Tag Archives: #pubtip

The art of knowing when to stop

I am in the thick of final, final, FINAL proofing for my next novel, The Last Dreamseer.

Somehow, I thought it would be quicker than this. I’ll explain my editing process: I’ve written the book, had writer friends look at it, revised and revised again. It’s then been to a professional editor for substantive edits (what’s wrong with the plot/characters), and revised. And then to a line editor (what’s wrong with the sentences), and revised. It’s then been printed out and read through by me, as well as being proofed by two professionals and fed through my Kindle to catch any errors I couldn’t see on the PC screen. I’ve then gone through the formatting, so all that was needed was to upload the final version to my retailers (Amazon and Smashwords).

I thought it would take me maybe an hour.

Two days.

It’s the oddest thing, but reading it through on the Amazon on-line checker made me see all manner of repetitions (and a few, plain, good-old typos) that had managed to escape all the eyes that have looked through the book so far.

Finally, it’s now done and uploaded and I’m relieved to see the back of it, if I’m honest.

Cover of Katy Haye's The Last Dreamseer
It’s beautiful … but it’s time it got off my PC and out into the real world.

Because the thing is, writing is the kind of art that doesn’t ever have to be finished. As well as checking for typos and errors, I was also aware of my fingers twitching over the keyboard, while my mind nagged at me, “Is that the right verb? Are you sure?” and “Maybe that scene would be better if it took place outside instead of in her room.”

I had to grit my teeth and stop myself making some unnecessary changes, thankful that I had a deadline because otherwise I might still be tinkering with the thing on my deathbed.

So that’s my tip for this week. If you have a piece you can’t stop messing about with, but you’re confident it is, fundamentally, fine as it is, then set yourself a deadline and move on. Publish it, if you plan to self-publish, or get it sent off to agents and editors.

And then move on to the next. Because that’s the other ‘always’ – there’ll always be another story to write.

And I can’t wait to get on with my next.

Overcoming Marketer’s Block

I haven’t blogged for a few weeks. I have a couple of good excuses – I’ve been crazy busy finishing the dirty draft of one novel and working on edits for another. Since I’m a writer, it’s good to be busy with writing.

Drowning in books

However, since I’m a self-published writer, it isn’t so good that I’ve also been silenced by indecision as I’ve tried to create marketing words rather than book words. This hasn’t only affected my blog. I spent a considerable amount of money at the start of the summer on a marketing course. It’s now past the middle of October and I have yet to put the great ideas I’ve learned about into practise because I’m not quite sure what I should say when I’m pitching myself to my ‘audience’.

I’m calling it marketer’s block. Every idea I have is instantly shot down in my head as being not witty, captivating or commercial enough, whether it’s a blog post or a newsletter article or a Facebook advert.

Book marketing

Now, I don’t have any patience with writer’s block – if you don’t know what to write, just write something. Write anything, because once it’s down on paper you can knock it into shape. I think because my marketing skills are so new (I’ve been writing stories since I could write, whereas marketing only started this year) I didn’t have the confidence to do the same.

But that’s changing now. I’m not going to second-guess myself any more. Writing a blog post, or an author newsletter, or an advert is just the same as writing a story – get it down, whatever it is. It doesn’t have to sparkle from the start, because you can always make it shine when you edit.