Words About Writing

Whew! Bought a printer last week. I had already hand-written enough to knock almost 20 pages off the print job, but what a relief to be able to print out the bulk of my manuscript. As of this morning, I have finished reading through the whole thing. The steps I am following for this first revision are: Write my original intention/goal for the first draft. Read the entire first draft (in a different format from how I entered it - handwritten and in print). Read it, stopping only for general, broad-stroke notes, not nitpicking. Write a synopsis of the story I just finished reading. Use the original intention, the notes, and the synopsis as a starting point for the second draft. Personally, after writing the synopsis, I re-read it, then highlighted bits of the synopsis that I think could be bigger plot points. Things that I recalled as I wrote the synopsis, but that seemed downplayed in the actual manuscript. Sidenote: The first step to this process that I followed seemed unne...

I'm at the point of revising the first draft of a book I wrote last summer. This was the first work of fiction I attempted, and it reads like it. Haha. That's why we edit. The problem is that I don't have a printer yet. I moved last summer, and gave my bulky, heavy printer to friends who had helped with the move. I don't need one often, so I thought I'd see how long I could go. For this first revision, I'm following advice of many writers, who suggest printing out the whole thing, re-reading it to familiarize yourself with the story - this is assuming it has been sitting on a back burner for a while - and then tackling major issues first. Well, I can't seem to find a print-shop in my new city that handles anything smaller than giant advertising banners. Also, every electronics store I've checked out seems to be focused more on TVs and cell-phones. I guess I need to track down how people get their computer needs met here. Maybe the computer places a...

I'm having some difficulty getting this website set up as I would like. There will be a profile photo, but the one I want to use is not Blogger friendly, apparently. I'll have to work on that. So, Hi! I'm Abigail Piet, and I write books. I have arranged my life so that my primary work is spent in writing and editing my current works in progress. (WIP) I'm working on getting published, but as we all know, it takes many rejections to get a book out into the world, so while I'm doing that, I thought it might be helpful - to myself, and maybe to others - to write about what is going on. I don't know how often I'll post here, but I do know that people who know me sometimes get tired of hearing about the process. Besides, among my near and dear ones are a few nay-sayers who don't believe any book will actually come out of me. Do you have people like that in your life? That's why this blog is up, and that's what I intend to do with it.