had a couple of bad ratings on Goodreads. Although they were unaccompanied by a review, for some reason I felt worse than when I read a review with the same rating on Amazon. But as my writer friend Kate Frost says, bad reviews come with the territory.

Bad reviews can be a little hard to stomach though after you’ve worked so hard on something. Although as my husband said, it’s not necessarily because my writing’s that bad, it’s just that it wasn’t to someone’s taste. As Kate also said you have to take bad reviews with a pinch of salt, just as you might a five star review which raves about a book. You don’t  know if they’re being fair or not.

I guess I’ve just got to keep my chin up and keep trying, promoting The Inheritance when I can and not being too downcast that it’s not selling that well.

How do you deal with disappointments in this self publishing journey?