When my friend and fellow author Maggie gave Southern Discomfort a beta read last month, I got some excellent feedback on the manuscript. She loved the book, pointed out some problems and said there were so few it should be a clean rewrite.
Mostly it is. I’m pleased with that. However to be sure everything is clean I still have to reread the whole thing. Aloud, because that’s when I spot problems. And there are a few besides the ones she caught (some of which I would have missed, so extra thanks). Most of them are simple stuff, places where I can and should take a compound sentence and chop it in two. One sentence where I used “ignoring” twice. Nothing that’s likely to make readers put the book down, still worth correcting. I’m a fan of novelist Kaye Gibbons’ advice to “write until the next word is inevitable.” I doubt I’ll get there on Southern Discomfort but it’s worth shooting for.
Sometimes I have found genuine problems. Despite going through all the street and road references, I discovered a place where the directions are wrong, with someone turning off Peachtree when they should be turning off Auburn (those are both famous Atlanta streets. Some developers figure duplicating the names will boost sales). I’m not sure anyone will notice. Even so, it’s good to correct.
Maggie also gave me a couple of suggestions I have to think about. One is whether Maria’s first-person sections would benefit if I include her name at the beginning, to alert readers we’re switching out of third person. I’m mulling it over, as with a couple of her other thoughts.
While it’s taking longer than I thought to finish, it’s going well and the book will benefit from the work. So yay me, and thanks Maggie.
The future’s so bright, I have to wear shades!
At least, I do when I’m at the dentist’s office shielding my eyes from the bright lamp.
#SFWApro.
