Learning From Your Mistakes

           I promised I would talk about all the mistakes I have done with my first book and what I do differently now.
         First, I will talk about SAVING FILES~you would think this isn't an issue, but as you do edits, things get lost or misplaced. I remember making an entirely new proof of my book from an older version. I have a friend who helps me proof since I can't afford to hire someone and she is quite used to doing it so I am fortunate. Even so, mistakes get made and I made the mistake of jumping the gun on ordering my first proof. I was impatient and wanted it in my hands immediately. HUGE mistake. I ended up doing about 10 proofs! Ridiculous!
          So this time around I did a few things differently. First of all, they say just get it down on paper and worry about the edits later. NOPE! I am more careful to have all names decided and places and other aspects of the plot so I don't have to go back and change so much or find things later on. If I do something unexpected to my layout, I make a note of it. Same with any changes. I note everything now.
           To begin with I use  LibreOffice. Writer The way it is made is much less complex and the coding is not what my son calls spaghetti coding like the more recent Word is. That one was just too much for my computer to handle, the style presets kept disappearing and that blessed space between every paragraph which is set as the default was a real pain to fix.  LibreOffice Writer still has the space between but it is so much easy to do. The program isn't perfect and it does has its limitations but it is free and it works. So I can't get a default set up (haven't really tried though!) of the formatting I want however I just make the changes for each chapter before I write it. Right click on paragraph, go down to bottom to "edit style" and make any changes you want there. I put my indent at 6 and check the box that says no spaces between paragraphs, and the space between lines I want, I then change the font to the one I purchased and set the spelling to what I want and size of font. Takes about two seconds and saves me tons of headaches!  I know how to do it in Word but for some reason when I use Affinity Publisher to format the book the newer Word program just does not jive well without a lot of fiddling. I have no use for that.
        I also also call each file folder E1 or E2 or E3 and so on. This means Edits 1 or so on. This way, when I get something back from my friend done, I can check it and save it in a different spot to keep from confusing things. In all my files, I have an "OLD" folder. I don't want anything anywhere that may confuse me. LOL I am easily confused especially when I have spent hours on the computer!
         Finally I have found a way to do the edits so that I shall need fewer proofs. I send all the chapters off for my friend to look at and correct. There is often a great deal to fix and she will, of course, miss a lot. I then look it over and send them back but I found there was just too much being missed so I started doing two things. The first thing is I only use "Find and Replace" sparingly because it really can be a sucky outcome. It can change the flow and the character of the words too much. IT is handy if you think you are being redundant with some words though. Finally I have learned to skip, you just hit find again and it will move on so you aren't replacing things you shouldn't replace!
         Once you have done everything you want to do there, you then open it in a read aloud program and have it that you have the read aloud on while you follow it in your other document. You would not believe how much the mind fills in and how many mistakes you will find because you can tell when you hear it, it isn't correct! I just use a free one and not the really good ones but in time I will have that but that's for later when I start making audio books.
         The last thing I started doing is going with one chapter back and forth at a time. This means my friend does it, I copy and save it as an E2 or E3 and look it over and send it back. Just the one chapter. I don't move on until I am satisfied with that chapter! I find it means there is far less messing about once you get into formatting the book in a publishing program. I will go into this at another time.
          When you are editing, having that gallery of characters and their names makes life so much easier. Also it you get caught up in what your writing, sometimes you can accidentally put in a wrong name. It does happen but not good! lol
          There are tons of things to think about when editing and it is nice if you have someone you can discuss things with like whether that was believable or that person was too this or that for the scene. I hope everyone has someone like to help them with this part. It is the most important part of writing. I also learned that not everyone is as good at proofing as they think so never take what someone says as gospel. Check it yourself also. Lastly remember the old saying, "Too many cooks spoils the broth" because this is also true of editing.
          Oh yes, never forget SAVE<SAVE<SAVE and back things up. I didn't and I lost a very valuable gallery because the program glitched! Also never open from "recent". Go to the file and open it from the source, it will also glitch less often.
          Well, time to get back to it. Have a great time writing!