Tuesday, February 22, 2011

What I Wish I Knew #2, Plus Gretchen McNeil's Amazing Cover Reveal, aka Two-fer Tuesday

You guys get a two-fer today (In Utah talk that=Two-for-one). A double post. A writing tip, plus a freaking awesome cover reveal! If you want to see my first writing tip, go here.

Tip first (saving the best--the cover--for last).

The delete button is your friend! Cherish it. Love it! USE it!

When I started out writing, I was terrified of deleting anything. So I didn't. And if I was forced to remove something from my MS, I'd cut and paste it at the end of the book Just In Case.

Well, that's stupid. The human brain is so awesome, if you delete something, even whole chapters, and then decide to put them back in, chances are you'll write them better than the first version. The brain is amazing. It can remember things and rewrite things better than you've ever imagined. So don't be afraid to delete.

And now, if you want to see something...


Chilling...

Haunting...

Awesome...

Yep.

And now.......... Drum-roll...................... click to see Gretchen McNeil's Possess!

13 comments:

Shannon O'Donnell said...

I think that cover is all kinds of awesome!

Tere Kirkland said...

Love this cover! Lucky Gretchen!

I'm definitely not afraid to get rid of old stuff, but I do tend to keep old versions for back up, just in case.

Great post!

Angela said...

I agree, it's an amazing cover.

Stephanie McGee said...

Friend indeed. I usually will copy and paste the entire manuscript into a new word processor file and revise that so I always have that older draft to reference. Usually where this comes in handy is if I am copying and pasting stuff to write into earlier or later scenes and lose the pasted parts and need to reference them.

Charlie Pulsipher said...

I stick stuff in another word document called Cuts. I am afraid of the delete button, but then I never look at the cuts ever again, so they are as good as deleted.

Great great cover!
Funny Stuff I Write And Draw

Matthew MacNish said...

Boy. That cover sure is beautiful.

Nicole Zoltack said...

Awesome cover!!

Unknown said...

I love the cover. Very haunting.

Jemi Fraser said...

I love my delete button! But I'm still to much of a coward to really delete - I save a bunch in old files! :)

Brenda St John Brown said...

Very cool cover. I used to keep a doc called "Other" where I saved all my deleted sections in one long document that didn't make any sense. Now I just cut. Although Ctrl Z is still my best friend. :)

Anonymous said...

Learning to use the delete button and to let go of words was the most liberating thing EVER! Nice post!

Gretchen said...

Thank you so much for the cover love!!!!

nutschell said...

I'm a word-hoarder. I keep everything. Sometimes, i find gems among the old scraps of papers. :P But when it comes to editing, I'm not afraid to cut words like weeds.