I’m in the middle of editing The Prophet Conspiracy right now. My editor (Sherrie Dolby-Arnoldy, by the way. If you write, hire her. She’s amazing, and works at an embarassingly-low price for how good she is.) sent the manuscript back with 5000 words worth of editors notes, so you know I had a lot of work to do.
When I do work for hire, or writing for my day job, it’s so easy to accept correction. But with my own work — especially with a novel like The Prophet Conspiracy, which is important to me and I love — it’s really hard to have every little detail nitpicked.
And yet, as a person whose job it is to communicate, I am absolutely bound by this simple fact: if someone didn’t receive the message I wanted to send, the fault is with me, not with them. If I want a message to get across, it’s MY job to make sure it’s expressed in a way that others can understand. If others don’t understand, I have not done my job.
If you’ve already signed up to be a beta reader, and you’re wondering where your free copy of The Prophet Conspiracy is, it’s coming. I just have a lot of changes to make. If you haven’t already signed up to be a beta reader, hurry up and do so! I need your help.