Some would say there is a fine, delicate and balanced skill to cook the perfect turkey. The same goes for writing a book. Fresh or frozen(Genre)? How do I dress it(Content)? What temperature and for how long(Word count and style)? Moreover, how often to baste(Revise and edit)? Sure, that’s all fine and dandy for the poultry but how does that apply to my book? I need to pick the genre (Or write the genre my heart picks) Books take a lot of prep work, (even if that prep happens throughout.) Editing and revision is important, but how many times do I edit and revise? How do I know when it’s done and to take the book out and serve it to my readers?
For me I had some guidelines, a list of things I needed to accomplish.
Story flow
Word count reduction
Filter words removal(Started doing this one word at time)
Foreshadow check and instillation
POV check and correction
Action tag revision (Show not tell)
Dialog tag revision (Show not tell)
I ended up revising and reviewing BiaAtlas many times. I had others review it for me and point out the obvious, such as misspelled words (that are technically not misspelled), but clearly wrong. And then I revised again.
Word count became by biggest challenge. As a first time writer and this being my very first book it had to, I mean had to, be within an industry standard word count.
When I finished my first draft I found out my book was 15,000 words over the maximum allowable of 125,000. Then as I went along and got it down to 125,000 with a lot of work. I sought professional consultation and the consensus is, it needed to be below 120,000. That was 5000 more to remove from a book I thought was done.
A little discouraged, yet determined I went about checking filter words and checking carefully for verbose descriptions. During this final review, I discovered one thing that I was stupid kinds of excited about and embarrassed over. I was up to this point reviewing one word or issue at a time. I’m not a professional editor to look for multiple infractions at a time… unless… as discussed in “Well colour me silly” I had a stroke of good fortune and had the idea to highlight all the potential trouble words at one time.
Holy Smokes! It worked!
By making all the words that might indicate a POV change or sentence issue, I was able to do one final and successful edit. I have only 704 words left to remove and 23 more chapters to go.
I made a list( A long list) Of words I know are filter, overused and issue words and made them stand out with bright colours. I made an excel file list with each chapter, the word count, how many were removed per chapter(entered as I finished), how many I had to go(This column was encouraging) and on average how many words I need to remove per chapter to achieve my goal(this changed with each line to reflect previous chapter edits)
As long as I stayed close to or over the removal average things moved along smoothly.
Now I will keep going and finish reviewing each chapter until I’m done and the further below that magic number I can get, the better chances I have of getting a Literary agent to look closer at my work and take me seriously.
I found there was some repetitiveness and verbose sentences that were easily reconstructed to lower word count and I’m beyond happy with how BiaAtlas now reads and flows.
So for me I know that BiaAtlas is nearly done roasting. Once I’m done getting the word-count down below 120,000 I will stop, take it out of the oven and let it rest(query more agents) and serve it to my guests(Get it published).
So thank you to all that bother to read, comment and like my blog posts. I appreciate every single one of you.
— an update since I pre-wrote this post on Sunday. I have 8 chapters left and I am now 233 words below the max!! Woot woot! Now to keep going, the rest is just gravy.
My advice about not overdoing the editing.
Draw a finish line and stick to it. Know when to stop and say it’s done, potential imperfections and all. My finish line changed, I thought the turkey was done but the professional thermometer said otherwise. I adjusted and redrew my line. This time it’s firm and I’m very excited.
-Sheryl
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I wrote a book. Now what? 
I think that writing may be similar to dressage: an ongoing process of improving the details and simplifying the movement so it all flows in a seamless way. Maybe? Maybe not? But the search for perfection has to be reined in for both endeavors.
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Yes It really does need to be reined in, especially if a perfectionist is at the helm. I know this will be the last run through. Then it’s on to editing and revising the second one that is impatiently waiting it’s turn. 😉
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“reined ” in! Nice one Sheryl!
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What a delightfully creative post. Love it! ❤️
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Much appreciated 🙂
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Wonderful advice and congratulations on hitting this finish line.
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Thanks, it was a lot of work, but completely worth it.
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One question, what is a pov?
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Point Of View – First person, second Person, third person. I’ll probably post on these soon. 😉
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Oh, ok, thank you, appreciate the clarification, awesome stuff.
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Congrats on getting below the word count and nearly finished, you got this! What does the name mean? BiaAtlas? If you’ve posted about this previously I must have missed it?
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No I didn’t post it earlier. My blog posts are not about BiaAtlas I created a story for my blog posts separately by accident. It’s the name of the company in the book I wrote. Bia is the Goddess of Force and Atlas is the Titan of strength. I cant say much more than that. 😉 And thanks, it’s been a long haul to get it under the max and it is such a great feeling.
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I didn’t think you were giving us bits of your book. Was always curious about the name of your blog, now I know!
It’s a great achievement, you should be so proud, I am 🙂
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Thanks.
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Some fine examples of poorly written books are sometimes found in Kindle’s free list.
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That’s why they say “Anybody” can publish a book. I’ve spent nearly 2 years on BiaAtlas to get it as perfected as I can. Now I just need a Literary Agent…
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What’s the name of ur book? Loved the way about editing.
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The one I’m currently trying to get picked up by a literary agent to hopefully be published is called BiaAltas. Thanks for reading and commenting. 🙂
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What is the book about? In short if u can. If its not an issue kindly go through my blog and do please spare some time to share my flaws. I would be very grateful.
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A young woman with a self inflicted troubled past set’s out to discover if she has what it takes to become a hero. When put to the test she discovers she is not only strong of mind and body, but able to be more than she ever dreamed.
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Sounds very interesting. By when will it be published, would surely love to read it.
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First I need to get a Literary agent before anything else happens. I have no idea how long it will take. Months… years maybe.
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