Thursday, April 25, 2013

Second Draft Done- Plans for Forward Motion


I've finished the second draft of He's The Weird Teacher- and other things students whisper about me. Somehow during the edit I added around 8,000 words, bringing the current total to about 73, 500 words. I added at least one chapter, maybe two between drafts because I remembered stories that I wanted to tell. I also found places where I wasn't clear and I needed to extrapolate more. Every writing class I've ever had tells me when you edit you're supposed to lose text, and I tried. I really did. I cut a bunch of things. I'm trying not to be precious with my words. But right now, at this moment, I've very happy with the product I have. I think it says everything that I wanted to say, how I wanted to say it. I feel like it conveys my voice rather nicely. I've got the file shared with a couple of readers, who are in various places through the book. So far I'm getting good feedback. Lots of positive comments, and helpful edits. I'm asking my readers to to double duty as line editors and content checkers. They are asked to both make sure the words are spelled correctly and punctuation isn't bad, and also be sure the ideas therein aren't insane. It's been very helpful.
I don't have a completion timeline yet. I think I need to put the text to the side for a few days, let the readers read, and let the words cook before I go back in for another pass. I have decided to go the self publishing route. The company who helped my friend Vanessa get her excellent ultrarunning book, The Summit Seeker, published and for sale looks like the place for me. The price is right, they do all the work from converting the file into an e-pub to getting it on amazon to getting paperbacks out, leaving me with little to do but promote promote promote.
That's where you come in, dear readers. I'm going to be asking for lots of help when the book is finally real. Please share it with your teacher friends, your student-teachers friends, your friends who like teachers. Post in on Twitter and Facebook and Google+. All I'm going to have for promotion is word of mouth. I don't expect to make a ton of money on this, that's not why I wrote it. But it would be nice to sell a couple to people who don't know me personally. I'd be lying if I didn't secretly hope that somehow Jon Stewart's booking people got copies of it and they decided Jon would love to talk to me. That isn't a fake interview I've conducted in my head on long bike rides as far as you know. But Jon would really like the book. That's all I'm saying.
Anyway, that's where I'm at right now. I'd appreciate anyone who likes what they've read so far linking to this blog on their stuff, especially if your circles mix with circles of people who would probably enjoy the book. Every new person is a potential ripple. If you're on the twitters I'm hashtagging tweets about the book with #HesTheWeirdTeacher.
Thanks for reading. Monday I'll post another excerpt.

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