Sandy Nathan's YOUR SHELF LIFE

The Kindle version of Numenon: A Tale of Mysticism & Mystery is available and priced at an unbelievable 99 cents! Here’s a link to Numenon on the Amazon Kindle Store! Am I crazy? Like a fox! When I last looked, Numenon was #8 in Religious Fiction (closing on The Shack), and #1 in Mysticism in […]

“SANDY, I’VE GOT A REAL BONE TO PICK WITH YOU,” Roberta said, sounding peeved. She’s my cousin from Missouri. We were on the phone. I hadn’t talked to her in ages. “WHEN YOU SENT ME YOUR BOOK, I LOVED IT. I STUCK MY NOSE IN IT AND DIDN’T STOP READING UNTIL I WAS FINISHED. YOU […]

I asked my editor: I just started the rewrite of Mogollon, and counted the words in its multitudinous files. 240K words. Arggh! I thought I had it half rewritten. Any tips?

Melanie Rigney (Editor for You): Yes

1. Identify your protagonist.

2. Identify where he/she is at the beginning of the book… and where you want him/her to be at the end.

3. Identify the crisis/turning points in the book that the protagonist faces (and wins or loses) within the book.

4. Identify the antagonist, what or who is keeping the protagonist from getting what he or she wants.

5. Consider all your secondary and tertiary characters. If their subplot does not tie into the ultimate and satisfying ending, cut them and the subplot. (Remember Mme. Mercier’s life story [which appears in my new sci-fi that Melanie just edited], and how much better Angel [the sci-fi manuscript] read once it was gone?)