I couldn’t sleep till 2:00 AM last night. My mind couldn’t relax. I was thinking about the project. Which meant I woke up late in next morning. The day I was expecting the ‘chaos’ to happen. It did.
First, our nephew and niece dropped in early in the morning. Then my daughter and son-in-law came from Melbourne unannounced. Melbourne had just life the lockdown and people were allowed to drive out of the city if they were in the ‘hot-spot areas. Our kids decided to pay us a visit.
I was planning to finish writing by end of yesterday. I was hoping to reach a 20K word count knowing that half of it will be edited out. I only managed to reach 17K yesterday. Not only I hadn’t finished writing the chapters but there were lots of gaps in all the chapters.
Editing the first chapter
I decided to start working on the first chapter. If I could fix the first chapter and establish the right voice and tone, I should be able to fix the rest relatively easily.
I used every bit of spare time to work on it. Fifteen minutes here and there. Before the shower, after lunch, before afternoon tea. I deleted heavily. The word count kept on going down, making me anxious but I wanted the first chapter to be tight. It is a short book after all. I couldn’t afford to waffle.
I was done by evening. After dinner my daughter did beta-reading. She liked it.
I never felt so much relief. If she liked it, that means it wasn’t bad.
She helped me fix the typos and I had one chapter near completed. She raised a few questions which I decided to address in the end.
After everyone had gone to sleep, I worked till midnight. Researching and filling some gaps. I was too tired to do editing.
I know I am behind. But there are two consolations. One, the cover is done. Second, I have my daughter here for the next few days. Which means I have a free beta reader and proofreader.
Read the previous posts to catch up on the story of writing an eBook in a week.
I Am Writing An eBook In A Week
Day 1 — Writing An EBook In One Week
Day 2 — Writing An eBook In One Week
Day 3 — Writing An eBook In One Week
Day 4 — Writing An eBook In One Week
Photo by Anna Demianenko on Unsplash