First First Draft Is Done!

My first draft of my first book is complete! I started writing in early February, after I left my day job and finished the last sentence on March 31st at 11:59pm. My goal had been to complete the first draft before April 1st, and I did it! I celebrated quietly with some Chocolate Fudge Brownie ice cream. No whooping and hollering at midnight at my house. Waking up the kids is a cardinal sin!

So onto editing! I'm planning to start my read through this weekend. As I mentioned in my post title, this is my first, first draft. So I have no idea how long the editing will take. I'm going to give myself until April 17th to finish the first round, focusing on tightening up plot lines, characters, fleshing out some scenes and cutting others. Big picture stuff. The main thing I want to get a handle on is whether I need to split this book up (almost certainly), and if so, whether it will be two or three books It's currently split into three parts, but I'm not sure I want to do three books, especially when this is part of a larger series already.

In the meantime, I'm also building out my online presence, researching my self publishing options, and figuring how exactly to launch a book! It's *almost* overwhelming, but I keep breaking things down into manageable parts, so for now, I'm not panicking. For now. Stay tuned for how long that holds.