An Author's Initial Thoughts and Feelings

This is my first post on this blog, which Kevin Meath has designed to give an insider's look at the process of taking a book from manuscript to finished product. Since this is my first published book, I'm learning about this process for the first time. My initial thoughts and feelings as we have begun editing have included excitement, gratitude, nervousness, and confidence.

• Excitement - I completed the manuscript over a year ago, so it's exciting to finally see editing underway.

• Gratitude - I was thrilled when I learned that Shepherd Press had asked Kevin to be my editor. One of the elders in our church knows Kevin and spoke very highly of him. Then I did some further research and discovered that Kevin had worked on books by C. J. Mahaney, Paul Tripp, and others. My gratitude increased.

• Nervousness - As a first time author, I've been (understandably) a little nervous about what the editing process would do to my book! How close will the finished product resemble what I originally envisioned?

• Confidence - But the apprehension is morphing into confidence. As I have dialogued with Kevin, I've observed not only his expertise, but also his graciousness and kindness - and his desire to serve me as an author. There is nothing of the ruthless editor slicing and dicing an unwitting new author's manuscript to pieces! Rather, Kevin is a wise practitioner who is coming alongside me to help make this book the best it can be. He is assisting me to finetune the flow of thought in the book, remove obstacles to the reader, and make the unique selling points of the book stronger.

As Kevin mentioned in a previous post, I now need to set aside some time to work on the directed rewrites he has sent. I'm hoping to do this within the next two weeks.