Writing Update: Final Editing and Beginning Book Two

Exciting times! The Lady of Worlds is in its final round of edits before I start shopping for beta readers (provided I haven’t secured an agent by then). Some of the edits that are coming back make me shake my head in shame because they’re so pedestrian. Duplicate words, unnecessary commas, back-to-back verbs. Then there are the edits that I just have to put my foot down because I feel they need to stay (because I am the omniscient author, of course). It’s a fun battle.

I’ve also officially mapped out Book Two in its entirety. I’ve never been successful at writing by outline before—I wrote The Lady of Worlds by knowing only the ending and beginning—so we’ll see how it goes. I’ll endeavor to remain at least accurate to what I want to happen in each chapter for the sake of progress, but I’m not going to stay beholden to a certain page number. If I need to edit later then so be it.

So far I’ve written a very rough version of the first chapter. I think I like it. It’s not what I expected at all. I wrote it before I had any clear idea what I wanted to write in my head, but I think it’s pretty decent word salad. It definitely needs refinement, but it’s a start. Croutons and olives can come later. I can’t wait to write more so that I can get to what I know will be my favorite part (which is a secret for now!).