Myths or Memories: Off to Beta Readers
I have noted on this blog that I, like most authors, spend much more time in the revision process than in the initial writing process. The second book in the Maui Mysteries Series, Myths or Memories has been in the revision process since I completed my first complete draft earlier this summer. That draft incorporated components from one of my self-published books, Something More, as well as components from my first professionally published book Pele’s Fire. I did this to move away from using extensive flashbacks in the third book, as many events in Pele’s Fire occurred simultaneously with events in Something More.
Myths and Memories now follows two different investigations as they proceeded in real time. One on Maui, led by Angela Beyers, and the other in the Mediterranean, led by a Europol agent named Emile Le Clerk with the assistance of Keone Boyd. Both investigations test the ability of those involved to follow the evidence wherever it may lead, even when certain facts stretch the investigators beliefs. They also test the personal relationships of those involved.
The slide attached is from my talk last year on Beta readers and shows my general process for revising my manuscripts in progress. This weekend, I sent my current manuscript for Myths or Memories to potential Beta readers and received their responses agreeing to take on the task. From the slide, you’ll see that once I send the draft out to my beta readers, I put it away. This provides me time to work on other things.
Often those other things involve editing/Beta reading manuscripts from colleagues. But at this time, I am temporarily caught up on those. Which means I am putting full effort into recrafting the third book in the Maui Mysteries Series, Pele’s Fire. I am currently forty-two scenes into the writing and will not break until I finish the first revised draft (usually over one hundred scenes).
This means there won’t be a lot of postings for a few weeks. But I will keep you apprised of my progress on both writing Pele’s Fire and getting Beta reader feedback on Myths or Memories. Those of you with sharp eyes will note one revision I made as I was sending the manuscript out to Beta readers. I changed the proposed title from Myths and Memories to Myths or Memories.
About the picture:
I used this slide in a talk I gave last year at WriterCon 2021. My talk that year was on the importance of having Beta readers.