As of today, my latest round of edits to This Darkness is Mine is complete. COMPLETE (YAY ME!)
The next step is underway, and that'll take me through to the end of August. In September, there will be another round of conscientious edits (and wrangling I'm sure).
From there, there really won't be anything left to do but seek a literary agent.
I've tried writing novels based on dreams, and I had zero (repeat ZERO) knowledge of plot, craft, style, arc, character development. I mean, I'd read books that I either enjoyed or didn't, but I didn't have the slightest idea that storytelling is an art with a structure.
This is the furthest I've ever come to completing a manuscript, and it's almost impossible to put the feeling into words, which of course makes me wonder if I'm a writer after all. Words are supposed to be my thing.
Again, I can't say enough good things about the writing community on Twitter, which reminds me. I hit another milestone - 10,000 followers last Saturday. I think that was June 8th, so I'm gonna write that down. Hello LITERARY AGENTS and PUBLISHERS, I have a social media platform with 10,000 followers!
Before anyone thinks I was born with persistence, I probably was, but parents don't particularly care for persistence in little kids because little kids only want what's no good for them. After I acquiesced my persistence, I gave up often. Now I can say sticking to something, even at my own pace, is in my power. Personal power is worth holding on to, and if you've ceded any along your journey, reclaiming it is possible.
With that, I'll leave you with two recommendations for developing good habits:
7 Habits of Highly Effective People (who doesn't want to be effective?)
Think and Grow Rich (it's really that straightforward)
Thanks for stopping by. That's all for now.
Make someone else's day magical!
Mackenzie
This is incredibly exciting! You’ve done something really special in writing a book. Keeping true to yourself and finishing something important to you! I’m so very, very happy for you!!
ReplyDeleteDizzy, I declare you AMAZING OFFICIALIS!
DeleteMackenzie
This is awesome! I'm so happy for you! By the way, how did you build your twitter platform? Do you do a bunch of follow sprees? What's the best way to interact with your followers? I'd love to learn from you :)
ReplyDeleteThank you Fayren! I started off last July tweeting links to my blog posts. Then I jumped on some blind follow trains, only to be *cough* bored with people's pop culture tweets. In December, I got wind of Steven Viner's follower train for the writing community. Since I had nothing to market or promote yet, I just started asking people questions about themselves.
DeleteI searched out the mental health, mental illness, and bipolar communities and had great conversations with people.
Once I was following about 500 people, my feed overwhelmed me, so I categorized tweeters into lists, mainly by genre. For awhile, I retweeted new followers' pinned tweets w/ a copy/paste of their bio to introduce them to my existing followers. I can't do that for everyone anymore.
On Follow Friday, I started doing genre-based follow trains so writers could meet peers and colleagues. I still do that. If there's no interaction, I just tweet into the thread, "Where is everyone at in the writing process" and they start talking.
It's all engagement and some transparency.
That's my big secret to building a twitter following. Asking nonintrusive but revealing questions and then listening to the answers and keeping a conversation going are the most important keys.
Regards,
Mackenzie