You have NO idea how often you say something until you write a book and realize that damn, you say something a lot. You say the same thing, a lot!! I said "a bit" 113 times in an 83,500-word document that became my book "Murder Book". I decided to go through it and take out about 78 of them. I had to substitute words for the most part, but other times I just rewrote the sentence. Dang. I'm not lying when I say I had no idea I said "a bit" just a bit too often. Makes me wonder how often I say "how often".
So, in the process of editing the books now, I have a list of words that I've used over and over again, and then I go back through the fat manuscript I'm currently writing to see if I need to edit out those words. You'd just surprise yourself; try it. Try writing a big fat murder book and then go back through it page by page and take out something that stands out and makes you think twice. In "Of Kilted Pleasure" I did that for the word "favorite" and something else; it's amazing! You just never realize it until you do a find and replace on it...and you scream! UGH!!!
Well, this time will be the worst, because it can only get better from this point forward. I don't think I'll reload the romance novel. It will have to stand as it is. I may someday make it a 5"x8" book, but not right now. I'm focusing on the murder thrillers and they will all be the same size; roughly 83500 words, and all 5"x8" when they are formatted. It's about 220 pages typed in Word. It becomes about 395 pages when you format it. That's such a fun thing to do. I'm not lying.
I have decided to keep the formatting large until it's time to make it into a book for uploading. I made the mistake of formatting Murder Book too soon, and then I couldn't go back to the larger pages. I had to work on a smaller scale. I won't do that again. I also won't repeat myself too often, because every single chapter that I finish, I will go back over and check it for words I used too often. In the end, I'll do it again to be sure I can get all those strangling word sets to be open, fluffy, more interesting, and entertaining. I love the fluff and stuff stage. I actually did most of the fluff and stuff as I worked each chapter this past time, and I'm noticing that I'm doing it again in Pinball.
It's sort of odd to realize that I'm writing and fluffing at the same time, but then again, I can always unfluff too. I did that with Murder Book, twice in fact. I'll end up putting the bits I took out of it into Pinball. Why not? They are sequential to a degree. Most of the thrillers will be sequential and that way a reader can pick up one and go to the next, I'll even say which books I've written so they can go back to the beginning, but right now I've only written one. LOL...you do have to have at least two to do that.
Also, please remember, when you read a novel, be it romance, murder, storytelling, or whatever, it is a work of fiction and the writer is using regular or relaxed language. It is not an essay that will be turned in for a grade. There will be non-words, there will be poor grammar, and there may be misspelled words if you're reading one of my books. I also have a habit of saying things differently, and people email me to let me know how wrong I have been. I love it. Yeah, no need to do that!
I was in training for a week to learn how to write Auto claim estimates; mostly hail and collision. I didn't have a chance to write anything on the second murder novel, but I did get some really good ideas as to some of the behaviors I may install into some of the lower or lesser-developed characters. I won't say what I want to say, but I will put it into my next novel. I actually have a t-shirt that reads "Be careful, you could end up in my next novel" and .... yeah; they will.
That's about it. I need to get my dinner ready, come back, and maybe write on the next book. The last thing I remember Nick saying to Fergy was that he wanted more of that old-time religion because he was fed up with the way parents let their kids run the household; not Eogahan...no, he's got it under control. He must be talking about someone in his mom's neighborhood. If I don't keep an eye on these characters they start talking, and when they talk they make plans. When they make plans, they take over my keyboard - - before you know it, I'm throwing a party and everyone is invited. It happens.
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