Getting it Right

I finished going through my novel, Flying Lessons, and making the corrections suggested by the editor I hired last month. When I finished doing it I gave it to my husband to look over one last time before I started formatting it for ebooks. Much to my dismay, my husband found obvious typos in it. Boy, was I annoyed.

I found this editor online. She wasn’t recommended to me by a friend or anything, but I had read positive things about her work. Why then was my “edited” novel left typo written? I don’t really know, but I’m thinking that with editors there are probably some types of books that they are able to edit well and other types of books that just aren’t their thing.

I’m not going to contact her and demand my money back or anything because she did correct quite a few things in the book that I didn’t notice. She caught some inconsistencies with the timeline and she corrected a lot of grammatical errors. That in itself was worth the money I paid her, but I won’t be using her services again.

When it comes down to it you have to find someone who you can work well with. That may take awhile. I’m just starting out really and I don’t have people that I know I work well with yet. Until I find those people I’m just trying things out and seeing if they fit. This editor wasn’t a good fit. That’s okay. I’ll find someone who is eventually.

Now I have to try to make sure this book is right before I can format it. My husband as gone through it once and corrected obvious typos. Now I’m going through it yet again to make sure it’s right.

Some people imply that self-publishing is taking the easy way out. They think that because you didn’t try to get a New York publisher you must not be that serious about your writing career. You didn’t pass through the gatekeepers so you must not be a real writer. Whatever (eye roll) …

Self-publishing can be hard. The learning curve is steep when it comes to figuring out what you need to do to get your novel on the market. I want this book to be good. I want it well formatted and as good as it possibly can be before I put it up on Amazon, Barnes and Nobles, and Smashwords. That requires going over it again and again until I’m sick of it. So that’s what I’m doing.

Being successful in this takes a ton of work. There’s marketing and social networking and all that jazz, but it starts with making the best product you’re capable of making. That’s a key first step that must happen in order to be successful. That’s what I’m doing now. I’m getting it right so that I’m confident about the book. It won’t be long now, and I’m sure it will be worth it when it’s finally finished.