A Writer’s Life (Part 4)
I love to write. Look at this little blog-thing I’ve got going on here. It’s another thunderstorm-y summer afternoon in Florida and I could bore you to tears with everything going on in my head, but I’ll save those tidbits for a future writing. I love to write everything down; my to do lists, lists for shopping at Target, which web sites to look at, new story ideas, phrases I would like to use in a story. It goes on and on.

After I signed the publishing contracts (@geemorganpublishing) for “Beneath the Surface” I thought I was on easy street. Of course, the first thing I did was turn back to one of the romance manuscripts I had begun writing. It was a giant relief to go from writing a story so personal and heart-breaking to a story of two people who meet and fall in love. I barely had a few words on the page when I was sent a questionnaire about my cover design for “Beneath the Surface.” I’m a visual person and all my kids happened to be visiting that weekend so it became a game for all of us. Unanimously the book cover was chosen and I returned to my happy love story. (As a sidenote being a first time author I thought choosing my cover first seemed strange. Maybe not strange, just unexpected. However, those who designed the cover took the concepts from my manuscript and put it in one picture. That picture became my cover, the focus for my edits, rewrites and first marketing strategies.) Just as I was starting to get comfortable in the land of romance BAM! came my first set of edits! It wasn’t too bad. I handled it, but with some technological difficulties. Then came the second set of edits and that is when we (@geemorganpublishing and me) discovered the reason the editors and I were having difficulty seeing each other’s comments for the edit is because I was writing from a tablet not a PC. To progress further with “Beneath the Surface” I needed to dig deep between the surfaces of my pockets and under my couch cushions for immediate cash to buy a new computer. There was a quick trip that evening to find a new computer so I could complete the editing process. It was around that time I faced the fact that I would not be writing anything else until “Beneath the Surface” was published. As each edit came I wanted to read my story less and less. Not because it was terribly written or boring. Imagine taking the worst parts of your life and playing them over and over again. That is what it was like for me re-reading my book. I was always glad to make it to the end. Although I knew how it ended I still cried tears of joy, reading about my children and the memories we have made. Through all of this, there was another good idea born.