I finished the first draft of my novel last night and there are a few things that happen now.
- I'm going to put my book away for the next 4-6 weeks.
- Meaning, I am not going to read, write, revise, or ANYTHING for the next few weeks.
- I'm going to write an aspirational book review of my book.
- This is going to be a short synopsis of a potential reader who loved and understood the book.
- It's going to be just a few sentences
- It will be what I hope a reader felt, understood, and learned from my book.
- It will touch on the main theme or purpose of my story.
- Manuscript swap
- I can work with another author and we can swap books and review each other's work.
- This way I can still feel productive without breaking my book break.
- Celebrate!
- I just wrote a FREAKING BOOK - I should enjoy that and be proud of myself for accomplishing something I wasn't sure I could.
- Avoid Self Doubt / Pep-talk
- I am important and what I have to say is meaningful, I'm not less than because I didn't write the next Great American Novel, but I did write something, and that's amazing in itself.
- It's okay if I do get a bit of imposer syndrome here, but it is important to remind myself that I did something really cool. I haven't even read it yet, how do I know if it's bad or not? I don't - so I'm going to try to relax.
Those are my plans for the book for now and my tips on how to stay sane in this waiting period. More to come!