On January 11, 2021, I received an email from my editor at Ambassador International with the subject line “Final Edit”. I opened it tenatively thinking there was one more thing yet to do on the book to get it ready for the next stage of the process. I was surprised and relieved to read that the editor was ready to give the book to the creative team who will design the cover. My days of revising with her were over. Yay! I was so excited I almost cried. The book that had started out with Ambassador International as a 68,000 word document had grown of the last year and a month into an 87,000 word book.
My editor helped me flesh out my characters and the town. Beta readers offered their support and excitement for the project. I wish my mother was alive to see this through to the end. Sadly she died in March of 2018, long before I was offered a book contract.
Looking forward now, I’m excited to see what the creative department will come up with for the cover art. I hope they follow my suggestions and put a woman in the foreground standing to the side with a man outside a schoolhouse in the background. At this point, I think I’ll be happy with whatever they decide as long as it isn’t a split cover. Meaning title and my name in the middle of the cover with two different scenes one at the top and one at the bottom. I don’t like covers like that at all. One consistent image will be fine as long as it hints as to what is in the book.
So now that my first romance novel is being published sometime this year, it’s time to continue with the brother’s story. His name is Harl. He meets a rejected mail-order bride at the train depot and the story goes forward from there. Stay tuned for the unfolding of his story.
Thank you for reading my blog.
Greta