Dwayne’s Comments (group member since Apr 01, 2017)

Dwayne’s comments from the Support for Indie Authors group.

No links folks.

From the magical, musical novel Rave On:

“Boys,” said Apryl. “It’s been a long day and I don’t feel like cleanin’ up blood, or takin’ no one to the hospital. Del, I’m sorry you’re in love but you don’t need to take it out on my husband. Maybe you should go home until this blows over. Lie down. Take an aspirin. It might not be too late.”

“It ain’t even love,” Lamar said. “You barely know the woman. Jesus, Del. It’s infatuation or obsession or something.”

“Maybe it’s just indigestion, sweetie,” Apryl suggested.

“I do love her.” I wasn’t sure that I was, but Lamar now had me in the mood to be cantankerous.

Opening a discussion about making maps is fine (not sure why you would narrow it to one genre) but this ventured into self-promotion and included links. Please review the rules. Thanks.

Genevieve wrote: "Off topic.

Stay on topic, please. If you want to offer feedback to someone on their web site, contact them via a PM or see if there is contact information on their website. Thanks.

Jenna wrote: "Comma after first war?"

It reads better without it.

Leah wrote: "Dwayne, It’s a typo lol! I meant “in” not “I’m.”"

Ah. So, none of us are perfect. Lesson learned.

W. wrote: "I do that as well and for the same reason: you have to see what is REALLY there not what you KNOW is there "

Yes. When read in order, I know what's coming up in each chapter and my mind flows right along with the story. Mixing things up forced me to focus and say, "Okay, where am I? What's happening?" and helped me see where the story was weak and needed some tweaking.

Ian wrote: "I felt it was of great benefit to focus just on each scene in isolation, ignoring its fit in the overall flow. "

Exactly. This project of mine is so huge it's kind of hard to see the scenes as individuals when read from start to finish as it all kinda runs together, in a sense. This way I was able to focus on smaller parts of the novel and it really helped me see places where dialogue went on a little too long (or - even worse - was completely pointless), things were over-explained, etc.

Leah wrote: "Personally, I’m worried that I’m the last 5 or so years writers have the impression they should lower the bar on “perfection.” "

This line confuses me. I'm not sure what you mean.

What could possibly go wrong? Cliched. I've seen it in far too many blurbs. Plus, I have absolutely no idea at this point what the story is, so how could I guess what might go wrong?

Paul Moore is dungeon to the Demon Nyka – if he uses magic, the demon gets out and the world is destroyed. so his business as a demonic broker is... broke, and now the mayor of Barrowhurst-under-Helltide wants him to supervise traffic enforcement by the supernatural, a new disaster opportunity brought to you by Mickey “Short-Cut” Twitch, boyhood friend, arch-nemesis and practising moron. Holy Moses. *rubs eyes* That hurts. I was lost at "Paul Moore is a dungeon" and then it just goes on and on with this long run-on sentence. I'm not sure - is Paul Moore a man or a dungeon or somehow both? And this demon has the power to destroy a world, but not a man or a dungeon. Okay... Totally lost at this point and frankly would be scrolling on to find another book. If I can't follow the blurb, I will be helpless with the book.

And Paul has his new girlfriend, the beautiful uber-witch Simone, mistress of the dark arts and trainee human, keen to explore the extremes of relationship intimacy and chariot racing. Sorry. All I'm getting is "there's a hot babe in my book". What is her role in the story?

Enter the Moore Traffic Plan (because no-one trusts the Twitch name), fully functional, perfectly safe, highly efficient. Except Mickey Twitch always cuts one corner too many, and there’s a prophecy of exploding barrows, one-handed men and the imminent end of the world. So, no pressure. I'm lost again. This seems like a lot of inside jokes about Mickey Twitch. I have no idea who he is.

All Paul has to do is defeat a demon-slaying ancient evil, rescue his girlfriend and stop Mickey, all against impossible odds. Oh, those pesky ancient evils. This is Simone's role, then. Damsel in distress. Okay. Your earlier mention of her indicated she might be more than that.

Forget the paving on the Road to Hell, the Demon Nyka is offering a shortcut called Temptation: Become my priest, little mortal, take the deal and together we can do magic safely...

It feels like there is a story here, maybe a really good one. There's just too much info being tossed out all at once. Focus on the main plot of the story. Don't overload the reader with details.

So, that round of editing ended a couple of days ago and seemed a success. The first few chapters feel tighter, now.

For those wondering - putting it all back in order has not been an issue!

And for this round of edits, I hunt down all those pesky words that are sometimes overused or plain useless - that, just, and, very, then...

Sometimes the very things that cement a bond between two people can drive a wedge between them. Doesn't really tell me anything.

Especially in emotionally trying times.Fragmented sentence.

Tabitha and Milt have been through a lot together. Travel to the future, family issues, a new baby.So far it's all really vague and I'm having trouble finding anything with which to connect.

They each deal with it in very different ways and Tabitha starts to feel alone in her struggle to accept her new identity as a mother while remaining the strong, independent person she always was.Deal with... what in different ways? You haven't really said what they've been through or what issues they're having. Can you give an example of what kind of struggle she's having?

Tabitha longs for a getaway, even if it’s just a short one.Okay...

Some of us don’t handle change well.Okay... true, but again, I'm not finding much to relate to. What kind of changes are the characters facing and why aren't they handling them well?

You’ll love or hate her for her survival tactics. No. I dislike being told how I will react to a book, a character, etc. Besides... what is there to survive? She has a baby and wants a vacation.

Milt is concerned, busy with his plans to keep horrible things that he already knows about from happening. What horrible things? Still pretty vague.

He is a little concerned about Tabitha, too, but what can he do? Well, if he's only a little concerned, I'm not really interested. Seems there's nothing much going on.

Believing she will get herself over this slump, he doesn’t even suspect Tabitha’s plans. Neither do I. Why would I want to read this? You need to hook me in.

Bottom line, you have two people who have a baby and apparently there's some other stuff going on, but you're so passive about it. If you're not excited about your book, your readers won't be either. If you are excited... let it show in your blurb!

Kristy wrote: "Hi. Is it O.K. to post my new book here? "

No. It is okay to read the rules instead of just posting and letting someone clean up your mess. Thanks.

Geo wrote: "Why did you ...?"

Typos happen. Let's not pick on each other over them.

I like chapter titles, but it's a preference thing. If you don't care for them, don't use them.

Comment removed. No links, please.

1. Always!
2. I try not to rely too heavily on spell checkers, but I do at least a couple of brushings with them.
3. Have not really gotten into doing audio books, yet.
4. Heh. I'm already super sensitive about this one.
5. Yep. More or less what I'm doing with this round.
6. I kind of do something like that. Every time I start a new edit, I change the font. It really helps me see mistakes when the whole thing looks "different".
7. I hope you mean "genre". *grin* That's tough 'cause I am not a genre writer. For this work, though, almost all the betas were folks who had read some of my previous works and enjoyed them.
8. Never heard of such a thing.
10. Breaks always ruin my momentum and often cause me to abandon projects. I can't do that with this book. I need to get it done.

Hey. It's nice you wrote a book. We've all done that. Now, please be respectful and read the rules before posting again. Thanks.

The posts in question are in other groups, anyway. So, go to the posts and follow the instructions GG gave.

Or practice it. Give it a shot on the rough draft and if, by the third draft or so, it feels off or artificial, let it go.