Monday, October 01, 2012

Final Day of Immersion

I haven't had much free time. Except for a couple hikes, an evening visit to Boulder for dinner and a short walk down Pearl Street and dinner out last night, we've been working and working and working. I just realized we worked through both dinners, too!

Not that I'm complaining. Though might brain might be!

I've learned so much. I can't even begin to quantify how wonderful this Immersion Weekend with Margie Lawson has been. It's also a tad overwhelming.

Yesterday, we acted out scenes from our books.  We learned lots about choreography. I also learned how hard it was to straddle a moose (Maurice, the same giant moose we donated in August to the PSNEA (Norwegian Elkhound)) rescue auction.bigger than me and give it CPR!

The changes I've made to parts of my manuscript are exciting. I've been tightening and rewriting and cutting. Oh-so-much cutting, but a lot of stuff just doesn't need to be there. An example of a change I've made:

Before:  Caleb's gaze raked over her. He didn't look impressed by what he saw.

After:  Caleb's gaze slid over her as if he'd reviewed the evidence, passed judgment and sentenced her to the not-worth-his-time crowd.

The rewrite is something Margie calls amplifying. In this case it shows us so much more about character and tells us a little extra too. The POV character has done prison time and always is trying to prove herself.

Wanting to do the same thing to the rest of the pages is daunting. I keep telling myself one day at a time (cliche alert as Margie would say!) I only wish I had more time to work on this manuscript.

I have lots of pics, but without service up here they're stuck on my iPhone. I downloaded the photos via a cord. They show up in iPhoto, but not in the finder or when I try to upload them via Blogger.

Anyway, I have a few more hours before we head to the airport. I'm working on the turning point that sets things into action for the last third of the book.

I'll post the winner of my website contest tomorrow morning! I want to make the most of the time I have here!

Have a great day!