“The first draft is nothing but your ingredients. Once you have them in front of you–a beginning, a middle, an end, and all your characters–then and only then can you write your novel.”–Tiffany Reisz.

I call it my rough draft. Rough, first, whatever. I took a different approach to Battle Scars. I’d worked from an extensive outline for Keeping the Family Peace. This time, I just plunged in. I had a few lines on each of 7 cards on the corkboard in Scrivener. So last week, I finished pt. 3 (which is THE END)! (I think I’d previously mentioned I’ve broken this novel into 3 parts.) Finished!

ONE STEP FORWARD…

And you know what happens next.

TWO STEPS BACK.

Gotta love writers group and beta readers who bring multiple perspectives and their own writing experience into a critique. I love ’em. Truly I do.

The beta…