For reasons too extensive to go into here I am revisiting a novel length manuscript I last opened in November of 2014. This novel, at the suggestion of an agency, went through a major change in 2015 and that revised version has been the version sent to various people. Now I am taking the opportunity to go back to my original vision and use it for a different submission.

Originally, I went in for the prosaic task of turning all the underlined text into the house’s preferred format italics which required carefully reading every page of the novel to make sure I didn’t miss an instance. This led to the discovery that this earlier, longer version of the story is also before I changed the name of one of the major military ships that appear in the story, Okay, so now I am not only fixing underlines with italics but I’m watching for the old name so I can replace it with the new one.

Of course, my writing a changed over the last five and a half years, hopefully for the better, and I am finding the odd sentence where I need to massage it a little to get it to where I am today in terms of style and voice.

Then I discover an error that somehow slipped past all my earlier edits, my beta readers, and everyone else who has taken a gander at the manuscript. Reggie leave Geneva under the light of a full moon; the same night Seth in Spain is getting ready for what he hopes will be a romantic evening under a new moon. Glad I caught that one!

Still, my most common reaction to re-reading and working on this manuscript has been joy. This is the sort of book I love to read and while there are minor edits taking place, I am very happy with the prose and love revisiting my original vision.