About Writing My First Novel, “There Is No Mercy Here.”

About Writing My First Novel, There Is No Mercy Here

I would do it again, and I love my crazy book. Having said this, I’ll add that doing this, with no training or mentors, has been uphill, then sliding down on my ass, getting back on the wagon, and uphill again. The truth about me is that I am most likely the most stubborn person alive. My book will be finished. My book will be published, or I will die trying. Does a little drama add to the emotion?

The greatest obstacles, when looked at from my end, have been software and internet interruptions. They have issues comingling. Just yesterday, I sat and worked for 15 hours, including the necessary breaks. The long stretch was meant to compensate for the 16-hour blackout from the previous day. Then, last night at about 8 PM, as I rushed to the finish line, another blackout left us in the dark for about two hours. Early this morning, I rushed to finish last night’s work thinking that the editing would stand at about 98% finished. 

As I’m smiling and celebrating that my goals are being met, I notice that the editing from the past three days has been deleted or just not saved! I’m on it. There is no other way out but damn. 

Google.docs had been wonderful until it decided to eliminate page numbers and links to chapters. This document is 150k words long. I wrote to Google often asking for assistance. No luck there. About two days ago, like magic, the pages appeared numbered. I may have to move to Word for future books. It’s immoral to ask beta readers to navigate through an electronic book with no page numbers. Of course, I have no shame and did ask anyway.

Grammarly, the editing software, is a 7. A writer has to use it, but you need to keep a close watch because it interprets what it’s programmed to do. I watched, fascinated, how Grammarly argued with itself about the use of a comma or a semicolon or this word versus another. It has many mindless suggestions. Writers have no reason to fear AI. It’s a tool and nothing else. 

No matter what I do. How hard I work, my published book will have a typo somewhere hidden to ridicule me for daring to write this book. I shall forgive myself. If I were perfect, I’d be Goddess, and that’s ridiculous. So now I play catch the typo until I give up and move on to the rest of the process of getting this book published. Will anyone read it? I hope so because it’s a great story. I’m not tooting my own horn. To quote Stephen King, writers are secretaries taking dictation of the story they are being told. I cannot claim to be the originator of this story. It is a message from the future. If you think I’m kidding, read it, and tell me. 

I’ve been cranky; I’m a writer. I’m allowed. Hugs and kisses, Mercedes, who dared!!!

Thank you for reading.