Pivoting

I was at 42,000 words in my new young adult murder mystery work in progress when suddenly the developmental edits (the first round of edits that are more big picture) hit my inbox for my upcoming young adult superhero novel, Superficial.

No! I was in a really good spot with the work in progress and I didn’t want to stop. But that’s life, you just have to learn how to pivot. So the next morning I wrapped up the chapter I had been working on and wrote notes for myself for the next time I got the chance to work on this project.

The day after and for the next four weeks, I worked on my developmental edits. I immersed myself back into the world of Superficial and got into the heads of my main characters (yep, there’s two of them in this one; it’s set in a duel point of view). I hadn’t looked at this book since I sent it to my publisher almost exactly a year ago. I also realized as I was making my edits I’ve grown as a writer so there were a lot more changes that I wanted to make than I expected.

I thought it would be harder to pivot but once I started re-reading my story, it all started to come back to me and I fell in love with it all over again. My debut book Does Love Always Win? will always hold a special place in my heart but Superficial is my fun book, the one that is so much different than anything else I’ve ever written and I’m really proud of it. I also don’t think there are many other books out there like this one. It’s a cross between Marvel and National Treasure with some different plot twists that I hope will keep readers engaged and wanting more.

I returned my edits to my publisher and now it’s the waiting game all over again for the second round of edits but in the meantime, I’m going to take advantage of the time and try and finish the first draft of my work in progress.