I was fortunate to find a savvy editor when I submitted the original draft of my first manuscript back in October 2010 as mentioned in the previous blog.  She has been in the business of editing, publishing and had her own imprint at Simon & Schuster.   She is booked till June, and she was kind enough to put me in touch with another editor, stating “I don’t want you to lose your momentum.”   I thank her for that.

This editor specializes in working with authors who are writing their first fiction novel.  Her credentials are just as impressive as the first editor.  She has written fourteen novels under a different name, she’s acquired some very successful authors (I have read books by three she listed as well as know many of the others), she worked for the movie/film industry and she has started her own freelance editing business helping new authors obtain an agent and hopefully sell their manuscripts to publishers.  She sounds like the perfect answer to me.

I’ve finished the manuscript, all 320 pages of it.  I took the plunge, my heart  in my throat and I emailed said new editor.  Her method of working is simple, straightforward and I think I’m really going to like working with her, but she’s going to have my dream in her hands here shortly.  I am due to email it to her on Friday.   God, I know I won’t be able to sleep or eat.  I’ve worked on it so long, I think I will have withdrawals.  What am I going to do when I don’t have it to tweak, to re-write?  Then, I wonder and wonder what she will think of it.  While it’s been sitting on my desktop, for only my eyes to read over and over, along with a few select family members and friends, I could daydream about it being a best seller, maybe it would end up in a bidding war at scads of major publishing houses.  That’s when Iphysically need someone to kick me in the a–.   I need a bit of a reality check (AGAIN). 

I’m a realist too, and sometimes when I read it, I think it lacks substance.  What in the world am I trying to get my protaganist to say, to think?   Is it too shallow, predictable?   I read and read other books I think might be similar, I compare my writing to them, wondering how did they do it?  It seems so simple, but I know,  just to get the right tone, the right mood into one sentence can take hours, hell it can take days. 

I hope she will find at least 20 worthy pages out of 320.

 Will her review, her editorial letter back to me, telling me what’s right or wrong with it, ultimately snatch that dream, dash it against an editorial tornado of ridicule?  We’ll know in two weeks from Friday…GULP.  I know she will stay professional, but one of the authors she recently worked with whose manuscript sold said “check your ego at the door.”  Honestly?  I am ready for a professional opinion.  THAT will be a reality check for sure.