Book, Wedding, House (not in that order)

[KAWells]

Oh! Hi there.

Let me bring you up to speed. I am currently finishing up my amazing incredible young adult fantasy novel and will be submitting it to publishers soon. I am also trying to find a house and plan a wedding. Here’s the update:

BOOK

Oy. I’ve just finished doing a major revision (as my good friend Joe put it, “Crank it up to notch 11!” I imagine this in an old man voice, even though I’ve never met him) and that’s what I’ve done. I’ve also gone through and retyped all 215 pages = carpel tunnel. Next step? Reading it aloud. Believe me writers when I say DO THIS. It’s almost as valuable and Strunk and White's “Omit unnecessary words” (almost). When you retype it you find all the little things that are worthless like who was sitting next to Alek in the van, and who was behind him, and who sat in the front seat. Or how it took Nadia two steps to get to the door. Or how every sentence in that paragraph starts with “She.” And reading it aloud? Only an insane person would want carpel tunnel and laryngitis! But you'll find all the dialogue that sounds funny, or sentences that just don’t sound right. Sure, it sounded ok in your head, but doesn’t everything?


The next step? Sending it out to my readers in my circle I developed from Critters (see links for critters.org plug) and get back feedback that I already know. Bree’s addiction is a little ambiguous. Nadia does what to her hair? Todd makes out with her, really? Things that I already know deep down don’t work but need the extra oomph to fix.

Countdown to submission? Approx a month.

Also, I talked to upcoming star Cavanaugh Lee author of “Save As Draft” today. A fun quirky piece about a love triangle that takes place entirely over the Internet: Email, Eharmony, Twitter, Facebook. Really, which one of us hasn’t had a relationship blow up because of our Facebook status? She gave me a lot of helpful advice about the ways of the publishing world, and frightened me to bits about query letters. As if I wasn’t scared enough. Check back here around May, when her book appears on shelves, for an exciting interview with Cavanaugh.

WEDDING

Things that I accomplished this week – making/sending out save the dates. Oh, paper source and your lovely stamps. If you’re invited to the wedding and you didn’t get a save the date it's because I didn’t think you deserved one. Look, if you’re my maid of honor you know when the wedding is (cough JEANNE). Although it might be a good idea to send one to the fiancé. I put an alarm in on his Iphone, but will that be enough to get him there on time? The people who got them are the ones who have to buy plane tickets, and aren’t related to me.

Now, off to find a DJ!

HOUSE

Can I just say how much I hate short sales and foreclosures? I have now started carrying around hand sanitizer after looking at one of the houses yesterday. Seriously, if you need somewhere to film the next swamp thing, let me know. I have the perfection location. Bonus? It smelled like pee. What was this house selling for? $485,000. Oh, California. The one house (out of the six I looked out) that I liked and was reasonably priced already had 8 offers.

I’m starting to loose hope but I’m not sure how much longer I can live in this apartment building. We had a hundred dollar water bill (for the two of us) because the apartments aren’t individually metered. And a $280 tow bill because there wasn’t parking that night. Yippee, give me a mortgage.

Check back tomorrow for what will become a reoccurring segment
Tips I learned while writing.

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