Yesterday, I finished the first draft of the book I started for NaNoWriMo 2018. I’m planning on calling it Letty Rose and The Murder Next Door.

As happy as I am to finish the first draft of my second novel, I still have a long way to go. As the saying goes, your first draft is the base, editing is where you put the details.

I found that as I wrote, new and better ideas would spring up, but that I hadn’t planted the seeds earlier in the story as I needed too. I also found more conflicts that I wanted to stress than I first thought.

I also slightly changed the way that I write and my writing setup changed slightly. I was fortunate enough to get a new iMac earlier this year. While most of my writing took place on my iPad Pro and Smart Keyboard Folio, some substantial portions were writing on my iMac.

When it comes to editing, I’m not sure how I plan to do it all. Scrivener for iOS doesn’t seem to have a great editing mode on the iPad. My laptop is getting long in the tooth, but it is still usable – for now. Once the MacBook Air gets updated with the new Magic Keyboard, I think that might be my next writing machine.

Finally, while the complete novel is far away, I thought I’d put the first little bit of the book here. I don’t think that it will change much between now and the next draft. If you have any feedback, let me know!