Hi. I'm Cat and currently, I'm attempting to drive myself more insanefinish up a 130k-ish novel before the end of May. This is the third revision for this, and I'm juuuuuuuuust about willing to let an editor have at it. Maybe. Possibly. I think.

I haven't been reading nearly as much as I should be lately, but I blame the whole trying to go insane thing.

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I've been forcing myself to read more while pushing hard on the writing, but it can be tricky balancing the two.

I think 130k borders on the too-long end of the scale, but exceptions happen. (An agent talking about novel lengths.) It might be worth looking at places to tighten it, although I say this without having read the thing so I've no idea if the book actually needs all the 130k.

Either way, good luck finishing and submitting it. =)

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Actually, I know it's clocking in at the high end. The first draft was 320k, the second somewhere around 240k, so, at 130k, it's ready to be shipped to an editor.

Please note: I mean an Actual editor, NOT a publishing house editor. Meaning, someone who will tell me what's wrong, where and what can be done so it can be sent to agents/publishing houses.

I'm not stupid enough (and that's a personal opinion about myself, not a reflection on anyone else) to think that the third draft is anywhere near publishable. I think I've one or three more drafts, before that can happen.

As for finding time to read: I've found YA a lot easier to read, when writing, than anything epic. (I have GRRM to read, and several others.)

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Ahh, right.

I'm sure you already know this, but choose carefully with a hired editor. There are a lot of people who scam new writers. There are, however, some legit people who could prove tremendously helpful. I know that Jeff VanderMeer offers a book critiquing service, as does John Jarrold (who is also a reputable lit agent, but he keeps the book-doctor and lit-agent aspects quite separate and is legit).

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Yeah, I started stalking P&E a while ago, because I knew some people had to be scamming someone somewhere. (Sad state huh?)

But I'll look into VanderMeer. Thanks.

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H-Holy crap, I cannot even imagine 130k, let alone 320k. [is still trying to work her way past 2k] orz

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Well, to be fair, it was co-written at the 320k stage.

Then, my first rewrite took it down to 240k, taking out a lot of extraneous crap that we, as the writers, had to know, but the reader really didn't.

I'm still doing that, trying to get it down to about 130k.

I'm just glad that I've got more than a few reccs from P&E about who to contact for a thorough edit of this thing. All my friends have seen it, and are probably sick of it! Plus, it's at the stage where I cannot do anything else with it. Someone else needs to prod it with a stick.

I'm going to cringe when I get it back. I know it....

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