After giving myself Wednesday off to celebrate the arrival of fall, I got back to work yesterday, reading through the whole book in one day. That’s the best way to spot things like repetition (where a character says more or less the same thing multiple times or I use the same description repeatedly) or continuity errors and contradictions. But I did take advantage of our lovely weather by putting the manuscript on my tablet and sitting outside to read it.

I may want to tinker with the ending, but this book won’t require massive rewrites or revisions. I did have some repetition, with the same information conveyed multiple times. They’re talking to different people, so in reality might have told the same story more than once, but I can trim it or reword it so the reader won’t have to read it over and over again. There are also a couple of things I need to set up better. Otherwise, it’s mostly an issue of editing. I was weirdly sloppy in this book. Usually even my first drafts are pretty tight, without a lot of typos. But there are typos galore in this, as well as some repeated or skipped words. I guess I got excited and my brain was going too fast for my fingers. I also found at least one case where a character’s name that was changed didn’t get changed. I’d forgotten the original name, so in reading I had to wonder who that person was supposed to be before it finally dawned on me.

Now I’m doing my editing pass to tighten and polish the book. I’m still hoping to have it published before Halloween, since it’s kind of a Halloween book.

My “yay, I finished a draft” present to myself was a new hoodie. My fall “uniform” is generally a tank top and a hooded sweatshirt, but every year I find myself wishing I could find a lighter weight one, like maybe made of t-shirt material instead of fleece, so it’s just enough to cover my arms without adding a lot of weight but easier to take off when I get warm than if I actually wore a long-sleeved t-shirt. I’d done some searches at places I usually shop without finding anything and mentioned this on Twitter. Someone suggested a particular brand, and while they didn’t have anything, I tried a related brand and scored a jackpot. Even better, Amazon carried this item, and I have free shipping and a gift card, so it was essentially free. And it was in a local warehouse, so I got it the next day. It’s rather ridiculous how happy this one item has made me, but it’s perfect for a chilly morning out on the patio, then I can take it off when it gets warm. It’s actually a bit lighter and more open a weave than t-shirt material, which makes it perfect as a layering piece in semi-warm weather that changes a lot throughout the day.

We won’t get into how many hoodies I own now. And I’m trying to resist the temptation to get another one of these in a different color.