It seems everything is a blessing and a curse. I am eternally grateful to Tim for going over every chapter, word by word, for my final edit. He is very good at pointing out places that need clarification and punctuation. But, you knew there was a but in there, didn’t you? He never read Kurt Vonegut’s quote from Man Without a Country –

“Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you’ve been to college.”

Kurt Vonegut

We continued our task at nine o’clock this morning, going over chapters fourteen and fifteen. We’ve reached the half-way point now. I listened to him a little differently today because this past weekend I attended the Florida Writers Association’s annual conference. The closing panel discussion included agents and publishers. “Don’t edit your voice out of it,” they said.

After months, and maybe years–time has become a blur–of hearing how important editing is, I was taken aback some with that comment. Writing and painting have more parallels than I realized. When a painting is overworked it loses its freshness, so too with writing. Knowing when to stop is an essential part of the puzzle.

When Tim says, “That’s not how I would have said that,” I know to say leave it. Other times it’s less clear. It will be interesting to get input from my editor when we reach that step.

In the meantime I have played around with some cover designs. All opinions are welcome.

If you don’t like either cover, please let me know that too. Of course, I may have no say in what the cover looks like depending on where this goes, but it’s fun to play with it. In re-thinking the title, my friend Laura suggested leaving off “waters.” I like that idea. Again, I may not have a say in that either.

Thanks for playing. Maybe by next month it will be in my editors hands and I’ll be on to my next book–yes, I do have another book in my head.