Beginning the After Action Review

Whenever we completed a mission in the military we would perform an AAR or After Action Review. This would be a lessons learned session where everyone would get to talk about what went right with the mission and what went wrong. Although I'm still in the midst of self-publishing my novel, I think I can provide some AAR points on my efforts. Ergo, I am going to start having a series of posts on self-publishing lessons learned that way others who might be considering this option can learn from my mistakes and foibles.

It's Never Truly Complete/Edited

Toe the Line (here) was edited several times, and proofed twice. Despite that I am still finding problems in the text. Just last weekend I took my cousins marked up copy and inserted her edits. Far more than there should have been. The lesson learned here is DO NOT use multiple platforms for editing. I went from Kindle to MS Word and back to printed copy to make my edits. It was ridiculous, confusing, and I would swear it made for more problems than there were in the first place. Pick one (preferably paper) for that final edit and stick with it. Get a hard copy of your novel prior to announcing a release and have a trusted reader mark it up.

One of the editors recommended that I print it out and read the book out loud. This is just plain silly. Who reads a book out loud? My readers won't. I should have taken another few days, printed out an advance copy from Createspace (here) and read it as I expected my readers to read it. Next time I'll know better.

AAR Point #1 - I was way too fast in thinking that my novel was complete and completely edited. Won't make that mistake again.