Cedric Nye!

Who is also an author of his own zombie series! Congratulations and thanks to Cedric for sharing and liking the book promo on Facebook, and I hope he enjoys the books. Also, thank you to everyone who liked/shared the promo giveaway.

Took this week off as I wanted to recharge the batteries a bit after completing the first draft of 131 Days, book 3. Work will begin on the new werewolf book on Monday,and I hope to have a first draft within 6 weeks.

Also, some folks have been asking about books and when they might be released. It’s hard to give a solid answer, as each book takes time.  Here’s a breakdown of the timeline of a book:

1–Write first draft.

2–Let sit for a few months (usually do first draft of another book during this time).

3–Go back and do second draft (repeat #2 if necessary).

4–If clean enough (ie, reads fine to me) I send out to trusted beta readers who will read and give me their valuable opinions on the book (this time varies, about 3-4 weeks).

5–Make adjustments .

6–Send book to editor (about 3-4 weeks).

7–Make adjustments as suggested by editor (about 1-2 weeks).

8–Send to proofreaders (I use 3 as of this writing, and things still get through all of us–this takes another month or so).

9–Make adjustments after each proofread (only a day or two, if that, as each proofread copy is faster to check).

10–Deliver final copy of book to formatter, which only take a couple of days, if that. Then…

11. Upload and hope to Gawd it sells.

Total time from first draft to first sell? About maybe 5-6 months.

So that’s how it goes IF all is flowing smoothly in the creative juices department. Stress about sales, personal issues, health, etc, etc, can all slow the process of creating a book down. An exceptionally long book (90K+) can drag the process down, although I’m going to try and aim for shorter novels from here on in if I can (say, 70-90K words). It takes a while, and the batteries do have to be recharged from time to time. I once told my aunt about how many words I produce in a day (on good days, 3,000-4500) and her jaw dropped. She said. “Y’know, in high school, when we had to turn in papers, I’d be counting every word, even the little words,” (ie “a” “an” the” ) which put a smile on my face.

I did the same thing when I was in high school.