So, as I mentioned yesterday, my new nightmare is improving my work and losing the improvements forever. However, I found a hard copy of chapter 1 with the new text, copied it into my existing document, saved it all is good. Right? Wrong.
Sitting on the Throne of Writing (tm) and copying stuff from hard copy to electronic while dealing with a very needy cat meant errors crept into the text. What's worse, I submitted the new chapter 1 to my new online critique group without proofreading it aloud.
Basically, never do that. Before you hand your work to anyone to critique, read it aloud to yourself first. I don't care if it's 10:30 on a work night, as it was for me. Do it or you'll look as foolish as I did.
Oy, the typos. Vey, the paragraph that should have stayed where I put it.
Oh well, I'll try to do better on my next submission.
Speaking of, I got some critiques back on Chapter 4. I was pretty happy with it when I wrote it and so far everyone's been pretty positive, too. A few nits to clean up, some details need to be clarified and a little trimming needs to take place but on the whole I wish chapter 2 and 3 were as much fun to read. I wonder if the problem there is self-imposed? I decided on this 'one chapter from Jacob's POV, one chapter from Jael's POV' structure with the intent of it paying off much later in the book when we no longer see one of the character's POVs after saying goodbye. Am I limiting myself unnecessarily with this form? Or will the (hopefully minor) aggravations and travails be worth it in the end? I guess I won't know until I get feedback on the novel as a whole.
Sigh. I wish I could find people willing and able to read an entire novel and offer critiques. Ah well, one chapter at a time is what I have and that's more than I had with Smooth Running.
Sitting on the Throne of Writing (tm) and copying stuff from hard copy to electronic while dealing with a very needy cat meant errors crept into the text. What's worse, I submitted the new chapter 1 to my new online critique group without proofreading it aloud.
Basically, never do that. Before you hand your work to anyone to critique, read it aloud to yourself first. I don't care if it's 10:30 on a work night, as it was for me. Do it or you'll look as foolish as I did.
Oy, the typos. Vey, the paragraph that should have stayed where I put it.
Oh well, I'll try to do better on my next submission.
Speaking of, I got some critiques back on Chapter 4. I was pretty happy with it when I wrote it and so far everyone's been pretty positive, too. A few nits to clean up, some details need to be clarified and a little trimming needs to take place but on the whole I wish chapter 2 and 3 were as much fun to read. I wonder if the problem there is self-imposed? I decided on this 'one chapter from Jacob's POV, one chapter from Jael's POV' structure with the intent of it paying off much later in the book when we no longer see one of the character's POVs after saying goodbye. Am I limiting myself unnecessarily with this form? Or will the (hopefully minor) aggravations and travails be worth it in the end? I guess I won't know until I get feedback on the novel as a whole.
Sigh. I wish I could find people willing and able to read an entire novel and offer critiques. Ah well, one chapter at a time is what I have and that's more than I had with Smooth Running.
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