~ THE LAST BOOK ~

Last year, I finished one round of editing my book, The Last Tree, with the help of my critique group, the Gang of Four. This year, I am working with the same group on the final edit of the material.

As the Gang of Four has kindly agreed to critique four chapters a week, I will hopefully be able to achieve my goal of completing the polishing process by the middle of the year.

The goal at this stage is to self publish The Last Tree, third book in The Chronicles of Aden Weaver in spring.

However, due to finances going in other directions, this year (namely, painting the house and things for the kids), I won’t be able to throw money at my product, this time. So, instead of lavishing $5000 upon my creation, I will be tapping the same resources my nephew uses to publish his books at University, and I will put The Last Tree out “on the cheap.” Most people buy e-books anyway, so as long as the formatting and layout is professional, it’ll be fine.

I feel ready to finish writing this series, now. I began this epic adventure, writing rough draft in 2005, and I’ve loved every minute. Writing has given me a much needed escape from the humdrum of my life and duties as single parent to two young boys. Now, fourteen years later, the kids are teenagers, and The Chronicles of Aden Weaver are nearing completion. I want to wrap the series up. It’s time to move onto fresh pastures and see what wants to be written.

People often ask me, “What are you going to write next?” “What’s the next project?” Truthfully, I don’t know. I’m neither a plotter nor a planner. I feel I’m not the one in charge of the creative inspirational thought. I’m one of those pantser types, who sits on the edge of their chair hoping the muse will strike. I pace the house quite a lot in between bouts of “corpse pose” (yoga pose that requires lying flat and peaceful) on the floor. I do relaxation methods to unhinge myself enough from the rush of daily life, so that I can be receptive to the inspired thoughts. I never know ‘what’s next’ until I get there.

For now, I’m driven to round off this trilogy to the best of my ability and put a suitably satisfying conclusion to my debut as a published author.

I’m glad I bit the bullet and decided to go Indie. However, it is challenging. I’ve found it takes a lot of courage it takes to self publish. The self doubt I have experienced since publishing my books has been enormous to the point of being overwhelming at times.

People already can buy and read my stories. I’m exposed. I’m out there on the page. And, I have to learn to be okay with that.

I guess this is all part of the process of being a published author – learning to present your work and then, more importantly, to stand by it.

The next task is to put pen to paper (fingers to keys) and start a new story.

At present, I’m approaching the halfway mark editing The Last Tree. The inner writing voices that had been nagging me about structure and plot have gone silent. I feel the story is cohesive now, and all the story threads have been tied off, the questions have been answered. If we keep going at this rate, we’ll conclude the editing stage in late April.

After that, the hard graft of the self publishing mill – the slog that stands between the polished manuscript and the novel – shall begin in earnest.

The jobs for an Indie seem deceptively simple: proofreading, copyediting, layout, book design, cover, blurbs, promos and accompanying launch material. ‘It’ll only take a few weeks,’ I used to naively think.

But no, it takes months of sustained effort. I’ve been there twice before, and at this stage, I’m under no illusions about the labour that lies ahead.

Similarly, I also know that it can be done. The Herculean tasks can be fulfilled and in the end we get to do a victory dance.

The triumph one feels on the day of the book launch is euphoric.

So that’s the carrot I dangle at the end of the pole before me as I start the march into the final stretch: I tell myself, you can do it, just keep going. Wish me luck!

 

Talk to you later,

Keep Creating!

Yvette Carol

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Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life. ~ Confucius

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