Any tips for editing the novel-length manuscript? So far I'm taking it scene by scene. First I read through, correcting any errors I find and making changes that make the prose flow better. Then I think about what that scene is doing there, and if it serves its purpose, and if there's anything I can cut, since I need to lose about 25,000 words to get this puppy to marketable length. And at some point before I ship it out, I'm going to need to do a big fat continuity read, since I'm sure it's got all the glitches you'd expect in a book that took two years to write and was written out of order.

Probable cereal...

Interesting tidbits from conference:

Among the speakers, we had local category author Jane Porter, who submitted for 17 years before getting her first sale, and also local but very big-name historical author Julia Quinn, who sold her very first novel. The odds are overwhelming that I'll be somewhere in the middle, but such is my hubris that in my vain little heart I believe I'll be closer to Quinn. (Porter started very, very young--she submitted her first manuscript at 19--and it sounds like she made every beginner mistake in the book in both craft and dealing with the publishing industry.) Anyway, I found it encouraging both that you really can get a hit your first time out, and that dogged persistence and patient practice of the craft can pay off.

I'm also feeling cautiously optimistic about my pitch to the Avon (Harper imprint) editor. When I'd finished, she said it sounded like a very good set-up and asked if it were serious or light. I said it included some humor, but overall was on the serious side. She said that was good, because they had quite a few light/humorous Regency authors, and she thought the line would benefit from more variety. And they ask for three chapters and/or 100 pages, which I think is enough to show off my good qualities.

Susan, you need someone to read it top to bottom and suggest as they go.

Is that the sound of someone volunteering to have a fat 125K-word manuscript file in her inbox?

Susan, if it isn't the sound over there, it most DEFINITELY is the sound over here. I love regencies, LOVE them. I don't get to read nearly enough good ones. I catch the most egregious historical errors, but generally don't mind smaller ones if they're in the service of a good story.

Please? Profile address is good.

Susan, I don't have Deb's writing credentials, but I have plenty of time on my hands. I would be happy to read the manuscript and offer you some feedback.

You can send it - I certainly intend to read it. I don't know that I can get it done with the speed you want, though.

Thanks, all. I'll send it as soon as I've polished the scene I'm currently working on. I just moved a bunch of stuff around in such a way that it won't make much sense without some new transitions added in. Let me know if a seriously big, fat Word file is a problem, and I can break it up into several chunks. And deb, even if all you have time to help with in the immediate future is the first 50-100 pages, that'd help a lot for the editor and agent who are getting partials, and would also help me make a good first impression on your friend.

On second thought, I'll send y'all the pre-edited version, since figuring out how to rejigger the backstory is going to be the work of more than fifteen minutes. Just know that I plan to shift the badly frontloaded backstory from the first seven pages to somewhere later in the first chapter or two, and open with Julius walking into the library and startling Lucy. (Unless, of course, you all tell me, "No! Backstory good! Keep the backstory where it is!")

Several chunks would be easier for my computer.