The following post was drafted in June 2014 and I never published. It is weird to see where I was five and a half years ago, working on getting my first book out in the world, and where I am now. While I feel like I haven't made it very far because I am still working on the manuscript referenced below I know my soon-to-be-published book A Single Girl's Guide to Wedding Survival: A Novel has improved greatly since 2014 and I'm proud of all the edits and time I've put into it.
My 2014 time capsule is below.
In 2011, I completed my first full manuscript. It was the day before my birthday. I was excited. I printed it out and took it to my mother to read, who was in the hospital at the time and was very very sick with very aggressive blood cancer AML. So my present to her was that I had completed the whole thing and I wanted her to the first to read it.
I had started novels before but had never actually written the whole thing to completion. This book though was different. I started it and wrote the whole first draft in a month and a half.
Now three years later, I've gone through at least fifteen drafts of this manuscript. I've written three other manuscripts (though two are only a few thousand words shy of being done 1st drafts). Along the way, my mother got better. I've lost friends, had roommates come and go, and had life batter me around but still, I'm working and reworking this book.
It feels like I may always be evolving and pushing this manuscript. Now don't think that I'm a perfectionist. Well, I'm still a recovering one. I have sent this out to agents. I just can't seem to find the right one at the right time so in the meantime, I'm honing my craft but reading and taking classes which means I go back and touch the manuscript to make it better and better each time.
Flash forward to now in 2020.
After 30+ drafts completed on A Single Girl's Guide to Wedding Survival: A Novel, over thirty rejections from traditional publishing, and now I am on the road to self-publish the book. Currently, I finished typing up my editor's notes. I had hoped to publish once I had incorporated her feedback, yet after doing all the updates I think I may need one last polishing round of edits. I know the book will get out there so I'm not sweating it too badly.
Onward is all I can do. Pardon me as I get back to the work.
Tally-ho,
Melissa