Books and Babies

When a coworker returned after his wife had a baby, a group of us eagerly gathered around for a look at the pictures on his phone. Who doesn’t like to coo over photos of newborns? I think it’s because we don’t just see a squishy little human. We see potential wrapped in a tiny bundle. There lies a future scientist with a cancer cure, a religious leader who will bring the world together in peace, or a famous inventor.

It’s the same when birthing a book. On the verge of publication, we can’t help but have high hopes. Will our book “baby” be a genius and loved by all? Once the book is published and out there, it’s up to … well … social media and, God willing, word-of-mouth.

Frama-12 isn’t fully born yet. Here is the latest update:

On Valentine’s Day, I submitted the third and final round of edits to the publisher.

Next, came the Author Portal requirements, which included items such as author name, the book’s tagline, dedication page, and a sample from the book. After the last round of edits, I’d completed everything in the portal except the sample.

The excerpt didn’t have to be the opening of the novel. Just a short intriguing snippet for advertising purposes. I quickly found and submitted that sample, but in the interest of brevity, I’ll post it at a later time.

There’s a condition, during pregnancy, where moms-to-be turn forgetful and lose their minds. That same thing can happen, birthing a novel, especially when you’ve got plot points and character development taking up memory space. Anyway, that’s my excuse for going braindead when I learned my novel’s tagline missed the mark and my editor, Jo, wanted something shorter. Fortunately, with her examples, and inspiration, the two of us came up with this:

Alternate worlds? Alien armies? Summer vacation just took a wild turn.

It’s my hope that the new tagline will bring clarity to the book’s unusual title and beachy cover.

Occasionally, authors and parents have another thing in common. Coming up with creative spellings and names for their kids. Yeah, I’m guilty of that with “Frama.” Here is a short audio clip to help with a few of the unusual names and pronunciations:

And, finally, after completing all of the above, Jo sent another Frama-12 email with an attachment – the pre-galleys. I’d heard of galleys. To catch any glaring errors before it’s too late, you get a copy of the formatted text before the book goes to print.

After reviewing the pre-galleys, I only needed to cut a few words so one of the chapters wouldn’t end as a single line on the page. No prob, or, in the publishing vernacular, “easy-peasy lemon squeezy.”

After receiving my corrections to the pre-galley, Jo wrote back that the proofreading department has it now and the corrections will be back within four to six weeks. I’m not sure what comes next. Contractions? All I know for sure is the baby’s on the way!